MCPS schools are segregated

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I find this to be very true. My dd's elementary school, 73% white. Her middle school 63% white. Her high school was 52% white. Both middle and elementary schools are still 9 on great schools, high school has dropped to 6 this year. DD just started college. And this is one of "less" segregated areas in MCPS. New town-homes and houses built in the last 2 years were sold for 500K and 800K respectively. I can't imagine that socioeconomic distribution is equal, not even close. DD had white and black friends, but very few Hispanic friends in HS. They are predominantly poor, according to dd and do not do well in school. I think this tells us that school groups are segregated within the school too. I am in favor of busing and desegregation in MoCo. Only good things will come out of it. Rich parents will still pay for their kids tutors and enrichment even if their kids are attending Einstein, rich white parents should have nothing to fear when it comes to desegregating schools and even busing. The backlash here is pure racism, nothing else. Even the most enlightened limousine liberals still get scared when they see a person of color near them. If you don't want your kids to end up racist, you need to expose them to diversity. Only hearing real life stories from kids "unlike" them, who are really just like them, like all of us,be it black, Hispanic, poor or rich, will make your kids open minded and realize the very real racial and economic divide in the country. If your kids stay in your lily white neighborhood they will end up racist, there is no doubt of that at all.

Most people do not have unlimited time and money to homeschool their kids after sending them to Einstein. Forget it. I can’t parent other kids, and my kid can’t parent other kids. Don’t have kids unless you can parent them. I was told that all the time whilst growing up.

Not sure why you had to bring Einstein into this. It’s a popular school in the DCC and about average level of FARMS for the county. Funny that you think it’s an example of abject poverty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not forced segregation.

Hispanics want to live by Casa de MD and their community housing and markets.

Blacks want to live by their churches and their communities. Same for Christian Asians. The Jews want to live by their temples.

That’s how the world works. People live by and in their communities. That doesn’t mean a 500 sw mile county in a dense and traffic ladened area totes batshit crazy with bussing and forced segregation.

Fairfax, chapter 220, NY, Others all offer optional school rankings to go if there is capacity. But you always firstly have the option of your designated community school pyramid.

This.

+10

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I remember when I started to look at colleges and my parents told me that I had to go to a school with at cv last 10% Jewish population. I didn’t really understand it until I went to college (one with a large Jewish population) and was the first Jew that many people had met. The questions I was asked, the assumptions made, and the comments I heard made me sure of one thing- when I graduated I would always love in an area like I grew up. One where I was comfortable with my religion. So, yes, I picked my home based on the location of lots of synagogues but also so my children could grow up surrounded by people that share their same beliefs. This is what redistricting is about for me. I want my white children who are minorities to be in a school with people like them. And I don’t want a far ride away from that.

+1000.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a township district that had an optional, elective bussing program: inner city kids could go to suburban schools with capacity, can suburban kids could go to specialty schools downtown, IF they elected. A Small taxpayer funded bus provided curbside pickups and drop offs, for the 40+ minute drive.

Sadly, I never saw the inner city kids’ parents at anything, even their own kids’ basketball, football games, track meets, or band concerts. Most had to catch the 2:50pm bus back or they were stuck with 90 minutes of city busses.

No community feeling there.

It was a school within a school as everyone hung out “with their own people.” Large Chinese and Vietnamese population too.

I also heard the N word on a daily basis, from the blacks. This was in the 1990a. Maybe no one says that word any longer.

The difference is those parents had to work and didn't have flexibility to take off.

No. It was time and logistics of driving in rush hour at 5pm. Remember, these were inner city moms or parents who ELECTED to be bussed to suburb schools with capacity. And they didn’t show up. Imagine if they didn’t have white collar jobs or filled out an application and decided as a family to get bussed? Really uninvolved.

Likewise, My spouse and I wouldn’t do our 5pm commute and then turn around and go one way to Kid As half done game and the other way to Kid B’s activity at the other school. What a $hit$how!!

We’ll be moving. We have lots of job options elsewhere, no need for this difficulty and nonsense in our lives or our children’s lives.

+1000.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Four pages of people explicitly defending segregated schools.

But MCPS is not responsible for housing policies. They are trying to de-segregate as much as they can by busing, much to the disgust of many parents. What exactly is the school district supposed to do about the fact there are very few low income housing in certain parts of the county? How can the school district force wealthier parents to live in the poorer parts of the county?

Heading on to five pages of people explicitly defending segregated schools...

? How am I defending it? I'm saying school districts can't do much about housing policies. And you didn't answer the questions. If you can answer that $64K question of how the school district can change housing policies, then you should run for the school board since you seem to think you have the answers.

And I don't live in a W cluster.

School districts can do a lot about school policies, though.

Yes, and the only thing they can do is busing and trying to attract more wealthier families to under performing schools by placing magnets in such schools.

And isn't this what MCPS has done and also trying to do with "busing".

That's not "defending segregation" as someone keeps stating. I'm still waiting to hear from that person to answer the question of what you want MCPS to do about housing policies that are creating the segregation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Four pages of people explicitly defending segregated schools.

But MCPS is not responsible for housing policies. They are trying to de-segregate as much as they can by busing, much to the disgust of many parents. What exactly is the school district supposed to do about the fact there are very few low income housing in certain parts of the county? How can the school district force wealthier parents to live in the poorer parts of the county?

Heading on to five pages of people explicitly defending segregated schools...

? How am I defending it? I'm saying school districts can't do much about housing policies. And you didn't answer the questions. If you can answer that $64K question of how the school district can change housing policies, then you should run for the school board since you seem to think you have the answers.

And I don't live in a W cluster.

School districts can do a lot about school policies, though.

It seems to me that people are making assumptions that the school board can control certain things which they cannot. In MoCo, housing values are based on schools. The better the schools, the higher the housing costs. Redistribute an ES with a lot of minorities to a W school and over time the neighborhoods that feed into that ES will trend wealthier and the poorer current residents will be forced out due to increasing rents. If they want more diversity in the W schools then the county should buy large tracts of land and build low income high rise apartment blocks in places like Potomac and Bethesda. I’m all for that, get low income people into the higher performing schools. I’m not for that. I’m not for creating future islands of wealth in a misguided attempt at social engineering that’s doomed to failure. It feels a little bit like the school board wants to play a game of housing lottery. I would wager some of their houses will magically appreciate from the final decision.

"The better the schools" = the fewer poor/black/Latino kids at the school = the more segregated the schools.

People who say that the school board can't do anything about segregated schools because it's all about housing are defending segregated schools.

So, what's your solution? Busing? People who keep saying that others are defending segregation by saying that it's the housing policy that is the issue are not providing answers, just accusing others of "racism".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is nothing new almost every place in the country has rich people who self select and drive up real estate prices for the "good" schools and "crappy" schools for the poors middle class is a mixed bag

Fairfax County (North West, West, SouthWest vs East/South East generally)
Montgomery County (West vs East generally)
Arlington County (North vs South generally)
Washington DC (WOTP vs EOTR generally)
Prince Georges (public schools almost universally suck, people of means go private except for a couple pyramids with you guessed it high real estate prices)

If you start messing with the rich areas and trying to break up these islands of prosperity. Guess what the rich will start going to private school en masse and you get a situation like Alexandria where the schools suck from middle school on because all the wealthy are in private school.

or even better all the entitled whiners move away which improves the overcrowding situation and leaves people who are interested in being part of the solution

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure if this has been addressed anywhere on this thread or on others, but why doesn't the county rezone certain areas and open it for development of low-income housing in the higher income areas like Bethesda and Potomac? I've heard rumors of this as an option before. For example building a low income community on the land where the closed East Gate pool is located in Potomac. I've also heard of this being explored for some of the under-utilized office parks near Montgomery Mall.

They should but cannot because of NIMBY school capacity rules.

? You mean poor people like overcrowded schools and rich people don't? Poor people are fine with school capacity over 150% but the rich aren't?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

Right! It's not the county public school system that should fix the lack of parenting and poverty! It's other parts of the county government that should fix the lack of parenting and poverty!

Or, um, something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It seems to me that people are making assumptions that the school board can control certain things which they cannot. In MoCo, housing values are based on schools. The better the schools, the higher the housing costs. Redistribute an ES with a lot of minorities to a W school and over time the neighborhoods that feed into that ES will trend wealthier and the poorer current residents will be forced out due to increasing rents. If they want more diversity in the W schools then the county should buy large tracts of land and build low income high rise apartment blocks in places like Potomac and Bethesda. I’m all for that, get low income people into the higher performing schools. I’m not for that. I’m not for creating future islands of wealth in a misguided attempt at social engineering that’s doomed to failure. It feels a little bit like the school board wants to play a game of housing lottery. I would wager some of their houses will magically appreciate from the final decision.

"The better the schools" = the fewer poor/black/Latino kids at the school = the more segregated the schools.

People who say that the school board can't do anything about segregated schools because it's all about housing are defending segregated schools.

So, what's your solution? Busing? People who keep saying that others are defending segregation by saying that it's the housing policy that is the issue are not providing answers, just accusing others of "racism".

My kids already get to school by bus. How about yours?

I support the boundary analysis MCPS has commissioned, which will examine ways to increase capacity and reduce demographic disparities by adjusting boundaries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

Right! It's not the county public school system that should fix the lack of parenting and poverty! It's other parts of the county government that should fix the lack of parenting and poverty!

Or, um, something.

As I said it's the county government with the welcome mat for illegals and adding affordable housing. Imagine a company actively trying to recruit lower performing workers. Asinine but this is MoCo for you.

Schools are there to teach period not be social workers. Have you talked to teachers they are tired of doing things way beyond their job description.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is nothing new almost every place in the country has rich people who self select and drive up real estate prices for the "good" schools and "crappy" schools for the poors middle class is a mixed bag

Fairfax County (North West, West, SouthWest vs East/South East generally)
Montgomery County (West vs East generally)
Arlington County (North vs South generally)
Washington DC (WOTP vs EOTR generally)
Prince Georges (public schools almost universally suck, people of means go private except for a couple pyramids with you guessed it high real estate prices)

If you start messing with the rich areas and trying to break up these islands of prosperity. Guess what the rich will start going to private school en masse and you get a situation like Alexandria where the schools suck from middle school on because all the wealthy are in private school.

or even better all the entitled whiners move away which improves the overcrowding situation and leaves people who are interested in being part of the solution

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

Is there any data to support this? For example, if a school goes from say 5% to 25% FARMS, do the scores of affluent kids actually fall as a result?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is nothing new almost every place in the country has rich people who self select and drive up real estate prices for the "good" schools and "crappy" schools for the poors middle class is a mixed bag

Fairfax County (North West, West, SouthWest vs East/South East generally)
Montgomery County (West vs East generally)
Arlington County (North vs South generally)
Washington DC (WOTP vs EOTR generally)
Prince Georges (public schools almost universally suck, people of means go private except for a couple pyramids with you guessed it high real estate prices)

If you start messing with the rich areas and trying to break up these islands of prosperity. Guess what the rich will start going to private school en masse and you get a situation like Alexandria where the schools suck from middle school on because all the wealthy are in private school.

or even better all the entitled whiners move away which improves the overcrowding situation and leaves people who are interested in being part of the solution

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

Is there any data to support this? For example, if a school goes from say 5% to 25% FARMS, do the scores of affluent kids actually fall as a result?

Fairfax County did a big study on this it's on board docs somewhere (too bad the search on here sucks) basically once you cross I want to say 20% or so school performance starts to go down. Once you cross 40% or so it becomes a lost cause.

I think a big things is if you have tracking or not and we all know tracking is on the way out

Think about it, if the teachers has to worry about 5 new lower performers that's time taken away from the rest of the class so I think logically performance is going to suffer.

Now most parents will supplement and kids are generally bright anyway but I think it's still safe to say having 25 top performers is better than 20 top performers and 5 kids who need lots of help. There is a reason why Title 1 exists to give kids who need extra help extra resources.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It seems to me that people are making assumptions that the school board can control certain things which they cannot. In MoCo, housing values are based on schools. The better the schools, the higher the housing costs. Redistribute an ES with a lot of minorities to a W school and over time the neighborhoods that feed into that ES will trend wealthier and the poorer current residents will be forced out due to increasing rents. If they want more diversity in the W schools then the county should buy large tracts of land and build low income high rise apartment blocks in places like Potomac and Bethesda. I’m all for that, get low income people into the higher performing schools. I’m not for that. I’m not for creating future islands of wealth in a misguided attempt at social engineering that’s doomed to failure. It feels a little bit like the school board wants to play a game of housing lottery. I would wager some of their houses will magically appreciate from the final decision.

"The better the schools" = the fewer poor/black/Latino kids at the school = the more segregated the schools.

People who say that the school board can't do anything about segregated schools because it's all about housing are defending segregated schools.

So, what's your solution? Busing? People who keep saying that others are defending segregation by saying that it's the housing policy that is the issue are not providing answers, just accusing others of "racism".

My kids already get to school by bus. How about yours?

I support the boundary analysis MCPS has commissioned, which will examine ways to increase capacity and reduce demographic disparities by adjusting boundaries.

As stated, we don't live in a W cluster, and yes, I support the boundary study. It still doesn't explain how stating that MCPS doesn't control housing policy, which is really the cause of the segregation, means that I support the segregation.

Still waiting for someone to answer the question on what else MCPS can do since some of you think this is an MCPS problem rather than housing problem that MCPS does not control.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is nothing new almost every place in the country has rich people who self select and drive up real estate prices for the "good" schools and "crappy" schools for the poors middle class is a mixed bag

Fairfax County (North West, West, SouthWest vs East/South East generally)
Montgomery County (West vs East generally)
Arlington County (North vs South generally)
Washington DC (WOTP vs EOTR generally)
Prince Georges (public schools almost universally suck, people of means go private except for a couple pyramids with you guessed it high real estate prices)

If you start messing with the rich areas and trying to break up these islands of prosperity. Guess what the rich will start going to private school en masse and you get a situation like Alexandria where the schools suck from middle school on because all the wealthy are in private school.

or even better all the entitled whiners move away which improves the overcrowding situation and leaves people who are interested in being part of the solution

um the only people left are idiots who are fine with mediocrity. Do you really think people in Bethesda and Potomac or any wealthy are are going to go East where the schools generally suck? lol and more importantly once you start to dilute the generally higher quality more prosperous areas with students from the rest of the county performance is going to down. Even W clusters school performance is going to go downhill if this plan liberal white guilty braindead equity plan is ever put in place.

As others have said it should not fall on schools to fix the lack of parenting and poverty that is increasing every year in MoCo. That is on the local government who somehow thinks adding less performing people through looking the other way on illegal immigration and adding more affordable housing is somehow a good idea for this region.

Is there any data to support this? For example, if a school goes from say 5% to 25% FARMS, do the scores of affluent kids actually fall as a result?

Fairfax County did a big study on this it's on board docs somewhere (too bad the search on here sucks) basically once you cross I want to say 20% or so school performance starts to go down. Once you cross 40% or so it becomes a lost cause.

I think a big things is if you have tracking or not and we all know tracking is on the way out

Think about it, if the teachers has to worry about 5 new lower performers that's time taken away from the rest of the class so I think logically performance is going to suffer.

Now most parents will supplement and kids are generally bright anyway but I think it's still safe to say having 25 top performers is better than 20 top performers and 5 kids who need lots of help. There is a reason why Title 1 exists to give kids who need extra help extra resources.

Actually found the link

https://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/files/AHBN695B725B/$file/Socio-Economic%20Tipping%20Point%20Study%20of%20Elementary%20Schools_July%202013_technical%20report.pdf