APS Immersion Boundaries

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

[Anonymous]

I see the schools that are under consideration but — how likely are the swaps at this point? Some people are saying to be concerned; others say the switch is unlikely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I see the schools that are under consideration but — how likely are the swaps at this point? Some people are saying to be concerned; others say the switch is unlikely.

It’s really hard to say with the low covid enrollment numbers. Any time APS can punt on unpopular decisions they do, so my guess would be that they are going to “wait and see.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Barcroft/Carlin Springs (Claremont) and Barrett (Key) are sending very few kid to the immersion schools despite large Spanish speaking populations (page 5). Not sure bussing to a different school would make much of a difference, but I guess that’s one of the things they are looking into.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Barcroft/Carlin Springs (Claremont) and Barrett (Key) are sending very few kid to the immersion schools despite large Spanish speaking populations (page 5). Not sure bussing to a different school would make much of a difference, but I guess that’s one of the things they are looking into.

Moving schools is definitely not going to solve for this problem since the schools are basically the same distance from each of these neighborhoods

[Anonymous]

Recommendation is to just move schools north of 50 to key. No Key schools to Claremont.

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/28-Oct-2021-Immersion-Feeder-Structure-Committee-Update-2-for-DLI-Community.pdf

Committee recommended that boundaries not be based on “feeder” schools, since those boundaries keep changing, but APS staff said that was beyond their current capabilities. So maybe they will do that for the next mega boundary adjustment.

[Anonymous]

Yayyyy! This is the right set of recommendations for right now, IMO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yayyyy! This is the right set of recommendations for right now, IMO.

Wow, so looking at the data table, they just made Claremont a Title 1 school and Key will now be under 20% fr/l. Also, look at the imbalance of white kids now assigned to Key over Claremont and the imbalance of native Spanish speakers. How can they adopt this policy and talk about “equity.” Who was on this committee? JFC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Do you want them to move east-west instead?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Do you want them to move east-west instead?

Why not just leave things as they are? The boundaries may not be perfect, but they're far from egregious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Do you want them to move east-west instead?

Why not just leave things as they are? The boundaries may not be perfect, but they're far from egregious.

Either leave them or move E/W and eliminate the “island” that Central Office can’t seem to deal with. What’s wrong with them? That’s more egregious than creating ANOTHER title 1 school in South Arlington?!?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isnt Key crazy over capacity though? What would adding zones do? I see the case for adding the few on the north that have low immersion enrollment anyway- to help with transportation. But doesn’t make sense to add a bigger zone like barcroft or Carlin springs - esp when Spanish speaking applicants were close to even last year.

It's not just about adding to Key. It's about re-doing the zones for both immersion schools.

Here’s the document with more detail - page 6 outlines proposed zone switches - Fleet, Barrett and West would be the potential Key moves

https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Immersion-Elementary-Feeder-Committee-Informational-resource-for-community-Sept.-30-2021.pdf

Wow. The proposed changes would shorten bus routes, but they would make for a pretty stark N/S Arlington split. Is that really the direction the county wants to move?

Do you want them to move east-west instead?

Bus routes for the kids who are economically disadvantaged aren’t super long. If parents from Tuckahoe want Immersion, they can travel. That’s called equity. Not creating two economically and racially disparate schools. It’s like, we have to do the worst possible thing in all cases? It’s not nearly segregated enough, so now we’re going to put our fingers further on the option schools to make them segregated, too? Holy hell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yayyyy! This is the right set of recommendations for right now, IMO.

Wow, so looking at the data table, they just made Claremont a Title 1 school and Key will now be under 20% fr/l. Also, look at the imbalance of white kids now assigned to Key over Claremont and the imbalance of native Spanish speakers. How can they adopt this policy and talk about “equity.” Who was on this committee? JFC

I don’t think you are reading the tables correctly. The issue is that while the Claremont zone has more Spanish speakers they apply for the immersion program at a much lower rate than people zoned to Key (24% for Claremont vs 48 percent for Key). Key actually has more native Spanish speakers than Claremont despite having a smaller pool.

So if you look at the FRL slide, while Claremont zone has higher % of FRL population, Key actually has higher enrollment (40% FRL vs 31% at Claremont). The changes are expected to reduce reduce Keys FRL % but would still be similar to Claremont.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yayyyy! This is the right set of recommendations for right now, IMO.

Wow, so looking at the data table, they just made Claremont a Title 1 school and Key will now be under 20% fr/l. Also, look at the imbalance of white kids now assigned to Key over Claremont and the imbalance of native Spanish speakers. How can they adopt this policy and talk about “equity.” Who was on this committee? JFC

I don’t think you are reading the tables correctly. The issue is that while the Claremont zone has more Spanish speakers they apply for the immersion program at a much lower rate than people zoned to Key (24% for Claremont vs 48 percent for Key). Key actually has more native Spanish speakers than Claremont despite having a smaller pool.

So if you look at the FRL slide, while Claremont zone has higher % of FRL population, Key actually has higher enrollment (40% FRL vs 31% at Claremont). The changes are expected to reduce reduce Keys FRL % but would still be similar to Claremont.

The applicant pool being so unbalanced will be seen in the school population over time, and will reflect the demographics of the potential applicants. The data says that under the new boundaries the percentage of fr/l potential applicants will increase at Claremont from 38% to 49%, while at Key it will decrease from 22% to 19%. The percentage of potential white applicants at Claremont decreases from 49% to 28% at Claremont and increases at Key from 51% to 72%. Tell me again how this isn’t going to, over time, result in a whiter and wealthier school at Key and a less white and less wealthy population at Claremont. The reason Claremont is so unbalanced now isn’t a result of the current boundary map and applicant pool, but rather the historic neighborhood preferences for Claremont, whereby white families utilized their preferences and others did not.