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Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)
New CC Middle School
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Anonymous
Here's another: Larchmont Elementary in Kensington (now Grace Episcopal). Wow, this post brought back memories. I went to Whittier Woods - a hundred years ago! |
Anonymous
| Yes, list of closed schools brought back memories for me too. I went to Georgetown Hill (now Ivymount) on Seven Locks. I think it's fair to say that some of these schools were built in a time of using lots of asbestos and in a time of completely different building codes. MoCo also has a rabid Dept of Permitting Services that makes sure you're in code. This doesn't mean some these schools couldn't be reclaimed by the taxpayers as necessary. This overcrowding, given the potentially available buildings, pisses me off too. MoCo is a giant crazy bureaucracy. Moreover, too many of the decision makers on MCPS aren't stakeholders. Some of them aren't even MoCo residents and/or they don't have kids in the school system. |
Anonymous
| To the person who heard from the person with the Superintendent's office - did he/she mention whether some of the current Pyle MS area would feed into Westland MS if they built the new MS? Right now, 6 ES feed into Westland MS: NCC, CC, Somerset, RCF, Westbrook, and Bethesda. If he/she said the new middle school would take students from NCC, CC, RCF, and Bethesda (which is 4 of the 6) - it doesn't seem that Westbrook and Somerset alone would matriculate enough students to fill Westland. |
Anonymous
Good point, that appears to be a decent size site, but I don't know what the acreage is. Anybody? I think they want a site with at least six acres, three for building, three for athletic fields and buffer from neighborhood. |
Anonymous
I'm not sure if you're referring to my post or another one, but my understanding is that they have not considered at all what the boundaries of the new school would be. They have to find a site first. At the most recent meeting, we were told that the new school would have to have 750 students to be viable. The full report is here: http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/planning/Index2.shtml. |
Anonymous
At our meeting with the community superintendent and the land/building people, it was very clear that one of the 2 middle schools (either Westland or the new middle school) would take students from another middle school that was over crowded. Pyle (which will be 125 over capacity) was explicitly mentioned. Also N. Bethesda (after Pyle) which is projected to be 100+ students over capactiy. Although many parents expressed not liking the fact that the middle schools were so big, this was clearly the preference of MCPS for reasons of ecconomy of scale and because they say that they can offer more varied courses (both in substance and level of challenge) where larger numbers of kids are gathered. I don't think parents thought this thru very carefully. First, this creates a split articulation which many kids don't like -- they make friends in junior high school only to get to high school and find that their friends have gone on to another high school. Second, in the past (although perhaps not as much now) Westland has been seen as not as high quality a middle school as Pyle. So, I'm trying to envision Pyle parents being redistricted to Westland and then what? Back to Whitman? Split articulation is also something that many eastern BCC cluster parents want to avoid, since their kids are already bearing the burden of a split primary/elementary articulation, both by being split from K-2 at Rosemary Hills and 3-6 at either NCC or CCES, and by being split away from friends when they move all the kids from RHPS into 2 different elementaries. Also, many parents assume that the new middle school will be in the eastern part of the BCC cluster, yet the MCPS people made no specific commitment to this. To build a middle school in the eastern part of the county, but redistrict kids from Pyle to Westland would leave one middle school on the western side of the county which would be, frankly, very white and high income, and another middle school on the eastern side which would presumably have a higher number of minority and low SES students. This is not a healthy dynamic for our community, which has a long history of integrated schools (to the degree possible within our broader cluster boundaries). |
Anonymous
| I'm confused, 19:51 PP - if the new middle school takes the kids from NCC, CC, RCF, and Bethesda, don't they all go to BCC? Where is the split articulation? And how does this new middle school wind up being predominantly low SES?? Of those four schools, which besides RCF have a high concentration of FARMs or low-income students? (Or minority, for that matter?) Not trying to be difficult, I'm just genuinely not understanding your post. |
Anonymous
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Lynbrook is 3 acres too small for a middle school. All the schools the PP mentioned need to be torn down, asbestos issues and ADA.
They are considering an urban type school and building up and having underground parking etc. Why do we need a new council? This is the same council that voted to lift a building moratorium that caved into builders to build higher density housing in the B-CC cluster. The thought process, nobody with kids will live in condos, they will be empty nesters and we won’t have to worry about enrollment going up, the same council that has done nothing to improve the roads around all the building, the same council that failed to say no to the Filmore, the same council that spent two months talking about a guy wearing a dress using a women’s bathroom, the same council that decided the Bethesda Metro needs a 2nd entrance at $60 million dollars. Does it really matter what party you are in to realize they are out of touch? Oh don’t forget the parking rates going up to subsidize Wheaton and Silver Spring TMDs. The County has been mismanaged for many years, $400,000 for a security detail for the county exec?-he can use police officers, That could outfit a school with computers, new books for the library, or playground equipment, $65,000 private bathroom? That sounds like it could have been a teacher’s salary right there. There are other areas of the county that are overcrowded as well The soonest a MS could be in the CIP is the 2013-2018 CIP, that does not mean it will be built, it means there will be money available to do all the studies, purchase the land, plan it, build it, and open it. If you have a child in the school system now, they will never set foot in that middle school as a student. Sad but true |
Anonymous
I mean split articulation as in 2 middle schools feeding into BCC with potentially at least one of the two middle schools taking kids into middle school from outside the BCC cluster and then returning them outside the BCC cluster for high school (i.e. that some kids from overcrowded Pyle or N. Bethesda may be redistricted for middle school only within the BCC cluster and then back to their home high school of Whitman, or whatever). Plus, frankly, it's unclear how the elementary schools would break up into two middle schools. It's entirely possible, depending on the location of the second middle school that parts of the current Bethesda or Chevy Chase districts could be split at the middle school level. For example, Bethesda west of Wisconsin might be sent to Westland, but East Bethesda could be sent to a new middle school. Or Chevy Chase west of Connecticut could go to Westland, but east of Connecticut or east of Brookeville to a new middle school. Minority/low SES areas come mainly from apartments and condos in the Rock Creek, Rosemary Hills and North Chevy Chase areas, mostly from east of Beach drive. (Summit Hills, Barrington Apts., and other apartment/condo complexes in these areas). There are some pockets also in Bethesda. These low income/minority areas are currently split among at least 4 elementaries (Rock Creek Forest, NCC, CCES, Bethesda and Rosemary Hills) and all kids go together to Westland. Farms rates at Somerset and Westbrook are 2.9-6.9 percent; at the other elementaries it ranges from 9-24%. I didn't say the new middle school would wind up being predominantly low SES/minority. That's not true anywhere in the cluster. I said it would have a higher minority/low SES rate than what would be left at Westland, which would wind up looking demographically more like Pyle. (Not a good thing in my mind.) That is a concern because the community as a whole created and nourished for many many years a structure for schools in the cluster that was as integrated as possible while still trying to minimize and distribute fairly the amount of busing that goes on. And undoing this at the middle school level is not what I would like to see. On the other hand, many parents feel, legitimately so, that having a 1000+ student middle school at Westland with long transportation from east of the cluster as not ideal either. These are things parents should think about because there are creative program options that could help solve some of these problems. Perhaps there could be an inter-cluster choice process with one middle school offering continuing immersion and strong languages and the other specializing more in science/math? Or perhaps the middle school with the higher FARMS/minority rate should receive more resources in order to assure equal academic opportunity and achievement? I don't know what the answers will be, but now that the middle school is going to be a reality, parents need to think much more carefully about what it might look like not only in terms of location and physical plant structure, but in terms of population and programs. |
Anonymous
How do you know? What's the acreage, I can't find it listed. I thought that six acres was the necessary amount of land for an MS with athletic fields and neighborhood buffer. Six acres doesn't sound that huge to me. |
Anonymous
Back in the 70s Leland was actually a Jr High school. It merged with Western Jr High to form Westland. So now it looks like we resplit Westland. When I went to Western in the 70s it did split between BCC and Whitman. Of course it was also 7th-9th grades in those days. |
Anonymous
I think Lynbrook is about 6 acres, maybe a little more. Of course it seems like there's even more room over by Gwendolyn Coffield. |
Anonymous
Regarding the split articulation argument, this is common in the rest of the county. A lot of Eastern BCC cluster parents support the MS to make more room in the elementaries that have 6th grade. Why do you think Pyle parents would have a hard time with thier kids going to Westland as opposed to their kids going to a very overcrowded school? I take it you are on the east side of the county and worried that your kids will be in there with minority and low SES students. I'm not sure how you've figured that though. |
Anonymous
| Have any of you signed up to speak on Nov 10th? |
Anonymous
| I'm not signed up to speak but I will email my comments to the BOE. |