Did you take the middle school start times survey?

[Anonymous]

We were happy with all the start times under the current system: 9:15 am ES, early MS start with after school clubs, and the HS start time is reasonable as well.

No actual questions were asked in that survey. What a waste of monry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was very disappointed they didn't ask about the MIDDLE SCHOOL AFTER SCHOOL program.

Well then you don't understand the MIDDLE SCHOOL AFTER SCHOOL program.

It's not FCPS that's try to ax it.

Contact your county supervisor and raise hell, like the rest of us.

[Anonymous]

I am a middle school parent (none other in FCPS) and only answered questions on the MS start time, if my child was responsible for after-school babysitting/had a job, and how many hours of sleep my child gets per night.

Obviously I did not answer any questions on ES or HS.

The mischaracterization of this whole thing has left everyone confused. It's not just start times for middle school -- it's every school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That was a terrible survey. People with kids in elementary school can't voice their opinion about changing school start times for middle school, which will affect us soon? FFS FCPS, can anyone in leadership do anything competently?

If there is any shift in MS times, it's going to have an effect on EVERY school. It's not just MS. So you will be affected no matter what grade your child is in.

Terrible communication surrounding this from the school board.

[Anonymous]

Having a 6th grader who will be in middle school when they are proposing these changes and a high school student who experienced early middle school start times, I would like to weigh in on middle school specifically, not just elementary and high school.

[Anonymous]

It's a lame survey. Also who wants to leave comments by email that aren't anonymous? That should have been built in to the survey.

[Anonymous]

I came here because I thought maybe there was something wrong with the survey. I can’t believe how bad it is. I’m a professor too. My undergrads can design much better surveys working completely on their own. It’s infuriating to think people have been paid to design that survey and analyze the data. There will not be any meaningful results. It would have been so easy to add a few more questions and it would add hardly any time to the analysis effort. This tells me they don’t actually care about parent input and will do whatever they want. It’s a complete joke. I am going to write to someone — school board rep? Superintendent? Not sure which would be best.

I have a 5th grader and will be curious to know if the student survey is equally terrible.

[Anonymous]

“ This tells me they don’t actually care about parent input and will do whatever they want. ”

Sadly this always seems like the real intent of the surveys.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“ This tells me they don’t actually care about parent input and will do whatever they want. ”

Sadly this always seems like the real intent of the surveys.

+1. I think there may be a legal requirement to get community input on certain things in VA, and that's the only reason they do it. It would be incredibly hard to prove they intended not to get real information.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was very disappointed they didn't ask about the MIDDLE SCHOOL AFTER SCHOOL program.

? The survey was designed to ask about middle school start times, which it didn’t even do that! After school programs have nothing to do with that.

Of course it is relevant. If Middle School doesn't start until 9:45 am, then the after school programs will not be operated. Many parents would prefer an early start + after school programming vs. a late start and no programming.

The after school activities are dependent on the budget. Totally separate issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Having a 6th grader who will be in middle school when they are proposing these changes and a high school student who experienced early middle school start times, I would like to weigh in on middle school specifically, not just elementary and high school.

All you have to do is answer yes to the do you have a middle schooler. You’ll see, it doesn’t change the survey much anyway.

[Anonymous]

It's quite clear that they don't actually care about community feedback for both this and the boundary review. They're ticking the boxes to say they gathered feedback and will do what they want.

This survey was ridiculous. We're at an 8:35 start (8:20 drop off) ES. I love our start time and would be devastated for it to be pushed back to 9:05 (8:50 drop off) but I would be fine with being an 8 am start (7:45 drop off). The survey gathered only the first of those 3 view points and I can't help but think it intentionally didn't gather any useful information.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What middle schoolers have JOBS? Kids are barely 14 in 8th grade. They can't legally work.
Really, the survey was asinine.

Some kids work for their parents' business or work babysitting and the like or work illegally to help pay bills.

Yes, I took the survey. I said I was fine with the start time. None of the plans make sense to me and I don't want MS start times pushed to after 9AM.

[Anonymous]

can someone post a link to this survey in this forum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:can someone post a link to this survey in this forum.

No. It is emailed only to FCPS parents. We aren’t going to post it to a forum which is filled with many non FCPS folk.