Superintendent's Recommendation for Richard Montgomery ES #5 Boundaries

[Anonymous]

I personally think RM is performing better than Rockville in general right now.

But with exactly same pattern (when ES#5 starts), 2 ES with high FARM rate and 3 well performed ES, RM's performance could become very similar to Rockville, again that is just my own thoughts, I might be wrong.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:totally agree with above post, the ultimate goal is to have a plan to help all the kids achieve their best potential, instead of widening the gap.


you don't have to look far to see the effect of having two low performing ES in the cluster.

Rockville high school cluster is a great example,

3 of there ES achieve good performance: Rock Creek Valley ES, Lucy V. Barnsley ES; Flower Valley ES

2 of it ES are not: Maryvale ES; Meadow Hall

So what do you say has been the impact to Rockville HS as a result of having 2 ES that are high FARMS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I personally think RM is performing better than Rockville in general right now.

But with exactly same pattern (when ES#5 starts), 2 ES with high FARM rate and 3 well performed ES, RM's performance could become very similar to Rockville, again that is just my own thoughts, I might be wrong.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:totally agree with above post, the ultimate goal is to have a plan to help all the kids achieve their best potential, instead of widening the gap.


you don't have to look far to see the effect of having two low performing ES in the cluster.

Rockville high school cluster is a great example,

3 of there ES achieve good performance: Rock Creek Valley ES, Lucy V. Barnsley ES; Flower Valley ES

2 of it ES are not: Maryvale ES; Meadow Hall

So what do you say has been the impact to Rockville HS as a result of having 2 ES that are high FARMS?

BUt Maryvale and Meadowhall have always fed into Rockville and those 2 schools have always been the poorer schools out of the other feeder schools. Back in the day, Rockville was a high performing HS even with those 2 schools in the picture. Agreed, the school's performance is not at the same level as it used to be, but I'm not sure that we can claim that the reason is due to those 2 schools alone. FARMS and ESOL rates have gone up in all the schools. With RM, the FARM levels are staying the same. You have not increased your FARM rates; just that you have redistributed them.

[Anonymous]

How to redistribute the FARM rate make huge difference.

Right now, FARM kids were evenly distribute among three ES, results are three good ES and good middle and high school.

The proposed boundaries redistribute majority of FARM towards ES #5, it will really have negatively impact not only to ES#5, but to RM cluster.

There are study showed High farm rate hurts both farm and non-farm kids, resulting low performing school.
The low performing school will most likely no longer attract well educated professionals.
I do think at that point, it will be a turning point for RM cluster.


I don't know what caused Rockville performance going down, I just think similar pattern would most likely lead to similar outcome.


quote=Anonymous

BUt Maryvale and Meadowhall have always fed into Rockville and those 2 schools have always been the poorer schools out of the other feeder schools. Back in the day, Rockville was a high performing HS even with those 2 schools in the picture. Agreed, the school's performance is not at the same level as it used to be, but I'm not sure that we can claim that the reason is due to those 2 schools alone. FARMS and ESOL rates have gone up in all the schools. With RM, the FARM levels are staying the same. You have not increased your FARM rates; just that you have redistributed them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Not true! The neighborhood surrounding the school is increasing in SES. We just bought and moved in 2 years ago. The new families moving in are well-educated professionals.

I am not the poster, but you moved in Beall with 25% farm rate. Same is true for new families you saw moving in the last 1-2 years. Discussion is about RM#5 . Two different situations. Let's see how many high SES families move to a RM#5 in future if school starts with a high farm rate.


You are comparing previous buying trend from what's coming up. Twinbrook has a high farm rate despite being so close to metro it's not changing anytime soon. Reason is simple, high SES families avoid Twinbrook otherwise it should have changed with proximity to metro.

Yes. I agree with that completely

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:you bought your house two years ago when kids are going to Beall, which is a well performed school.


What we are talking about here is if the new school becomes under performed (most likely with 53% FARM rate), are those well educated professionals still be interested in moving in?

Just look at the sudden increase of the number of house on sale in the nearby neighborhood after the recommendation is out..


Again the point is we are all on same boat of the RM cluster, there is no point to perfect a couple of individual chambers while letting the boat sinking..

we should all work together for creating a better ES#5, it is really for the best interest of everybody.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The outcome for ES#5 with high FARM rate is non-poor kids family will gradually moving out the community, this is already start happening..

then there will be more poor kids in this school, which will eventually hit JW and RM.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I think what PPs are stating is that kids in the higher farms school will have a subpar education and not as ready for MS/HS compared to the other kids. By MS/HS it will be too late or that much more difficult for these kids to catch up, thus affecting the test scores (and ratings) of the MS/HS.

What is the cut off for FOCUS school to receive additional aid? Does ES#5 and Twinbrook still qualify as focus?

Also, this is just the Supe's recommendation. How likely is it that the BOE will 100% agree? Are they just rubber stampers? They are taking parental input, but is it just for show?

The likeliest outcome is that the non-poor kids at the higher-FARMS schools will be just fine. The question is therefore only whether poor kids who are currently zoned for low-FARMS schools (i.e., not Twinbrook) will do worse when zoned for a high-FARMS school. And statistically the answer to this question is probably yes, unfortunately -- but it seems unlikely to me that there are enough poor kids who will do enough worse to bring down the average scores and environment of JW MS and RM HS as a whole.

In other words, worry about the effect on individual kids, not on JW and RM overall.

Not true! The neighborhood surrounding the school is increasing in SES. We just bought and moved in 2 years ago. The new families moving in are well-educated professionals. Please stop spouting BS!

To rephrase... it is not true that non-poor families are moving out of the area. Quite the opposite. The issue is that the poverty is concentrated in subsections and apartment complexes.

You are right! I agree that we are on the same page. And yes, I've seen houses going up for sale but many of them are the original owners who are elderly and moving on. I do worry that some families may be getting nervous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Just look at the sudden increase of the number of house on sale in the nearby neighborhood after the recommendation is out..

This is a specious correlation. Houses that went on the market this week would have been preparing for sale before the recommendation came out, not decided to sell and be listed within 2-3 days.

You are right here. I don't think that anyone will put house on market within days of recommendations. I do think that all discussions taking place in the last 4-6 months had total 8 options, and RM#5 was high on farm rate in all options. There were lots of concerned parents in meetings. Some folks may have decided to move, but that's just an speculation.

Now recommended option has a even higher farm rate. If it goes through then it won't be surprising to see people moving out as long as they can afford it. Anyway, focus should be to create a balanced school. People move in and out for various reasons.

I live in the neighborhood. The houses going up are from original owners (houses were built in late 50s early 60s). We have seen a large turnover to young professional families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Not true! The neighborhood surrounding the school is increasing in SES. We just bought and moved in 2 years ago. The new families moving in are well-educated professionals.

I am not the poster, but you moved in Beall with 25% farm rate. Same is true for new families you saw moving in the last 1-2 years. Discussion is about RM#5 . Two different situations. Let's see how many high SES families move to a RM#5 in future if school starts with a high farm rate.


You are comparing previous buying trend from what's coming up. Twinbrook has a high farm rate despite being so close to metro it's not changing anytime soon. Reason is simple, high SES families avoid Twinbrook otherwise it should have changed with proximity to metro.

Yes. I agree with that completely

High SES avoid it because there is no high SES housing. Same with RM#5.

FARMS kids do not perform better in non FARMS schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RM cluster has been successfully because the current three schools are balanced, even it means some area were bused further, it is a route proven to work.

so we should follow those steps and also make ES#5 more balanced. Hollowing out the well educated professionals from ES#5 community will have big negative impact on the RM cluster.

No RM has been successful because they pulled RP out of Wootton, added Falllsgrove after promising plot owners Wottoon, building upper middle class neighborhoods like Rose Hill, and new home communities in West End. Oh and obviously adding IB. The kids in lower income neighborhoods are less of a percentage and still scoring just as low, if not lower than they were 20 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Not true! The neighborhood surrounding the school is increasing in SES. We just bought and moved in 2 years ago. The new families moving in are well-educated professionals.

I am not the poster, but you moved in Beall with 25% farm rate. Same is true for new families you saw moving in the last 1-2 years. Discussion is about RM#5 . Two different situations. Let's see how many high SES families move to a RM#5 in future if school starts with a high farm rate.


You are comparing previous buying trend from what's coming up. Twinbrook has a high farm rate despite being so close to metro it's not changing anytime soon. Reason is simple, high SES families avoid Twinbrook otherwise it should have changed with proximity to metro.

Yes. I agree with that completely

High SES avoid it because there is no high SES housing. Same with RM#5.

FARMS kids do not perform better in non FARMS schools.

Poor kids do not perform better in Title 1
Poor kids do not perform better in Focus
Poor kids do not perform better in high FARMS
Poor kids do not perform better in low FARM

Why? They are poor!! Decreasing poverty will be the ONLY thing that increase performance.

http://education.penelopetrunk.com/2015/11/02/the-best-way-to-lift-kids-out-of-poverty-its-not-education/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Poor kids do not perform better in Title 1
Poor kids do not perform better in Focus
Poor kids do not perform better in high FARMS
Poor kids do not perform better in low FARM

Bold part is not true.

https://tcf.org/assets/downloads/tcf-Schwartz.pdf

[ paper is - Economically Integrative Housing Promotes Academic Success in Mongtoemry country, Maruland ]

It's an extremely targeted report directly applicable to MCPS. If you can't be bothered to read the full report then here is summary - A kid from a poor family will do better at a low-poverty school than at a high-poverty school

[Anonymous]

Why is everyone so concerned about Beall? RP’s new stats look absurd. Talk about concentrating affluence. They should really keep one of their lower SES zones and send RP6 to CG or Beall.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is everyone so concerned about Beall? RP’s new stats look absurd. Talk about concentrating affluence. They should really keep one of their lower SES zones and send RP6 to CG or Beall.

Agree here, intentionally concentrating affluence and concentrating poverty in the same high school is not a good way to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is everyone so concerned about Beall? RP’s new stats look absurd. Talk about concentrating affluence. They should really keep one of their lower SES zones and send RP6 to CG or Beall.

RP6 includes the Tower Oaks neighborhood. Moving RP6 to another school will only increase relative FARMS rate at RM ES#5 due to losing higher income families in Tower Oaks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is everyone so concerned about Beall? RP’s new stats look absurd. Talk about concentrating affluence. They should really keep one of their lower SES zones and send RP6 to CG or Beall.

RP6 includes the Tower Oaks neighborhood. Moving RP6 to another school will only increase relative FARMS rate at RM ES#5 due to losing higher income families in Tower Oaks.

Well something needs to be done to more equitably distribute things.

[Anonymous]

Gotta love how no one cares for decades that Twinbrook sucks. Now we have another ES in a low income area and people expect the county to rezone every single school for 20% FARMS in a low income neighborhood?? LOL. The FARMS kids families don't care. Twinbrook loves their school. The FARMS kids will love walking to this brand new school in their own neighborhood. It is

The only ones complaining are the ones now going to RM#5 and aren't FARMS. Why? Because they are going to a school with half FARMS. So let's all drop the "We care about our FARMS kids! BS

What section do you all live in? Go to the board and offer to move your section into that elementary school if the FARMS means more than how far away you go to an elementary.