My massive dilemma about school pyramids - low income vs. more affluent? HELP ME!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I faced this dilemma on a different scale when picking which university to attend. Make the move. It's better to have your child surrounded by peers who will challenge him/her, then be in a place where everything is too easy because teh other kids aren't keeping up.

Would you prefer your kid go to Princeton or Iowa State? They may find Princeton more difficult, but isn't that the point -- to be challenged?

WHAT!

I graduated from Iowa State! Be nice. What could you possibly know about Iowa State?

[Anonymous]

I faced this dilemma on a different scale when picking which university to attend. Make the move. It's better to have your child surrounded by peers who will challenge him/her, then be in a place where everything is too easy because teh other kids aren't keeping up.

Would you prefer your kid go to Princeton or Iowa State? They may find Princeton more difficult, but isn't that the point -- to be challenged?

I don't care for this advice. A child can be challenged anywhere. And, frankly, I'm not sure that kids are better off who go to Princeton than Iowa State. There is more to life that making lots of money.

OP, What do you want to do? FWIW, the "community feel" was a driver for me in picking a neighborhood. Kids were toddlers and I really was not seriously concerned about the schools--except for elementary. I wanted a school in our community. That was very important to me. Turns out, we stayed here through high school--which, at the time, I did not expect. Fortunately, our schools were good.

Advice: do not make your decision based on the whole pyramid thing anywhere in FCPS. That is too subject to change, since your kids are still so young. It is okay to consider it--but do not base your decision on that.
Also, things with your dad can change, as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church HS is very small, for example - maybe only 1000 kids? But the school has not been renovated mostly bc the parents don't push for it, because they aren't involved.

This is a lie.

This was told to me by a staff member at Falls church high school. They also said the school board is screwed to favor the wealthier schools.

Falls Church HS has closer to 1900 kids than 1000. George Mason HS in Falls Church City is closer to 1000, but there's no high school in FCPS with fewer than 1700 kids.

FCHS did get a bad deal when FCPS established a "renovation queue" for its schools several years ago. The fact that the board member for the Mason District traditionally has come from the Stuart HS area rather than the Falls Church HS area may have played a role in this not getting challenged enough at the time. But the current School Board member (Sandy Evans) and many FCHS parents have been actively pushing for the school's renovation, which should be taking place by the time OP's kids are in high school.

As the overall demographics at FCHS, it may be worth noting that the number of white kids there has gone up in recent years, even as the total number of white students in FCPS has gone down. I don't mean to imply there's something magical about white kids, but they tend to be at least middle class in Fairfax County, so that gives you some feel for the future prospects of an area that benefits from being inside the Beltway, close to Metro and Tysons, near the Mosaic District, etc.

[Anonymous]

Move. I did this in Arlington after my kids started. It was worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FOR YEARS now my family been struggling with a major issue. Do we stay in our current house in a fairly low-income school pyramid or move just a mile away to a more affluent pyramid with a "great" reputation? Seriously, I have been questioning this for YEARS and cannot make a decision -- but there are other issues at play as well. I just want to get feedback from people, please only respond if you have good intentions and don't make nasty remarks!

I have 3 kids, oldest will be in kindergarten in 2016-2017 (so we have a year to decide). We are in a decent neighborhood in the Camelot/Luther Jackson/Falls Church HS pyramid. If we move to my father's neighborhood just a few miles away, we are in Wakefield Forest/Frost/Woodson pyramid. We can afford to do this, although moving requires we sell our home first, live with my dad for awhile while we wait for the right house to come on the market.

Anyway, our motivators for moving would be the following:
1. better schools (supposedly)
2. Closer to my ailing dad who I will have to care for
3. A nicer neighborhood with a more community feel (lots of social events, nice HOA, pool)

Anyway, I hear different things about the schools. Some tell me the lower income schools (like Luther Jackson/Falls Church) receive more resources, money, smaller classes, and that my child will have a better chance of "standing out" because not every kid is trying to be Captain of the football team and in honor society and in a million clubs. Basically, there are not as many over-achievers. Downside is that the parents are not as involved because many are working 2 or 3 jobs and have little to NO time to be involved with their kids' lives at school. The kids my kids would be friends with may come from poverty.... and some may come from unconventional home situations like many families living in one apartment. There will be much more diversity, but Falls Church HS is very small, for example - maybe only 1000 kids? But the school has not been renovated mostly bc the parents don't push for it, because they aren't involved.

On the other hand, if we move, We would send our kids to Wakefield Forest (which I love), but then to Frost in Woodson which seems to be filled with overachievers and high-income kids. The competition seems to be intense, class sizes are larger, less diversity, but is considered one of the finest schools in the area. My kids may not have the chance to "stand out" because most the kids are being cheered on my motivated parents. That being said, my kids would be hanging out with kids from more affluent backgrounds with more involved parents. Woodson also has seen suicides recently and is a HUGE school. Seems like a child could easily get lost there.

Two other issues -- if we move to Woodson district, my kids could walk to Wakefield Forest instead of bussing it. I would be close to my ailing dad, making it easier for me to care for him (along with 3 kids), and we would live in a slightly nicer neighborhood -- houses a little nicer, more parks, pool, etc.

Mostly, I would like opinions about the school situation. What is your opinion on a low-income pyramid vs. affluent pyramid?

My child is "affluent," attending a "less affluent" high school with an enormously diverse student body, and stands out, and not in a good way. It is making our whole family miserable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FOR YEARS now my family been struggling with a major issue. Do we stay in our current house in a fairly low-income school pyramid or move just a mile away to a more affluent pyramid with a "great" reputation? Seriously, I have been questioning this for YEARS and cannot make a decision -- but there are other issues at play as well. I just want to get feedback from people, please only respond if you have good intentions and don't make nasty remarks!

I have 3 kids, oldest will be in kindergarten in 2016-2017 (so we have a year to decide). We are in a decent neighborhood in the Camelot/Luther Jackson/Falls Church HS pyramid. If we move to my father's neighborhood just a few miles away, we are in Wakefield Forest/Frost/Woodson pyramid. We can afford to do this, although moving requires we sell our home first, live with my dad for awhile while we wait for the right house to come on the market.

Anyway, our motivators for moving would be the following:
1. better schools (supposedly)
2. Closer to my ailing dad who I will have to care for
3. A nicer neighborhood with a more community feel (lots of social events, nice HOA, pool)

Anyway, I hear different things about the schools. Some tell me the lower income schools (like Luther Jackson/Falls Church) receive more resources, money, smaller classes, and that my child will have a better chance of "standing out" because not every kid is trying to be Captain of the football team and in honor society and in a million clubs. Basically, there are not as many over-achievers. Downside is that the parents are not as involved because many are working 2 or 3 jobs and have little to NO time to be involved with their kids' lives at school. The kids my kids would be friends with may come from poverty.... and some may come from unconventional home situations like many families living in one apartment. There will be much more diversity, but Falls Church HS is very small, for example - maybe only 1000 kids? But the school has not been renovated mostly bc the parents don't push for it, because they aren't involved.

On the other hand, if we move, We would send our kids to Wakefield Forest (which I love), but then to Frost in Woodson which seems to be filled with overachievers and high-income kids. The competition seems to be intense, class sizes are larger, less diversity, but is considered one of the finest schools in the area. My kids may not have the chance to "stand out" because most the kids are being cheered on my motivated parents. That being said, my kids would be hanging out with kids from more affluent backgrounds with more involved parents. Woodson also has seen suicides recently and is a HUGE school. Seems like a child could easily get lost there.

Two other issues -- if we move to Woodson district, my kids could walk to Wakefield Forest instead of bussing it. I would be close to my ailing dad, making it easier for me to care for him (along with 3 kids), and we would live in a slightly nicer neighborhood -- houses a little nicer, more parks, pool, etc.

Mostly, I would like opinions about the school situation. What is your opinion on a low-income pyramid vs. affluent pyramid?

My child is "affluent," attending a "less affluent" high school with an enormously diverse student body, and stands out, and not in a good way. It is making our whole family miserable.

[Anonymous]

Over my dead body would I let one of my children attend a school in the Falls Church HS pyramid. If you care at all about your children, MOVE.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Over my dead body would I let one of my children attend a school in the Falls Church HS pyramid. If you care at all about your children, MOVE.

One of my kids just graduated from another school, but took an Academy course at Falls Church HS. Another had a summer job where some of his co-workers went to Falls Church. Nice kids, no problems. You are bonkers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All I'm going to say is that if you move to the Wakefield Forest area there is a good chance you'll get rezoned to Poe/Annandale in a few years.

Not going to happen. They just rezoned people from Wakefield Forest out of Poe/Annandale. They're not going to move them back after all that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I'm going to say is that if you move to the Wakefield Forest area there is a good chance you'll get rezoned to Poe/Annandale in a few years.

Not going to happen. They just rezoned people from Wakefield Forest out of Poe/Annandale. They're not going to move them back after all that.

Your wishing this does not make it so. The boundary shift was in 2012. The relevant policy (Policy 8130.7) states "Adjustments shall be made without respect to magisterial districts or postal addresses and, whenever possible, shall not affect the same occupied dwellings any more often than once in three years."

The SB's obligation is to all the kids, not just those in Wakefield Forest who think their property values might take a hit if moved or moved back to Annandale.

[Anonymous]

Keep in mind that the county and School Board have both signed onto the One Fairfax initiative, which pledges to look for ways to increase equity within the county.

The two lowest-cost, most obvious things the county could do to further that goal would be to move part of Woodson to Annandale and part of West Springfield to Lee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I'm going to say is that if you move to the Wakefield Forest area there is a good chance you'll get rezoned to Poe/Annandale in a few years.

Not going to happen. They just rezoned people from Wakefield Forest out of Poe/Annandale. They're not going to move them back after all that.

Your wishing this does not make it so. The boundary shift was in 2012. The relevant policy (Policy 8130.7) states "Adjustments shall be made without respect to magisterial districts or postal addresses and, whenever possible, shall not affect the same occupied dwellings any more often than once in three years."

The SB's obligation is to all the kids, not just those in Wakefield Forest who think their property values might take a hit if moved or moved back to Annandale.

Given that they just did a boundary adjustment right there, and the school board has bigger fish to fry than dealing with minor overcrowding at Frost and Woodson (like more serious overcrowding at McLean, Marshall, Oakton, Centreville, West Potomac, Carson, Hughes, Kilmer, Longfellow, Jackson, Glasgow), I still think it's not going to happen. I guess we'll see.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Over my dead body would I let one of my children attend a school in the Falls Church HS pyramid. If you care at all about your children, MOVE.

Maybe if you wanted to learn gang signs and Spanish, teen moms

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I'm going to say is that if you move to the Wakefield Forest area there is a good chance you'll get rezoned to Poe/Annandale in a few years.

Not going to happen. They just rezoned people from Wakefield Forest out of Poe/Annandale. They're not going to move them back after all that.

Your wishing this does not make it so. The boundary shift was in 2012. The relevant policy (Policy 8130.7) states "Adjustments shall be made without respect to magisterial districts or postal addresses and, whenever possible, shall not affect the same occupied dwellings any more often than once in three years."

The SB's obligation is to all the kids, not just those in Wakefield Forest who think their property values might take a hit if moved or moved back to Annandale.

Given that they just did a boundary adjustment right there, and the school board has bigger fish to fry than dealing with minor overcrowding at Frost and Woodson (like more serious overcrowding at McLean, Marshall, Oakton, Centreville, West Potomac, Carson, Hughes, Kilmer, Longfellow, Jackson, Glasgow), I still think it's not going to happen. I guess we'll see.

It's not just the number of students, although Woodson is over-capacity now by more than many of the schools you asserted had "more serious overcrowding." It's that Woodson is both over-crowded and adjacent to a school that was 400 students under-capacity last year, as well as the fact that Annandale is starting to flirt with accreditation issues and Poe was denied full accreditation.

It was a bad decision to pull so many single-family neighborhoods out of Poe/Annandale, largely engineered by Tessie Wilson on her way out as a School Board member, and now FCPS is going to have to deal with the consequences.

[Anonymous]

Wakefield Forest is a beautiful neighborhood, the elementary school is walking distance, the pool is great, and the community is really friendly. Those are the concrete, right-now things. Even if the high schools were the exact same caliber right now, it sounds like you're saying your family might be happier there because of everything else the neighborhood offers. There's something to be said for that.

Even if Woodson is a competitive rat-race and stays that way for the next 10 years, that doesn't mean your children would necessarily get sucked into it, any more than they would get pulled into gang life, or whatever the heck people are saying Falls Church HS has. If it were my family, I'd rather they deal with super smart type-A kids than worry they might get knifed in the bathroom because they wore the wrong color to school that day.