APS boundary process this fall?

[Anonymous]

There are about 300 kids in the MS immersion program. How many of those are native Spanish speakers by MS? I bet less than half.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

Where would they move it? Kenmore, and then bus a bunch of Kenmore to WMS?

Immersion to Swanson, it’s the middle of the county and then bus Swanson kids to WMS. Swanson is actually closer to WMS than Hamm is to WMS.

They could move the Swanson kids who track to Yorktown to WMS.

That’s nearly half the school and the houses that directly surround the school. People are not going to go for that. They need to peel off some Swanson and some Hamm that are on the outside of those zones. Sorry Hamm some of your snowflakes are going to have to get on a bus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are about 300 kids in the MS immersion program. How many of those are native Spanish speakers by MS? I bet less than half.

I think you're wrong about this. The largest proportion of kids who stay in immersion now are already zoned for Gunston.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are about 300 kids in the MS immersion program. How many of those are native Spanish speakers by MS? I bet less than half.

I think you're wrong about this. The largest proportion of kids who stay in immersion now are already zoned for Gunston.

There are a lot of non-Hispanic kids zoned for Gunston.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are about 300 kids in the MS immersion program. How many of those are native Spanish speakers by MS? I bet less than half.

I think you're wrong about this. The largest proportion of kids who stay in immersion now are already zoned for Gunston.

There are a lot of non-Hispanic kids zoned for Gunston.

The stat I could find is that 36% of Immersion students at Gunston are still getting ESL supports. But that doesn't include the native speakers who already passed the test to graduate from the ESL program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

Can someone post a link to that part of the policy? I recall, as was debated at length on this forum, that demographics was moved off of the priority list. Walkability and keeping neighborhoods together was prioritized.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

Can someone post a link to that part of the policy? I recall, as was debated at length on this forum, that demographics was moved off of the priority list. Walkability and keeping neighborhoods together was prioritized.

Moving Immersion to WMS:

Improved demographic balance and WMS not 100% white

Keeps walkability for neighborhood schools around WMS and keeps neighborhoods together.

Seems like a home run for all the policy priorities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

Can someone post a link to that part of the policy? I recall, as was debated at length on this forum, that demographics was moved off of the priority list. Walkability and keeping neighborhoods together was prioritized.

Moving Immersion to WMS:

Improved demographic balance and WMS not 100% white

Keeps walkability for neighborhood schools around WMS and keeps neighborhoods together.

Seems like a home run for all the policy priorities.

Alignment is still a factor, as far as I know. The MS immersion program feeds into the HS immersion program that’s housed at Wakefield.

If immersion goes to WMS, this small group of kids then go to off to Wakefield for high school. This means Wakefield would have students from Gunston, Kenmore, TJ, and Williamsburg. This seems like the opposite of alignment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

Can someone post a link to that part of the policy? I recall, as was debated at length on this forum, that demographics was moved off of the priority list. Walkability and keeping neighborhoods together was prioritized.

Moving Immersion to WMS:

Improved demographic balance and WMS not 100% white

Keeps walkability for neighborhood schools around WMS and keeps neighborhoods together.

Seems like a home run for all the policy priorities.

Alignment is still a factor, as far as I know. The MS immersion program feeds into the HS immersion program that’s housed at Wakefield.

If immersion goes to WMS, this small group of kids then go to off to Wakefield for high school. This means Wakefield would have students from Gunston, Kenmore, TJ, and Williamsburg. This seems like the opposite of alignment.

In the brand new boundary policy last year alignment and walkability were prioritized, for better or worse. But that is in terms of boundaries not option programs.

However, PP makes a good point since Williamsburg doesn’t funnel into Wakefield. When immersion was originally at Williamsburg, the high school immersion program may not have been developed yet. If alignment is the determining factor, that leaves the only option as Kenmore. TJ has an IB program so that won’t work.

How many immersion students choose to do immersion at Wakefield? Is it the vast majority? Or do most go to HB, tech, or their zoned high school? Maybe immersion should just move to Yorktown to help fill up that school and relieve Wakefield?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

APS doesn’t really care about desegregation or segregation one way or the other as we’ve all seen. Especially now that it has been deprioritized via the new boundary policy. Case in point—remember when APS moved immersion out of Key to the old ATS site.

APS will choose Williamsburg, Swanson, Kenmore, or whatever school based on the current priorities which deprioritize demographics. Also, for legal reasons, race cannot be considered a factor.

That's contrary to the APS Policy on Boundaries. The recent revision in 2023 added demographics as an important factor.

Can someone post a link to that part of the policy? I recall, as was debated at length on this forum, that demographics was moved off of the priority list. Walkability and keeping neighborhoods together was prioritized.

Moving Immersion to WMS:

Improved demographic balance and WMS not 100% white

Keeps walkability for neighborhood schools around WMS and keeps neighborhoods together.

Seems like a home run for all the policy priorities.

Alignment is still a factor, as far as I know. The MS immersion program feeds into the HS immersion program that’s housed at Wakefield.

If immersion goes to WMS, this small group of kids then go to off to Wakefield for high school. This means Wakefield would have students from Gunston, Kenmore, TJ, and Williamsburg. This seems like the opposite of alignment.

Alignment is for neighborhood schools. There isn’t any alignment for ATS, Campbell , Tech, or IB alignment is the 1/3 of TJ aligned with WL.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

People are upset about the Heights not because it was new, it’s because they way way overspent on a small fancy building.

When that location was going to be a 1300 seat neighborhood middle school, they had a very generic box building for the design.

Then when it became HB the pivoted to a boutique award winning architect to make it a show case building (and the APS staff in charge of it used that project to land a better job elsewhere, I forget his name).

It’s ridiculous that HB with 700 students had the largest middle school plot of land when our county is desperate for space. If they had simply expanded HB program, that might have alleviated a lot of overcrowding and made planning simpler. But its model requires a small school.

That's not specific to HB. That's what APS has done with all the new buildings, neighborhood or not, didn't you know that? Have you seen Discovery?

If you disagree with overspending on buildings, I am with you, but don't try to blame HB.

I blame HB for not expanding their program, and the excess for the Heights far far exceeds any other renovation. It was because it was for “HBW” — their show case program of private school size for public school cost.

It's so inconsistent to give HB the tiniest parcel in the county and then demand that it expand. How? Where? Have you been there? There is no room.

Also, you are either unaware or don't care that the building also houses the Shriver program. This program is for kids with severe special needs. Many are in wheelchairs. The building was built to meet their needs. That's just going to be more expensive. That's how it is. APS has a responsibility to educate these kids. So no your narrative that APS built a palace for HB is just plain wrong. They didn't even finish the floors!

HBW is 700 students. It was going to be a 1300 seat neighborhood middle school. Even with Shriver, there was some number between 0 and 600 that they could have expanded. The costs weren’t high because of wheel chair access, but very on brand for HBW parents to use the Shriver kids as shields — it’s a pattern on many prior threads.

So first you ignore the Shriver program altogether like it doesn't exist then you come right back with accusing HB of using it as "on brand." Sorry, no. You're just an HB hater.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

It's on the opposite end of the county from the majority of the Hispanic population, so would involve significant busing and would prevent parent engagement by many of the Hispanic parents. There is not a large existing Hispanic community at WMS so it would not be considered a welcoming community. The school does not have a significant existing Hispanic community, so there are insufficient resources to support an immersion program, e.g., Spanish language library books, bilingual guidance counselors and administrators. There is no significant synergy with existing ESL services where teachers can service students in immersion and receiving ESL services, given the very limited number of other Spanish language ESL students at WMS.

Isn’t it 50/50, so like half the kids aren’t Spanish speaking so being near Hispanic populations is hardly a deal breaker

They can move the library books for heaven’s sake. You probably need one bilingual counselor.

WMS won’t be “welcoming”?? You are just making stuff up here.

but, but, but the library books!!!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

It's a little funny that APS has signaled their intention to move some of the people in the neighborhoods close to/north of Hamm to Williamsburg to make room for people in the R-B corridor at Hamm. We just keep going in circles.

That is so DOA. They are moving Immersion to WMS.

Jeeze, Taylor parents are persistent. That idea has only appeared here, touted by a few disgruntled Taylor parents, with absolutely no traction within APS admin. There are about a million other better solves than that harebrained idea.

DP. No skin in this game. What's wrong with moving Immersion to WMS? WMS is underenrolled. Last I heard Gunston was over.

The popular middle school Immersion Program actually began at Williamsburg. It would be going back to where it all started. It only moved to Gunston because Williamsburg was overcrowded and Gunston under enrolled. Option programs can move to where there is room. That’s been APS policy for decades now.

Link to the policy? You made that up. It's not an APS policy.

I didn’t mean to mislead. Option programs have moved to where there has been room over the decades. Policy or not, that has always happened since option programs were first created in the 70s through the last option program moves about 4 years ago. There certainly is no policy against moving option programs.

APS may very well move MS immersion, but they won't move it to WMS. That looks like desegregation busing.

Where would they move it? Kenmore, and then bus a bunch of Kenmore to WMS?

Immersion to Swanson, it’s the middle of the county and then bus Swanson kids to WMS. Swanson is actually closer to WMS than Hamm is to WMS.

They could move the Swanson kids who track to Yorktown to WMS.

That’s nearly half the school and the houses that directly surround the school. People are not going to go for that. They need to peel off some Swanson and some Hamm that are on the outside of those zones. Sorry Hamm some of your snowflakes are going to have to get on a bus.

Enjoy the WMS cave!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Voluntary transfers are not an adequate solution when a school like Williamsburg - at 80% capacity - is allowed to decide that it only wants to take 10 transfers. Swanson is still left overcrowded and Williamsburg only made a symbolic gesture in taking a few extra kids. Why does APS allow this? So the richest middle school in the county is also the least crowded by a long shot? We are a Glebe family and, due to the voluntary transfers, what would be about a 50/50 split between Hamm and Swanson ends up being probably a 80/20 split with several kids left disappointed and on the wait list for transferring to Hamm. Just let them all transfer or none of them - or better yet, switch the PUs to Hamm so that some kids aren’t left behind.

What do you mean by richest? You do understand that APS doesn’t give any extra money to the schools when it accepts transfers. They don’t get to hire any more teachers or any additional staff. Schools are told how much money they have and then the school makes a decision about transfers. If APS really wanted to use transfers to help it would have to give schools money based on number of students after transfers are factored in. Please learn how things work before spouting off about how schools don’t take 20% more students.

I assume they meant richest as in that’s where the wealthiest people in the county live. Speaking of not spouting off when you don’t understand how things work, if they accepted more student, they would hire more teachers. That’s been a complaint at Williamsburg, classes are quite large because they don’t have enough students for an additional team or more sections.

That’s not terribly accurate. What is true is that Williamsburg is no longer zoned to neighborhoods with more affordable housing types.

And yes, the large class sizes have been a serious problem there. The building is also quite old and in need of a complete rebuild (along with TJ).

And Swanson and Gunston.

Middle schools across the board except Hamm and Kenmore are in rough shape.

Swanson could definitely use a renovation but as a designated historic building, the front lawn and the facade can’t be altered.

Hopefully the boundaries and building renovation/rebuild pipeline gets figured out soon. All the APS focus has been on option programs it seems. Montessori, Tech, etc., and not the neighborhood schools.

Uh, the focus was never on options in recent decades, and then in the last four years it suddenly had to be. The Career Center had to be finalized to meet HS seat planning that was delayed from a decade before. That also meant addressing Montessori, which is in one of the worst buildings. Meanwhile, APS like many other school districts put long range Capital improvement planning on hold during pandemic. Now it has restarted. I agree the MS (where my kid is now) need to be addressed, but they will.

The only reason APS got a new building was that the community wanted to kick HB out of its very old building to put a neighborhood middle school there. That wasn't the original plan. The new building was supposed to be for a new neighborhood middle school, but parents didn't like that plan and wanted the HB building/plot. So HB had to move. Then after HB got a new building on that plot that no one else wanted, the revisionist history is that APS focused on options as expense of neighborhood. But really it was the other way around.

People are upset about the Heights not because it was new, it’s because they way way overspent on a small fancy building.

When that location was going to be a 1300 seat neighborhood middle school, they had a very generic box building for the design.

Then when it became HB the pivoted to a boutique award winning architect to make it a show case building (and the APS staff in charge of it used that project to land a better job elsewhere, I forget his name).

It’s ridiculous that HB with 700 students had the largest middle school plot of land when our county is desperate for space. If they had simply expanded HB program, that might have alleviated a lot of overcrowding and made planning simpler. But its model requires a small school.

That's not specific to HB. That's what APS has done with all the new buildings, neighborhood or not, didn't you know that? Have you seen Discovery?

If you disagree with overspending on buildings, I am with you, but don't try to blame HB.

I blame HB for not expanding their program, and the excess for the Heights far far exceeds any other renovation. It was because it was for “HBW” — their show case program of private school size for public school cost.

It's so inconsistent to give HB the tiniest parcel in the county and then demand that it expand. How? Where? Have you been there? There is no room.

Also, you are either unaware or don't care that the building also houses the Shriver program. This program is for kids with severe special needs. Many are in wheelchairs. The building was built to meet their needs. That's just going to be more expensive. That's how it is. APS has a responsibility to educate these kids. So no your narrative that APS built a palace for HB is just plain wrong. They didn't even finish the floors!

HBW is 700 students. It was going to be a 1300 seat neighborhood middle school. Even with Shriver, there was some number between 0 and 600 that they could have expanded. The costs weren’t high because of wheel chair access, but very on brand for HBW parents to use the Shriver kids as shields — it’s a pattern on many prior threads.

So first you ignore the Shriver program altogether like it doesn't exist then you come right back with accusing HB of using it as "on brand." Sorry, no. You're just an HB hater.

Shriver is independent of HBW completely. It was only located with HBW originally because they had a tiny population on a huge campus so could accommodate at the original Stratford sight. They had to move with HBW because the property would still be under construction when it became a neighborhood school, so they moved to the Heights but they are in no way associated with HBW other than sharing an address.

It was on brand because EVERY TIME people talk about expanding HBW and how it got to keep 700 students on a site originally intended for 1300, they trot out their building neighbors: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/285/1145192.page