Mount Vernon?
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Anonymous
I could be wrong, but my sense is that both Marshall and South Lakes are very invested in their IB programs. They get pupil placements from surrounding AP schools that boost their enrollments and test scores, and people in both communities would fight very hard to keep IB. Robinson has a big IB program, too, but I'd bet most (not all) parents there would favor having a full menu of AP courses over IB and a handful of AP courses, which is what they have currently. Fairfax Station and Clifton are fairly conservative areas, and areas like that tend to prefer AP over IB given a choice. As for the other five schools, shrinking IB from five to one or two schools would make sense. I'd keep IB at Lee, since Edison has the Edison Academy, and maybe Stuart, but get rid of it at Annandale, Edison and Mount Vernon. It would attract more IB students to Lee and stem pupil placements from the other IB schools to AP schools like Woodson, Lake Braddock and West Potomac. But this is FCPS, so none of this will ever be up for reconsideration. It would be tantamount to conceding that FCPS made a bad decision installing IB at so many schools, and FCPS never acknowledges mistakes. |
Anonymous
To the pp- no. It's not so Saratoga can be shifted away. The point is that other sfh neighborhoods currently zoned wshs need to be rezoned to the under enrolled Lee. That would help the demographics at that school and relieve the over crowding at wshs. |
Anonymous
That's a good point. I do think if it was built as a cost cutting measure, they might try this. I don't know what IB participation rates at Marshall and South Lakes looks like, but I do think you could probably get away with a single IB school (i.e. Lee) to serve South County, Lake Braddock, West Springfield, Mount Vernon, West Potomac, Edison, Annadale, Woodson. I imagine if you were to limit the school to solely IB, you could probably even absorb capacity from Robinson (many parents would likely have their kids switch to AP to avoid bussing). |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
| Given that fcps just rezoned the closest single family/townhome neighborhood to WSHS, it is completely unlikely they will move them back or rezone a neighborhood that is even farther away over to Lee. |
Anonymous
| A lot of this discussion about messing around with West Springfield's compact boundaries to accommodate Lee seems like a useless, hypothetical exercise to determine how many people can be squeezed onto the Titanic. |
Anonymous
I think it works better if IB is in a school that's also an academy school. |
Anonymous
Not really. IB is very prescriptive so the diploma candidates don't have as much discretion in picking electives. Probably the only argument for doing so would be that IB is considered weaker in math/science, so adding some STEM courses to an academy helps address that concern. |
Anonymous
No, it's not. The Western part of the County already has to bus kids for an hour each way for TJ. Putting the County's second HS magnet in the Eastern part of the County too really is inequitable. If there is a second magnet school, it should either in the Western part of the County (like South Lakes) or it should be centrally located. Besides, Lee has done a sh$tty job of implementing IB. Almost no one at Lee manages to get the full diploma. Nobody is going to bus for Lee's program. Now, what might make sense is to take the 5 IB schools clustered together and reduce them to one-- probably Edison, because they have the strongest program of the 5. And keep Robinson, South Lakes and Marshall, all of which have strong programs. |
Anonymous
Really? Looking at School Profiles, IB participation is pretty high. I don't think there is a school large enough to hold all those 11th and 12th graders. |
Anonymous
+1- only one because I only had one vote in the last election. So disappointed many of the same board members were reelected. |
Anonymous
Total IB Participation in 2014-15 is 4,388 students. |
Anonymous
The PP probably meant to limit the IB school only to students pursuing full IB diplomas, which would get you to a smaller number. |
Anonymous
% participation by school and Building Utilization Ranking Annandale 48.8% #23 Edison 48.1% #19 Lee 46.2% #24 Marshall 65.5% #11 Mount Vernon 36.9% #25 Robinson 72.9% #16 South Lakes 58.3% #3 Stuart 56.5% #13 |
Anonymous
But why limit it? Is AP limited only to those students who pursue nine AP courses (roughly equivalent to three 2-yr HL courses + three 1-yr SL courses)? |