The demise of McKinley ES (APS)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Way to misrepresent what happened. It wasn't a petition to keep people out, it was a petition to adjust boundaries before anyone had actually moved so that Nottingham wouldn't be at 120% capacity after Discovery opened. You can't bitch about the current overcrowding situation at McKinley and in the next breath attack Nottingham for not wanting that kind of overcrowding either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are some PUs moving schools 3 times during elementary school years? How can they go from Nottingham->McK->Reed within 6 years? Will the SB let that happen?

The last of the elementary moves from when Discovery opened happened in fall 2015. No one who was in elementary school then will still be in elementary school when the new boundaries go into effect in fall 2021. No students are moving twice due to boundary changes.

Yes, some of the posters here are families who will be moved twice. Sorry, but that’s not a big deal, so what if you had to get used to a new school and don’t want to do it again.
Seriously grandfathering would make a lot of people happy I’m this case. Just grandfather 3rd grade and up, and siblings. There would be a whole lot less push back.
For the McKinley folks, if they grandfathered third grade and up (so current first graders and up) to reed, would you be happy?

Grandfathering, especially for that many years, would defeat the purpose of this exercise because school enrollment would be all over the place and out of APS's control.

Some families have 4 kids are in the elementary schools for over 15 years. Should their planning units be exempt from moving more than once in the span of 15 years so that family doesn't have to experience two moves?

You totally missed the point of my post. The family with four kids doesn’t get moved, they stay put, but all their neighbors do. They probably have a stronger opinion of where they go then their neighbors who don’t have kids in school do. The planning unit they live in gets moved many times, because people who would have raised a stink don’t care (since they are grandfathered). They did this for highschool a few years ago. There’s maybe two years where things are out of whack, but the boundaries are a little more sensible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

Thanks for this background, PP. So I guess McKinley parents would be happy if Nottingham was overcrowded instead of McKinley?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are some PUs moving schools 3 times during elementary school years? How can they go from Nottingham->McK->Reed within 6 years? Will the SB let that happen?

The last of the elementary moves from when Discovery opened happened in fall 2015. No one who was in elementary school then will still be in elementary school when the new boundaries go into effect in fall 2021. No students are moving twice due to boundary changes.

Yes, some of the posters here are families who will be moved twice. Sorry, but that’s not a big deal, so what if you had to get used to a new school and don’t want to do it again.
Seriously grandfathering would make a lot of people happy I’m this case. Just grandfather 3rd grade and up, and siblings. There would be a whole lot less push back.
For the McKinley folks, if they grandfathered third grade and up (so current first graders and up) to reed, would you be happy?

Grandfathering, especially for that many years, would defeat the purpose of this exercise because school enrollment would be all over the place and out of APS's control.

Some families have 4 kids are in the elementary schools for over 15 years. Should their planning units be exempt from moving more than once in the span of 15 years so that family doesn't have to experience two moves?

You totally missed the point of my post. The family with four kids doesn’t get moved, they stay put, but all their neighbors do. They probably have a stronger opinion of where they go then their neighbors who don’t have kids in school do. The planning unit they live in gets moved many times, because people who would have raised a stink don’t care (since they are grandfathered). They did this for highschool a few years ago. There’s maybe two years where things are out of whack, but the boundaries are a little more sensible.

I don't think you understand how grandfathering works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

Thanks for this background, PP. So I guess McKinley parents would be happy if Nottingham was overcrowded instead of McKinley?

Yes. At least this one would. Just being honest. We've lived with it for way too many. Time to pass the buck. Don't care if I'm politically correct. I'm fed up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

Thanks for this background, PP. So I guess McKinley parents would be happy if Nottingham was overcrowded instead of McKinley?

Yes. At least this one would. Just being honest. We've lived with it for way too many. Time to pass the buck. Don't care if I'm politically correct. I'm fed up.

Wow.

[Anonymous]

You haven't failed in being "politically correct." You've failed in being polite. So rewrite that: "Don't care about being polite. I'm fed up." I'm so tired of people equating "politically correct" with "polite." This is how we get Trump. You disagree without being rude, nasty and mean spirited. Or, at least you used to be able to do so in this country and this county.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

Thanks for this background, PP. So I guess McKinley parents would be happy if Nottingham was overcrowded instead of McKinley?

Yes. At least this one would. Just being honest. We've lived with it for way too many. Time to pass the buck. Don't care if I'm politically correct. I'm fed up.

And for several years before Discovery opened, Nottingham was one of the most overcrowded schools in APS, at 140% capacity. So by your reasoning, it was McKinleys turn and what’s fair is fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

I had no dog in that fight and can tell you that it’s not just McK parents who remember how the Nottingham PTA in particular acted back then, and threw McK under the bus with open eyes. It clearly bothers you that you’re remembered for that, but that’s life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

I had no dog in that fight and can tell you that it’s not just McK parents who remember how the Nottingham PTA in particular acted back then, and threw McK under the bus with open eyes. It clearly bothers you that you’re remembered for that, but that’s life.

So I guess you want to rehash. It's so obvious that you're a McKinley parent. No one else cares, especially after all this time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

I had no dog in that fight and can tell you that it’s not just McK parents who remember how the Nottingham PTA in particular acted back then, and threw McK under the bus with open eyes. It clearly bothers you that you’re remembered for that, but that’s life.

So I guess you want to rehash. It's so obvious that you're a McKinley parent. No one else cares, especially after all this time.

+1. This thread is draining every bit of sympathy I had for McKinley.

[Anonymous]

It's really not about payback. It's about what makes sense for the whole county. And for once, I think that's what APS has proposed. I really have not seen a compelling case for why either of these proposals is off base when you balance the transportation, the need to balance enrollment and the desire to keep as many kids together as possible. Yes, the balancing part willl have to play out in boundaries, but the rest of it is already there and makes a ton of sense.

[Anonymous]

Fine, fine, McK and Nottingham. So, who's turn is it for overcrowding? Tuckahoe? Discovery?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's really not about payback. It's about what makes sense for the whole county. And for once, I think that's what APS has proposed. I really have not seen a compelling case for why either of these proposals is off base when you balance the transportation, the need to balance enrollment and the desire to keep as many kids together as possible. Yes, the balancing part willl have to play out in boundaries, but the rest of it is already there and makes a ton of sense.

I just hope they can balance based on these options. A school above 100 and a school in the 80s is not OK. This would be a lot easier if one of the smaller schools was made choice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two Tuckahoe units were slated to move too Nottingham. One got switched to McKinley after Nottingham created a petition to keep people out of their school. The families that came to McK never actually made in in the front doors at Nottingham.

Nottingham did create a petition asking APS not to overcrowd it again right after moving 40% of its population to Discovery. Nottingham asked APS to balance enrollment and specifically pointed out how much capacity existed at Discovery and Jamestown. For some reason that I will never understand, APS would not send anyone to Discovery or Jamestown, and they made it a decision between sending kids to either Nottingham or McKinley. Unfortunately those were the only choices it would allow. Nottingham didn't have space and as it turned out - after an error was later discovered in APS's math - neither did McKinley. And that's how we are where we are today. Nottingham is at capacity again (but has multiple trailers), McKinley is over (but somehow only has one trailer?), and APS had to bring in preschool classes from all over the county to try to fill up Jamestown.

Some parents at McKinley are still bitter at Nottingham all these years later. Instead people really need to focus their effort on making sure staff does a much better job this time around and ACTUALLY BALANCES CAPACITY. But if you want to instead finger point at other schools and rehash something that happened 5 years ago, that's up to you.

I had no dog in that fight and can tell you that it’s not just McK parents who remember how the Nottingham PTA in particular acted back then, and threw McK under the bus with open eyes. It clearly bothers you that you’re remembered for that, but that’s life.

So I guess you want to rehash. It's so obvious that you're a McKinley parent. No one else cares, especially after all this time.

Nope, not a Mckinley parent. Just a parent sick of the backstabbing and hypocrisy, and with a working memory.