Voting Against 2017 FCPS School Bond

[Anonymous]

I will be voting against the school bond, too. There are schools like Lee and Mount Vernon that have space, but FCPS is expanding other schools that are overcrowded. It's a waste of money. What needs to happen is redistricting!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will be voting against the school bond, too. There are schools like Lee and Mount Vernon that have space, but FCPS is expanding other schools that are overcrowded. It's a waste of money. What needs to happen is redistricting!

That's the biggest issue. Re-districting is so unpopular. Look at this thread for example. People are clamoring for a new school, but still pushing away from the idea of a large scale redistricting.

Honestly, I support the bond. I also support redistricting. I think you need both and what we're doing is cutting off our nose to spite our face.

[Anonymous]

Interesting, when the SB redistricted South Lakes one of the big talking points was that FCPS had determined that "2000" was the appropriate # for high schools. They repeated it ad nauseum during the process--even though they had just spent big bucks to expand Westfield to 3000.

As long as these people are in charge, I'm voting "no". They are poor stewards of our funds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting, when the SB redistricted South Lakes one of the big talking points was that FCPS had determined that "2000" was the appropriate # for high schools. They repeated it ad nauseum during the process--even though they had just spent big bucks to expand Westfield to 3000.

As long as these people are in charge, I'm voting "no". They are poor stewards of our funds.

See, that's the issue. There will never, ever be 2000 seat high schools across the county absent building 3 more high schools. People have to make people that this isn't happening and then decide how to move forward in addressing over crowding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will be voting against the school bond, too. There are schools like Lee and Mount Vernon that have space, but FCPS is expanding other schools that are overcrowded. It's a waste of money. What needs to happen is redistricting!

That's the biggest issue. Re-districting is so unpopular. Look at this thread for example. People are clamoring for a new school, but still pushing away from the idea of a large scale redistricting.

Honestly, I support the bond. I also support redistricting. I think you need both and what we're doing is cutting off our nose to spite our face.

Apples and oranges. You seem to be making up arguments that a new school would have to be accompanied by a county-wide redistricting, when FCPS has repeatedly opened new schools in the past without doing so.

I don't want to pay for or send my kids to monster-sized high schools, so a protest vote to send a message that FCPS needs to revisit its capital spending program is not cutting off my nose to spite my face. It's a message for them to go back to the drawing board and come up with something better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will be voting against the school bond, too. There are schools like Lee and Mount Vernon that have space, but FCPS is expanding other schools that are overcrowded. It's a waste of money. What needs to happen is redistricting!

That's the biggest issue. Re-districting is so unpopular. Look at this thread for example. People are clamoring for a new school, but still pushing away from the idea of a large scale redistricting.

Honestly, I support the bond. I also support redistricting. I think you need both and what we're doing is cutting off our nose to spite our face.

I want a new school and don't care about redistricting. I just don't think redistricting across the entire county necessarily needs to happen or needs to happen in the same year that a new high school is approved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will be voting against the school bond, too. There are schools like Lee and Mount Vernon that have space, but FCPS is expanding other schools that are overcrowded. It's a waste of money. What needs to happen is redistricting!

That's the biggest issue. Re-districting is so unpopular. Look at this thread for example. People are clamoring for a new school, but still pushing away from the idea of a large scale redistricting.

Honestly, I support the bond. I also support redistricting. I think you need both and what we're doing is cutting off our nose to spite our face.

Apples and oranges. You seem to be making up arguments that a new school would have to be accompanied by a county-wide redistricting, when FCPS has repeatedly opened new schools in the past without doing so.

I don't want to pay for or send my kids to monster-sized high schools, so a protest vote to send a message that FCPS needs to revisit its capital spending program is not cutting off my nose to spite my face. It's a message for them to go back to the drawing board and come up with something better.

But you can't put the toothpaste back into the tube, PP.

FCPS spent millions expanding capacity. They aren't going to build a new school so the neighboring schools can be hundreds of seats under capacity while having other parts of the county with schools that are massively oversubscribed. FCPS is one unit, one district. Facilities is going to use the space it has and will shuffle a whole bunch of schools around to make the most of the resources it has. That's actually responsible resource management. Building a school and leaving its neighbors unsubscribed and not addressing crowding is a prime example of poor resource management. If the seats are there and the boundaries can be changed, the county will likely use what they have and make the most of it.

The reason why the new high school isn't being pushed is that there isn't support for redistricting to alleviate crowding. People want 2000 student schools. But FCPS has made the conscious choice to abandon that model because it's inefficient in their eyes and they can get more for their money by using bigger campuses.

[Anonymous]

FCPS has more than enough kids to open a new high school and not expand these five schools further. What is your point?

[Anonymous]

The reason why the new high school isn't being pushed is that there isn't support for redistricting to alleviate crowding. People want 2000 student schools. But FCPS has made the conscious choice to abandon that model because it's inefficient in their eyes and they can get more for their money by using bigger campuses.

There wasn't support for redistricting when they did South Lakes. The "2000" member high school was just a ploy to justify the boundary change. That's what the SB does--decide what they wish to do and then make a rule to justify it.

Kind of like the name change for Stuart. Evans and Hynes kept changing the rules.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FCPS has more than enough kids to open a new high school and not expand these five schools further. What is your point?

But don't you see, the schools already expanded and the capacity is already there. They do not want to waste with they have already created.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS has more than enough kids to open a new high school and not expand these five schools further. What is your point?

But don't you see, the schools already expanded and the capacity is already there. They do not want to waste with they have already created.

In that case, they should have taken the new western county HS out of the CIP years ago, and not strung people along with the hope/fiction that their kids might one day go to a reasonably sized high school.

In either event, I will be voting against the 2017 bond.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS has more than enough kids to open a new high school and not expand these five schools further. What is your point?

But don't you see, the schools already expanded and the capacity is already there. They do not want to waste with they have already created.

The bond is to expand 5 more high schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS has more than enough kids to open a new high school and not expand these five schools further. What is your point?

But don't you see, the schools already expanded and the capacity is already there. They do not want to waste with they have already created.

The bond is to expand 5 more high schools.

No, you don't get it. They only have to look at the existing surplus capacity if they are building a new school. It's fine to ignore it and build additions.

[Anonymous]

If the ideal school size was 2000 then why the hell did they expand westfield to fit 3000 kids? thats ridiculously large.

[Anonymous]

Poor stewardship - expanding West Potomac without first sending some students to Mt. Vernon and Hayfield. Both have space. The FCPS School Board is afraid to shuffle students when some may end up in poorer or less desirable schools. Having an elected school board, as opposed to an appointed school board, may be part of the problem. They realize they will suffer at the ballot box for messing with the boundaries.

By the way, the average enrollment at the 25 FCPS high schools is almost 2300 (2293). A long way from 2000. In fact, only Lee (1742), Jefferson (1786, controlled population), and Langley (1945) fall below 2000. Yes, Lee's enrollment is 551 less than the county average. Lake Braddock (2811), with the largest enrollment, has almost 1100 more students than Lee.

I will vote no on the school bond.