FCPS School Board candidates in Dranesville

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone find out how likely it is that Karloutsos will even be living in VA come January 20, 2021?

Can we get an answer, please? Michael Karloutsos is a Trump official and it’s far from clear they won’t return to Philly when Trump gets the boot.

Will she pledge to stay in the area through the end of 2023, yes or no?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone find out how likely it is that Karloutsos will even be living in VA come January 20, 2021?

Can we get an answer, please? Michael Karloutsos is a Trump official and it’s far from clear they won’t return to Philly when Trump gets the boot.

Will she pledge to stay in the area through the end of 2023, yes or no?

And, can we get all the rest of them to promise that they will stay healthy and not move with their spouse? Gee, some of them might even get a promotion that requires a move elsewhere.

Plenty of people come here to work in an administration and move on locally to other things. Even when the administration stays the same. Didn't Janie's husband begin here by working on the hill--many, many years ago?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More candidates probably responded to Mcspaces because it's not blatantly partisan like Voices of Fairfax. VOF is a front for Republicans from the Langley district. Although a few were apparently Democrats in the Nixon era.

School Board is supposed to be bipartisan. I am pretty sure that lots of Great Falls residents who support VOF also vote for Dems, by the way.

I just read the responses on the mcspaces. The weakest responses were from Omeish and Keys-Gamarra. (Keys-Gamarra is on the current board and tried to explain away its actions. What was her commitment to the vote considered by Strauss in January?)

Tholen's response did not seem to support any short term action. That bothers me.

I thought that the best responses were from Anastasia and Rachna.

No matter what the party endorsement , The Anastasia and The Rachel are quite similar. Both are practical and will not restrain themselves on bringing an amendment or advancing an issue or challenging staff and Queen Bee Cliques. Coming up with ideas to draw down Mclean enrollment via expanding a transfer reg or putting in programs is cheaper than the West Potomac Solution on overcapacity.

Dranesville District has some high poverty schools bordering Loudoun County near Sully District. If a trailer costs 40k that money could have been used as a 40k infusion at Hutchison.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone find out how likely it is that Karloutsos will even be living in VA come January 20, 2021?

Can we get an answer, please? Michael Karloutsos is a Trump official and it’s far from clear they won’t return to Philly when Trump gets the boot.

Will she pledge to stay in the area through the end of 2023, yes or no?

And, can we get all the rest of them to promise that they will stay healthy and not move with their spouse? Gee, some of them might even get a promotion that requires a move elsewhere.

Plenty of people come here to work in an administration and move on locally to other things. Even when the administration stays the same. Didn't Janie's husband begin here by working on the hill--many, many years ago?

PP's question called for a yes or no response relating to Karloutsos, a specific candidate whose spouse is a political appointee in the current Administration.

Realistically, the Democrats will retain at least 8-4 control of the School Board. I'd rather have someone like Tholen, who works well than others, than another SB member like Schultz and Wilson. They just seem to have knee-jerk reactions to oppose everything the other School Board members support, even when it's something as obvious as providing relief to an overcrowded high school.

[Anonymous]

Realistically, the Democrats will retain at least 8-4 control of the School Board. I'd rather have someone like Tholen, who works well than others, than another SB member like Schultz and Wilson. They just seem to have knee-jerk reactions to oppose everything the other School Board members support, even when it's something as obvious as providing relief to an overcrowded high school.

By all means. We need more lemmings on the Board. Ten is not enough. And, FWIW, Schultz pointed out the problems with waiting for the boundary policy to be revised. She was the one most actively challenging it. And, there are other schools with capacity problems--including elementary, This is not just a high school issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Realistically, the Democrats will retain at least 8-4 control of the School Board. I'd rather have someone like Tholen, who works well than others, than another SB member like Schultz and Wilson. They just seem to have knee-jerk reactions to oppose everything the other School Board members support, even when it's something as obvious as providing relief to an overcrowded high school.

By all means. We need more lemmings on the Board. Ten is not enough. And, FWIW, Schultz pointed out the problems with waiting for the boundary policy to be revised. She was the one most actively challenging it. And, there are other schools with capacity problems--including elementary, This is not just a high school issue.

Schultz's positions on boundary issues have been confrontational, not helpful. She only went after Brabrand for putting a halt to administrative boundary changes when she thought it would play well with the One Great Falls crowd. No one thinks she cared about overcrowding at schools outside her district before then.

And when specific efforts were made to address the overcrowding at McLean, she objected. Her biggest complaint was that Centreville was also overcrowded, which may be true, but (1) Centreville, unlike McLean, is scheduled for a major addition and renovation in the future; (2) there are no schools near Centreville with as much excess capacity as Langley; and (3) it's not like she ever proposed a boundary study to move Centreville kids to other schools (in fact, she was largely AWOL from the Board when the last CIP was adopted). So lots of posturing, but nothing to show.

We don't really need Schultz 2.0 in Dranesville. It's bad enough to watch Springfield suffer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More candidates probably responded to Mcspaces because it's not blatantly partisan like Voices of Fairfax. VOF is a front for Republicans from the Langley district. Although a few were apparently Democrats in the Nixon era.

Do Republicans even exist in GF? With the except of two, all the people I know in GF are devout Democrats. That being said, party politics need to be removed from the school board, so people can focus on educating our kids. There’s too much meta gaming with politics going on.

Langley area and especially GF consistently votes primarily for R candidates in SB elections. Strauss got re-elected w/support from Herndon, McLean and Marshall areas.

This year should be no different, at least if Dranesville isn't to end up with a SB rep who only cares about Langley pyramid and sees other areas as after-thought.

If they’re voting R in school board elections, and D in other elections, I suspect they are hoping a balance of political thought might be needed. The Ds I know in GF would cut off a limb or two before voting R.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More candidates probably responded to Mcspaces because it's not blatantly partisan like Voices of Fairfax. VOF is a front for Republicans from the Langley district. Although a few were apparently Democrats in the Nixon era.

Do Republicans even exist in GF? With the except of two, all the people I know in GF are devout Democrats. That being said, party politics need to be removed from the school board, so people can focus on educating our kids. There’s too much meta gaming with politics going on.

Langley area and especially GF consistently votes primarily for R candidates in SB elections. Strauss got re-elected w/support from Herndon, McLean and Marshall areas.

This year should be no different, at least if Dranesville isn't to end up with a SB rep who only cares about Langley pyramid and sees other areas as after-thought.

If they’re voting R in school board elections, and D in other elections, I suspect they are hoping a balance of political thought might be needed. The Ds I know in GF would cut off a limb or two before voting R.

A D voting for Karloutsos is getting someone with Trump Administration ties who only cares about the wealthiest pyramid in the county. That’s about as R as you can get.

[Anonymous]

The current board let McLean stay overcrowded.

In fact, they INSISTED on it.

Pat hynes is on video at the 05-13-2019 video agreeing to proceed with boundary studies for a few elementary schools as long as the board "holds itself accountable" for no new studies until "the process is improved strategically" (until the policy is revised)

[Anonymous]

Putting Langley and McLean on p.46 with vague language allows them a good chance to accomplish that.

If parents are satisfied, and stop paying attention they have a chance at passing the new policy and including both schools in their new county wide plan.

If parents get angry they can point to the CIP and say the ammendment makes no promises.

[Anonymous]

They will be able to point to the new policy and say that they have to follow the rules, they were studying McLean all along and since the process wasn't finished the two schools have to be considered in the new policy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They will be able to point to the new policy and say that they have to follow the rules, they were studying McLean all along and since the process wasn't finished the two schools have to be considered in the new policy.

I can be indignant that the School Board didn't plan better and allowed McLean to get overcrowded, or expanded Langley when it was McLean that actually needed the addition.

I can be relieved that the Board is finally taking steps to address the overcrowding and, hopefully, balance the enrollments starting next fall.

What I won't do is assume the worst-case scenario merely because some right-wing groups make stuff up and think that might be a path to getting some R candidates elected to lower-level positions when they aren't competitive in other state and local contests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They will be able to point to the new policy and say that they have to follow the rules, they were studying McLean all along and since the process wasn't finished the two schools have to be considered in the new policy.

I can be indignant that the School Board didn't plan better and allowed McLean to get overcrowded, or expanded Langley when it was McLean that actually needed the addition.

I can be relieved that the Board is finally taking steps to address the overcrowding and, hopefully, balance the enrollments starting next fall.

What I won't do is assume the worst-case scenario merely because some right-wing groups make stuff up and think that might be a path to getting some R candidates elected to lower-level positions when they aren't competitive in other state and local contests.

It's a myth that this is just right wing parents who are upset. Listen to the Board members at those work sessions. Don't be deceived. Your child could be bused out of your own community. It's not just busing in, it is also busing out. And, it won't be limited to high schools.

The policy should be:
capacity
commute time
distance
community
SES

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They will be able to point to the new policy and say that they have to follow the rules, they were studying McLean all along and since the process wasn't finished the two schools have to be considered in the new policy.

I can be indignant that the School Board didn't plan better and allowed McLean to get overcrowded, or expanded Langley when it was McLean that actually needed the addition.

I can be relieved that the Board is finally taking steps to address the overcrowding and, hopefully, balance the enrollments starting next fall.

What I won't do is assume the worst-case scenario merely because some right-wing groups make stuff up and think that might be a path to getting some R candidates elected to lower-level positions when they aren't competitive in other state and local contests.

It's a myth that this is just right wing parents who are upset. Listen to the Board members at those work sessions. Don't be deceived. Your child could be bused out of your own community. It's not just busing in, it is also busing out. And, it won't be limited to high schools.

The policy should be:
capacity
commute time
distance
community
SES

Community/contiguous boundaries

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They will be able to point to the new policy and say that they have to follow the rules, they were studying McLean all along and since the process wasn't finished the two schools have to be considered in the new policy.

I can be indignant that the School Board didn't plan better and allowed McLean to get overcrowded, or expanded Langley when it was McLean that actually needed the addition.

I can be relieved that the Board is finally taking steps to address the overcrowding and, hopefully, balance the enrollments starting next fall.

What I won't do is assume the worst-case scenario merely because some right-wing groups make stuff up and think that might be a path to getting some R candidates elected to lower-level positions when they aren't competitive in other state and local contests.

I employ logic and consider it very likely that the same board who wanted McLean to wait for their nuclear option---I mean, "comprehensive boundary review" still has that same desire.

I read p.46 of the CIP and saw that it isn't a guarantee.

I read the amendment and saw that it considers McLean and Langley for adjustment without stating that the adjustment would only be between those schools.

I saw no proposed implementation date.

I have no reason to trust that the same people who wanted to keep McLean overcrowded and Langley underenrolled until the new policy passed that would prioritize demographics above all else (and tried to hide that fact) are now suddenly acting in good faith.