Petition: Later MCPS school start times

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think we should operate on a 2 hour delay every Wednesday. HS students can sleep in, teachers get 2 extra hours for grading and lesson planning and meetings, older siblings can watch younger siblings in the afternoon, we don’t need any extra buses, it won’t cost the district extra money, kids can still have EC activities, HS kids can still work. The only wrinkles are that elementary school families would need morning childcare one day per week (although the same older siblings that watch kids in the afternoons would be home), and even though this plan doesn’t reduce instructional days, it would reduce instructional hours. I don’t know if we could still meet the minimum hours required. An extra 2 hours of sleep mid-week would really help HS kids.

Then another group will complain about learning loss. It will be like DL all over again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still haven't seen anyone who supports changing the bell times respond to the fact that many high school students have after-school jobs, and many others look after their younger siblings after school. Are people saying we should just ignore the needs of these families?

No one is saying we should ignore any needs. But they are saying that concern shouldn’t be a primary focus/priority for a school system that allows it to overrun student academic and health concerns and data.

After school jobs exist from 5-9. Additionally, students can buckle down so they get graduation requirements done by Junior year, such that they can have a half day schedule with work for Senior year.

Looking after siblings after school is a community problem not a school district problem. The county (ie DHHS and other departments) should partner with recreation, boy and girls clubs, non profits and the school district to provide after school programs. These could last for one hour maybe two. In some where needed they could provide school buses. This would allow these kid to get home at the same time as the HS kids.

All decisions and changes impact people. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t occur. It means you solve the issues and address the concerns raised.

Perfectly said

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still haven't seen anyone who supports changing the bell times respond to the fact that many high school students have after-school jobs, and many others look after their younger siblings after school. Are people saying we should just ignore the needs of these families?

No one is saying we should ignore any needs. But they are saying that concern shouldn’t be a primary focus/priority for a school system that allows it to overrun student academic and health concerns and data.

After school jobs exist from 5-9. Additionally, students can buckle down so they get graduation requirements done by Junior year, such that they can have a half day schedule with work for Senior year.

Looking after siblings after school is a community problem not a school district problem. The county (ie DHHS and other departments) should partner with recreation, boy and girls clubs, non profits and the school district to provide after school programs. These could last for one hour maybe two. In some where needed they could provide school buses. This would allow these kid to get home at the same time as the HS kids.

All decisions and changes impact people. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t occur. It means you solve the issues and address the concerns raised.

Some or maybe all of the county's recreation centers already offer an after school program for dirt cheap or free for lower income households. A school bus takes the students from the school to their neighborhood rec center. If HS student gets out after their ES sibling and the HS sibling takes care of younger sibling after school, they can go to their neighborhood community center to pick up their sibling. There are ways to change bell times.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we should operate on a 2 hour delay every Wednesday. HS students can sleep in, teachers get 2 extra hours for grading and lesson planning and meetings, older siblings can watch younger siblings in the afternoon, we don’t need any extra buses, it won’t cost the district extra money, kids can still have EC activities, HS kids can still work. The only wrinkles are that elementary school families would need morning childcare one day per week (although the same older siblings that watch kids in the afternoons would be home), and even though this plan doesn’t reduce instructional days, it would reduce instructional hours. I don’t know if we could still meet the minimum hours required. An extra 2 hours of sleep mid-week would really help HS kids.

Actually, now that I think about it, the instructional hours could be taken care of by having teachers work the exact same number of days, but we can cut out the non instructional work days for teachers at the end of the first 3 quarters because they’re getting that time back by having 2 extra non instructional work hours every week.

That sounds awful on so many levels.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

I am envisioning my whole neighborhood of HS kids getting on the little RideOn that comes by our neighborhood every 30 mins.

Obviously RideOn would need to run more frequently or add buses during peak school commute times. County is budgeting a large amount on transportation. Some areas of the county are served by Metro buses too and many HS take those already. It can work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I honestly think the job/sport/childcare concerns are more difficult than the transportation concerns.

It's true that many parts of the county are relatively well-served by public transportation. For example, I'd warrant that the entire Blair zone has a public transit option, or could have one pretty easily.

But the other concerns remain. We would need a 10-year plan to get to a place where free appropriate childcare was available for every school-aged child.

County rec centers have after school care. Check with your local one. Check with your ES school find out if a school bus takes students from your ES to that rec/community center. These after school programs are low cost. Or if low income, free. Solutions do exist.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

You can't be serious. Do you have idea how many school buses serve each high school compared to the number of RideOn buses that stop near the high school within 30 minutes of start time?

Do you think buses are magical vehicles with unlimited capacity? And what about all the kids that to those schools that don't happen to be served by the bus route that goes to the school? You think there's enough capacity at transfer points and routes?

You're either trolling or you haven't thought this through. I'm not sure which.

If you think high school start times should be later (which maybe you don't, who knows), then you have to provide solutions for how kids will get to and from school without expanding school bus transportation.

Existing public transportation is one of those solutions. Not the only solution. Not the solution that will work for everyone everywhere in the county. Not the solution that would allow MCPS to say: starting next year, all schools start at 8 am, and we expect everyone to take RideOn/Metrobus/Metrorail to school!!!! But ONE OF THOSE SOLUTIONS. Why are you disagreeing with this? It's ALREADY one of the transportation solutions for MCPS kids, but here you are saying no no no no unpossible no.

In fact, MCPS should be doing it already, regardless of school start times.. It makes no sense to expend more public funds on a separate, parallel school bus transportation system, in places where the public bus transportation can serve the purpose. It's wasteful of MCPS money and Montgomery County money, and it's also bad for the environment.

You're the one pushing for a later start time, but you haven't proposed a plan to accommodate it. As you suggest, public transit could play a role in that, you haven't even acknowledged the challenges there, much less proposed plausible solutions to them?

Do you live inside beltway? Density and school locations would make it very hard to meaningfully integrate school and county bus operations. A very large number of kids need to get to specific places at specific times. And while the times line up similarly to when adults need to begin their commutes, they're going to different locations than where the kids are going. So for coverage, capacity, and routing reasons, you'd need a lot more buses and routes. Only many of those would only be needed at specific times of the day. And that what the school bus service already does.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

I am envisioning my whole neighborhood of HS kids getting on the little RideOn that comes by our neighborhood every 30 mins.

Obviously RideOn would need to run more frequently or add buses during peak school commute times. County is budgeting a large amount on transportation. Some areas of the county are served by Metro buses too and many HS take those already. It can work.

You seem oblivious to the scale. School buses carry many, many more riders each day than RideOn. They're vastly different systems that need to be optimized for different problems. There's little to no efficiency that could be gained by integrating those services.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

You can't be serious. Do you have idea how many school buses serve each high school compared to the number of RideOn buses that stop near the high school within 30 minutes of start time?

Do you think buses are magical vehicles with unlimited capacity? And what about all the kids that to those schools that don't happen to be served by the bus route that goes to the school? You think there's enough capacity at transfer points and routes?

You're either trolling or you haven't thought this through. I'm not sure which.

If you think high school start times should be later (which maybe you don't, who knows), then you have to provide solutions for how kids will get to and from school without expanding school bus transportation.

Existing public transportation is one of those solutions. Not the only solution. Not the solution that will work for everyone everywhere in the county. Not the solution that would allow MCPS to say: starting next year, all schools start at 8 am, and we expect everyone to take RideOn/Metrobus/Metrorail to school!!!! But ONE OF THOSE SOLUTIONS. Why are you disagreeing with this? It's ALREADY one of the transportation solutions for MCPS kids, but here you are saying no no no no unpossible no.

In fact, MCPS should be doing it already, regardless of school start times.. It makes no sense to expend more public funds on a separate, parallel school bus transportation system, in places where the public bus transportation can serve the purpose. It's wasteful of MCPS money and Montgomery County money, and it's also bad for the environment.

County has released budget. $ for transportation. if RAPiD bus type (I think it is along Route 29) is working, offer that in other areas of county. Do not get rid of the school buses. The RideOn-Metro and yellow cheese buses can and already do co-exist. Point in transportation issues do have a solution. Childcare is provided at community centers. Or expand in-school after care programs. There ARE solutions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

You can't be serious. Do you have idea how many school buses serve each high school compared to the number of RideOn buses that stop near the high school within 30 minutes of start time?

Do you think buses are magical vehicles with unlimited capacity? And what about all the kids that to those schools that don't happen to be served by the bus route that goes to the school? You think there's enough capacity at transfer points and routes?

You're either trolling or you haven't thought this through. I'm not sure which.

If you think high school start times should be later (which maybe you don't, who knows), then you have to provide solutions for how kids will get to and from school without expanding school bus transportation.

Existing public transportation is one of those solutions. Not the only solution. Not the solution that will work for everyone everywhere in the county. Not the solution that would allow MCPS to say: starting next year, all schools start at 8 am, and we expect everyone to take RideOn/Metrobus/Metrorail to school!!!! But ONE OF THOSE SOLUTIONS. Why are you disagreeing with this? It's ALREADY one of the transportation solutions for MCPS kids, but here you are saying no no no no unpossible no.

In fact, MCPS should be doing it already, regardless of school start times.. It makes no sense to expend more public funds on a separate, parallel school bus transportation system, in places where the public bus transportation can serve the purpose. It's wasteful of MCPS money and Montgomery County money, and it's also bad for the environment.

You're the one pushing for a later start time, but you haven't proposed a plan to accommodate it. As you suggest, public transit could play a role in that, you haven't even acknowledged the challenges there, much less proposed plausible solutions to them?

Do you live inside beltway? Density and school locations would make it very hard to meaningfully integrate school and county bus operations. A very large number of kids need to get to specific places at specific times. And while the times line up similarly to when adults need to begin their commutes, they're going to different locations than where the kids are going. So for coverage, capacity, and routing reasons, you'd need a lot more buses and routes. Only many of those would only be needed at specific times of the day. And that what the school bus service already does.

As it happens, I am actually not pushing for later start times. I am merely saying that public transportation would help the goal of later start times, for people who have that goal. I am also not advocating for the complete abolition of school bus transportation.

Why you are so invested in arguing that public transportation would not help? Obviously it wouldn't work for everybody, and yes, some changes might be required, but nobody is saying that it would work for everybody and that no changes of any sort would be required.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If hs kids need more sleep why can't they go to bed earlier?

Haha. You must not have a teen or do not understand how about teen development.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still haven't seen anyone who supports changing the bell times respond to the fact that many high school students have after-school jobs, and many others look after their younger siblings after school. Are people saying we should just ignore the needs of these families?

No one is saying we should ignore any needs. But they are saying that concern shouldn’t be a primary focus/priority for a school system that allows it to overrun student academic and health concerns and data.

After school jobs exist from 5-9. Additionally, students can buckle down so they get graduation requirements done by Junior year, such that they can have a half day schedule with work for Senior year.

Looking after siblings after school is a community problem not a school district problem. The county (ie DHHS and other departments) should partner with recreation, boy and girls clubs, non profits and the school district to provide after school programs. These could last for one hour maybe two. In some where needed they could provide school buses. This would allow these kid to get home at the same time as the HS kids.

All decisions and changes impact people. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t occur. It means you solve the issues and address the concerns raised.

Some or maybe all of the county's recreation centers already offer an after school program for dirt cheap or free for lower income households. A school bus takes the students from the school to their neighborhood rec center. If HS student gets out after their ES sibling and the HS sibling takes care of younger sibling after school, they can go to their neighborhood community center to pick up their sibling. There are ways to change bell times.

Besides the fact that county programs don't serve every school (even with buses), their capacity is extremely limited. Each location can only take 45 kids. It doesn't scale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So many decisions are made based on free transportation. Snow days, flooded roads, start times, end times. It’s ridiculous. We need to do away with school buses, boost the public buses and make decisions based on what’s best for our kids.

You want elementary school kids to get on RideOn buses alone?

Even if you limited it to HS, RideOn routes could never scale up to meet the demand before and after school.

In plenty of cities ES kids get in the bus. At the very least MS/HS kids get on the bus and train.

I have a hard time imagining my 6-year-old getting on a city bus. Actually no, I know exactly what would happen.

Regardless, let's say, as you seem to suggest, we keep buses for ES, and have MS/HS ride non-school public transportation.

How would that work? RideOn only carries 57,000 riders per day. MCPS reports 100,000 students ride the bus, typically twice per day. That's an extra 200,000 rides.

Now, obviously not all of those are middle/high school students, but you're still looking at increasing rides per day by 3-4x.

Worse, those rides obviously aren't spread throughout the day or throughout the system. Most of the riders would be going to a handful of places. But they'd need to get picked up from wider range of bus stops than currently exist. So many, many more buses would be needed. For only on some routes that pass schools, and only for a couple hours each day.

In an area of higher density housing, workplaces, and transit, this could be workable. You would expect a higher percentage of walkers. And higher-capacity rail service carrying some of the burden. But this wouldn't work in a place like MoCo.

I don't think you're familiar with how RideOn and Metrobus work in Montgomery County. You go to a bus stop, you get on the bus, you take the bus until you get to your stop, then you get off. And many of the routes have different frequencies, depending on time of day.

I don't think you understand the massive increase in resources that would be necessary to accommodate potentially 200,000 more rides each day. And high schools and middle schools aren't transit hubs in the current county bus routes.

And what about the wide swaths of the county that aren't anywhere near a bus stop?

You make this statement like increasing ridership and transit routes/capabilities should not be a key priority for a county that wants to grow and keeps building dense housing. For that matter a county that has Sustainability goals.

Except adults wouldn't be going to the same place as kids, so those new buses would take awfully circuitous routes.

Why? Most of the high schools, right now, are served by existing routes. Kids could take existing buses, on existing routes, to and from school. Which kids are actually currently doing, right now. Even middle-school kids.

You can't be serious. Do you have idea how many school buses serve each high school compared to the number of RideOn buses that stop near the high school within 30 minutes of start time?

Do you think buses are magical vehicles with unlimited capacity? And what about all the kids that to those schools that don't happen to be served by the bus route that goes to the school? You think there's enough capacity at transfer points and routes?

You're either trolling or you haven't thought this through. I'm not sure which.

If you think high school start times should be later (which maybe you don't, who knows), then you have to provide solutions for how kids will get to and from school without expanding school bus transportation.

Existing public transportation is one of those solutions. Not the only solution. Not the solution that will work for everyone everywhere in the county. Not the solution that would allow MCPS to say: starting next year, all schools start at 8 am, and we expect everyone to take RideOn/Metrobus/Metrorail to school!!!! But ONE OF THOSE SOLUTIONS. Why are you disagreeing with this? It's ALREADY one of the transportation solutions for MCPS kids, but here you are saying no no no no unpossible no.

In fact, MCPS should be doing it already, regardless of school start times.. It makes no sense to expend more public funds on a separate, parallel school bus transportation system, in places where the public bus transportation can serve the purpose. It's wasteful of MCPS money and Montgomery County money, and it's also bad for the environment.

You're the one pushing for a later start time, but you haven't proposed a plan to accommodate it. As you suggest, public transit could play a role in that, you haven't even acknowledged the challenges there, much less proposed plausible solutions to them?

Do you live inside beltway? Density and school locations would make it very hard to meaningfully integrate school and county bus operations. A very large number of kids need to get to specific places at specific times. And while the times line up similarly to when adults need to begin their commutes, they're going to different locations than where the kids are going. So for coverage, capacity, and routing reasons, you'd need a lot more buses and routes. Only many of those would only be needed at specific times of the day. And that what the school bus service already does.

As it happens, I am actually not pushing for later start times. I am merely saying that public transportation would help the goal of later start times, for people who have that goal. I am also not advocating for the complete abolition of school bus transportation.

Why you are so invested in arguing that public transportation would not help? Obviously it wouldn't work for everybody, and yes, some changes might be required, but nobody is saying that it would work for everybody and that no changes of any sort would be required.

So, if we still need the existing school bus system, and school bus system logistics prevent changing times, how would we use the county buses? And what benefit would be gained?

You refuse to actually describe what you want to see.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Loudoun County does elementary first, then middle, then HS. HS is 9:30-4:15, elementary school is 7:30-2:15.

Why doesn’t MCPS do this then? Flip elementary and HS? Works well in Loudoun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we should operate on a 2 hour delay every Wednesday. HS students can sleep in, teachers get 2 extra hours for grading and lesson planning and meetings, older siblings can watch younger siblings in the afternoon, we don’t need any extra buses, it won’t cost the district extra money, kids can still have EC activities, HS kids can still work. The only wrinkles are that elementary school families would need morning childcare one day per week (although the same older siblings that watch kids in the afternoons would be home), and even though this plan doesn’t reduce instructional days, it would reduce instructional hours. I don’t know if we could still meet the minimum hours required. An extra 2 hours of sleep mid-week would really help HS kids.

Actually, now that I think about it, the instructional hours could be taken care of by having teachers work the exact same number of days, but we can cut out the non instructional work days for teachers at the end of the first 3 quarters because they’re getting that time back by having 2 extra non instructional work hours every week.

I would support this as long as we can enforce deadlines. I would set my deadlines for every Tuesday night. Anything submitted after Tuesday night is a 0% unless the student had extended absences.

Otherwise, it’s just less time to grade the tsunami of late work that hits us at the end of each marking period.