In my crystal ball (which is cloudy, to be sure), I see S Fairlington moving to Drew in 2021 and in the longer term some of kids closer to Columbia Pike moving to Barcroft. They need to actually build an addition first, though. |
Maybe, maybe not. They’ll only have money in the CIP for some things. They may need to spend some of it on expanding the ATS site for immersion. And they might expand/renovate Campbell, Barcroft, or Randolph. I think those were the 3 smaller, older schools that will be considered for renovation and expansion. I don’t know that Barcroft will be their first choice, or that they’d put an addition on only to bus poor kids across the Pike to a higher poverty ES. Doesn’t really make sense from a walkability or transportation standpoint, and certainly not from a demographic standpoint. No matter what, there will be Abingdon kids moving, and Drew is the only adjacent school that is significantly under capacity and projected to remain so for the foreseeable future. |
+1000 |
+1 |
Not as many changes as if the programs don't move ... |
Yep. There’s a good chance we will change schools possibly with only a small portion of our current school. It would be a bummer, but my child can adapt, so I’m not going to throw a tantrum if it makes sense for the broader community. |
| We will have a tough decision to make if our option school moves. I'm not throwing a tantrum either, but the county has no idea how the moves will impact the option programs. |
Which school? |
Either way it sounds like they didn’t pick it for the pedagogy. If a option program isn’t strong enough to survive a 2 mile move, why are we putting so many resources into it? |
I’m open to the possibility that moving option schools would present a significant burden to people, but it would be helpful to know what those significant burdens actually are. I think APS is sincere in their desire to provide supports during the transition, but people need to be willing to discuss their situations. |
| Because these schools close the opportunity gap. Because our community can afford to do so. Because these schools help relieve overcrowding. Like many other families, option school families also have jobs and commutes and transportation logistics to consider. |
I don't think option schools are necessary more expensive. There may be more busing, but where we live there is no neighborhood school we can walk to anyways. |
We need extra buses to go to the extra schools though. |
I wonder how many, though. How many ATS students live in the walk zones for other schools? If there’s a neighborhood school two blocks from your house, your neighborhood vs option calculus may be different than if your kid is going to end up on a bus either way. |
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If my kids weren't taking a packed bus (3-kids per seat this year) to an option school, they would still be taking up seats in our even further away and just as crowded neighborhood school. So options schools are not really extra schools because those seats still need to come from somewhere.
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