New VA school rating system in 2025-2026 SY

[Anonymous]

Look for more kids who aren’t ready or deserving of advanced coursework to be placed into advanced classes in order to meet new metrics.

[Anonymous]

My kids are in Churchill/Cooper/Langley pyramid so this metric will do nothing for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

Fairfax County was smaller than, teachers were better, admins were better, there were less standards, etc....

Or FCPS stopped the spin machine and it has always been bad.

No, it actually was an excellent school district. The spin is what we see today, when FCPS pretends to still be excellent and “world class,” as they like to say.

It had fewer poor and ELL kids. Those kids drag down school ratings and that's reflected in FCPS today. The schools that don't have those kids are still ranked as some of the best schools in the state

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

Fairfax County was smaller than, teachers were better, admins were better, there were less standards, etc....

Or FCPS stopped the spin machine and it has always been bad.

No, it actually was an excellent school district. The spin is what we see today, when FCPS pretends to still be excellent and “world class,” as they like to say.

It had fewer poor and ELL kids. Those kids drag down school ratings and that's reflected in FCPS today. The schools that don't have those kids are still ranked as some of the best schools in the state

+1. Pretty much this people. A school district reflects its population. I agree this is probably just an in for the introduction of school vouchers which will further drag down public education. I do disagree with some of FCPS’s policies like not holding kids accountable for their behaviors and grading policies. This will only put more pressure on school districts to teach to standardized tests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Washington Post gift link: https://wapo.st/4d08Kzy

“ Currently, Virginia combines accountability and accreditation into one measurement and awards schools a simple rating: accredited or accredited with conditions.”

“ Under the new plan, the board of education decided to break up the two measurements.”

“ Schools will still earn accreditation based on whether they meet basic state requirements. But now, they will receive a separate accountability ranking based on other metrics like mastery of topics and how much student performance has improved over a time period. It also will measure student readiness based on factors — which are still being finalized — such as chronic absenteeism and advanced coursework. The four categories for accountability will be: Distinguished, On Track, Off Track and Needs Intensive Support.”

Interestingly, it is estimated that 50-60% of schools are going to fall into the lower two categories of “off track” or “needs intensive support” because mastery is going to be weighted more than “growth” on the new rating system. I know we have a lot of troubled schools in the state and most are outside of FCPS and NoVa in general. I foresee a big, annoying push for attendance even more than this past school year, since that is something the schools feel they can push back on the parents.

What are your thoughts and how will this affect FCPS? Wonder if GreatSchools will take this into account in their rating mechanisms. The finalized regs are linked in the WaPo article - I only skimmed but am wondering if safety/weapons issues factors into the ratings at all.

I foresee angry parents, a beleaguered board and principals getting fired. I will continue to let my kids miss when our school goes into full remediation mode after most kids fail SOLs the first time around

Most the kids that fail the SOL are the kids that are absent. I'm a high school teacher and absences are out of control. There's literally nothing keeping a kid from slipping school. You also only hear about full day absences, lots of kids skip one period every day, and that data doesn't count as an absence because it isn't full day. There's kid with 40 absences in classes, and still passing miraculously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

Fairfax County was smaller than, teachers were better, admins were better, there were less standards, etc....

Or FCPS stopped the spin machine and it has always been bad.

No, it actually was an excellent school district. The spin is what we see today, when FCPS pretends to still be excellent and “world class,” as they like to say.

It had fewer poor and ELL kids. Those kids drag down school ratings and that's reflected in FCPS today. The schools that don't have those kids are still ranked as some of the best schools in the state

FCPS also used to separate the ELL kids into their own classrooms so it wasn't a distraction to the rest of the class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

Fairfax County was smaller than, teachers were better, admins were better, there were less standards, etc....

Or FCPS stopped the spin machine and it has always been bad.

No, it actually was an excellent school district. The spin is what we see today, when FCPS pretends to still be excellent and “world class,” as they like to say.

It had fewer poor and ELL kids. Those kids drag down school ratings and that's reflected in FCPS today. The schools that don't have those kids are still ranked as some of the best schools in the state

Those students were not isolated for the good of the class, it was because we didn’t understand then that EL students can and need to mix with their mainstream peers to learn both content and English.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

Fairfax County was smaller than, teachers were better, admins were better, there were less standards, etc....

Or FCPS stopped the spin machine and it has always been bad.

No, it actually was an excellent school district. The spin is what we see today, when FCPS pretends to still be excellent and “world class,” as they like to say.

It had fewer poor and ELL kids. Those kids drag down school ratings and that's reflected in FCPS today. The schools that don't have those kids are still ranked as some of the best schools in the state

Those students were not isolated for the good of the class, it was because we didn’t understand then that EL students can and need to mix with their mainstream peers to learn both content and English.

The knock on effect was that they didn't slow down the class. It's a non issue if there are only a few of them or if they have parents who care about education pushing them to learn english and integrate, but when a large percentage of a school is ELL, the quality of education will plummet

[Anonymous]

ELL students, if managed correctly, are an advantage to the school they are at because they have the potential to show the most growth compared to kids who are already on grade level and just pass.

[Anonymous]

My kids missed more than 10 days this year. Our ES kept begging me to bring my kids in on a teacher workday for what they called a two hour reading and math "workshop". I asked if my kids were behind? No. I asked for details on what the workshop would cover? It was told it would be "independent learning".

Then my teacher friend told me this was a way for schools to cook the books on attendance numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids missed more than 10 days this year. Our ES kept begging me to bring my kids in on a teacher workday for what they called a two hour reading and math "workshop". I asked if my kids were behind? No. I asked for details on what the workshop would cover? It was told it would be "independent learning".

Then my teacher friend told me this was a way for schools to cook the books on attendance numbers.

Wait, this was a thing FCPS did?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids missed more than 10 days this year. Our ES kept begging me to bring my kids in on a teacher workday for what they called a two hour reading and math "workshop". I asked if my kids were behind? No. I asked for details on what the workshop would cover? It was told it would be "independent learning".

Then my teacher friend told me this was a way for schools to cook the books on attendance numbers.

Also good for your kids, where being in school is good for learning and for valuing education. Whether they were sick or on vacation, missing over 10 days of school is very hard for kids, although you don't seem to realize it.

My oldest missed 15 days of school two years ago from covid, flu, and covid again (has never regained his sense of taste). And that school year, academically, was a struggle for him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids missed more than 10 days this year. Our ES kept begging me to bring my kids in on a teacher workday for what they called a two hour reading and math "workshop". I asked if my kids were behind? No. I asked for details on what the workshop would cover? It was told it would be "independent learning".

Then my teacher friend told me this was a way for schools to cook the books on attendance numbers.

Also good for your kids, where being in school is good for learning and for valuing education. Whether they were sick or on vacation, missing over 10 days of school is very hard for kids, although you don't seem to realize it.

My oldest missed 15 days of school two years ago from covid, flu, and covid again (has never regained his sense of taste). And that school year, academically, was a struggle for him.

Kids are all different. One of mine struggled HORRIBLY when FCPS failed to live up to their promise to let kids go two days a week.

The other decided it was going to be regular school or nothing and chose the 100% online option and did well.

That one came to the conclusion that in-person was not required to excel and when FCPS went back to a traditional schedule skipped whenever and continued to excel.

FCPS dragged their feet on reopening long after it was shown to be safe. Those who run the system can’t now turn around and pretend to care about education and the wellbeing of children.

🙄

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:ELL students, if managed correctly, are an advantage to the school they are at because they have the potential to show the most growth compared to kids who are already on grade level and just pass.

But the new ratings are going to weight “mastery” more than “growth.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s just amazing to me how far FCPS has fallen since the mid-90s. It would have been unheard of before then to have any schools in those lower two categories.

Massive illegal immigration and far-left Democrats on the SB are all responsible for this decline and it’s shameful.

What a weird and factually wrong thing to say. I also dispute the premise that FCPS "has fallen."

As for Democrats, I suppose it could be worse -- Republicans could be in charge.