APS Engage Update Pre-CIP Report

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

What's your plan for renovating schools that need it?

The swing space for elementary schools used to be Wilson Elementary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

They don’t need the seats right now, that’s why they can use it as swing space for 5-10 years. Look at enrollment numbers, you can’t use crowding in Rosslyn to justify keeping Nottingham open in the near term. Nice try though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Build new facilities in South Arlington, where the county needs them, already!

Stop messing around with boundaries and whatnot to try to alleviate crowding in the south by moving kids north. Please.

And I live in North Arlington.

They can’t. APS has stated In published reports that they are beyond the point of building their way out of the capacity crisis. They have to work with the facilities that they have. Even if they had the capital, it takes 10 years to bring a new school online. I would expect boundary changes, relocatable classrooms, and potentially leased office space for schools in the future. They can’t build anything new. It’s not even worth discussing.

It really defies all logic to say Arlington county cannot fix this. Sure different entities within Arlington county own different parcels of land, but come on. It is all one county government.

The overcrowding has been an issue for more than a decade. Poor planning then, and continued poor planning now, makes the problem worse. Leasing space for schools is a good idea though. It would be quicker than building a new school.

I agree that that they have been terrible planners. The money spent on HB Woodlawn- a school in Rosslyn surrounded by current and projected affordable housing units- blows my mind. Those kids aren’t in the walk zone for anywhere and we could have had some type of neighborhood school there rather than a fancy option school for rich people. But I do take APS at face when they say they aren’t building more schools. I think they are going to try and be creative with existing schools and possibly leading vacant office space. G_d help us.

Do you not know the history? APS wanted to put a neighborhood school there. But the neighborhood around the now Hamm complained and lobbied very loudly, so APS caved, and they kicked HB to Rosslyn and put Hamm on HB's old site.

I remember this. The neighborhood around the then HB wanted the site, said their snowflakes couldn't go to school in Rosslyn, so they killed the plan to build a ms in Rosslyn. And we got Hamm.

I don't have a lot of sympathy for people in that neighborhood who now may have to take a bus to Williamsburg to balance capacity. They caused this situation!

I’m sure I’ll be sorry I asked, but what is wrong with Rosslyn? The new HB site is beautiful. That could have been a brand new neighborhood school in a community surrounded by multi family housing and around the corner from a metro stop (ideally it would be walkable for most but I think siting schools near public transit makes sense in our community).

If APS really caved to the parents, shame on them. I hope they repurpose that brand new school in the heart of Rosslyn as a true community resource. What a waste.

Yes HB Heights is amazing. That is NOT what the neighborhood school would have gotten. They were planning to include 300 more students for a 1000 student neighborhood school on the same plot. The airy spacious building would this be turned into a warehouse, with kids bussed from 3 miles away in rush hour Rosslyn traffic.

I actually live in Rosslyn in one of the high rises (my kids are in high school now), and there are very few kids in any of the multi family housing in Rosslyn, at least middle school or high school age. So majority of a Rosslyn middle school would come from near the Stratford site

Sure, but some of them would have come from Lyon Village, the neighborhood north of Langston, etc. There would have been walkers.

Meanwhile all the parents who insisted that their kids needed to be able to walk to MS and therefore needed the site on Vacation Lane shifted gears as soon as the decision was made and insisted the site needed to provide convenient dropoff lanes.

My kids would have gone to the Wilson Blvd 1300-student middle school, and I would have been fine with that.

Ok now I’m back on your side 🤣. I wasn’t here for this situation. But a neighborhood school in Rosslyn a block from the metro in a county that is getting incredibly urban seems like a no-brained. And yes I agree North Highlands, Lyon Village, and maybe even parts of Lyon Park could have used this school if it were a MS.

Do any of you live in the urban bits? There almost ZERO families there. It’s all DINKS and singles. That’s partly why Arlington has such a low percentage of households that have children (19%), because of all these urban households without kids. There almost no 3 bedrooms. Most apartments don’t have any playspace. The only families are in affordable housing, because they don’t have better options.

There are a lot of kids in the urban bits even if the percentage per unit is low. Why do you think we did that whole switcheroo thing a few years ago? Apparently they aren’t the kids that you think count as real people with real needs.

[Anonymous]

I think Taylor needs major renovations

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

That’s why they made Key leave its former location. Innovation and ASFS as neighborhood schools aren’t over capacity and can absorb the new students. And NES isn’t being torn down, it can be repurposed back to a neighborhood school if necessary in the future.

[Anonymous]

Not true that all of LV goes private. My block sends 5 kids. Another block near us sends 8+.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Build new facilities in South Arlington, where the county needs them, already!

Stop messing around with boundaries and whatnot to try to alleviate crowding in the south by moving kids north. Please.

And I live in North Arlington.

They can’t. APS has stated In published reports that they are beyond the point of building their way out of the capacity crisis. They have to work with the facilities that they have. Even if they had the capital, it takes 10 years to bring a new school online. I would expect boundary changes, relocatable classrooms, and potentially leased office space for schools in the future. They can’t build anything new. It’s not even worth discussing.

It really defies all logic to say Arlington county cannot fix this. Sure different entities within Arlington county own different parcels of land, but come on. It is all one county government.

The overcrowding has been an issue for more than a decade. Poor planning then, and continued poor planning now, makes the problem worse. Leasing space for schools is a good idea though. It would be quicker than building a new school.

I agree that that they have been terrible planners. The money spent on HB Woodlawn- a school in Rosslyn surrounded by current and projected affordable housing units- blows my mind. Those kids aren’t in the walk zone for anywhere and we could have had some type of neighborhood school there rather than a fancy option school for rich people. But I do take APS at face when they say they aren’t building more schools. I think they are going to try and be creative with existing schools and possibly leading vacant office space. G_d help us.

Do you not know the history? APS wanted to put a neighborhood school there. But the neighborhood around the now Hamm complained and lobbied very loudly, so APS caved, and they kicked HB to Rosslyn and put Hamm on HB's old site.

I remember this. The neighborhood around the then HB wanted the site, said their snowflakes couldn't go to school in Rosslyn, so they killed the plan to build a ms in Rosslyn. And we got Hamm.

I don't have a lot of sympathy for people in that neighborhood who now may have to take a bus to Williamsburg to balance capacity. They caused this situation!

I’m sure I’ll be sorry I asked, but what is wrong with Rosslyn? The new HB site is beautiful see. That could have been a brand new neighborhood school in a community surrounded by multi family housing and around the corner from a metro stop (ideally it would be walkable for most but I think siting schools near public transit makes sense in our community).

If APS really caved to the parents, shame on them. I hope they repurpose that brand new school in the heart of Rosslyn as a true community resource. What a waste.

Yes HB Heights is amazing. That is NOT what the neighborhood school would have gotten. They were planning to include 300 more students for a 1000 student neighborhood school on the same plot. The airy spacious building would this be turned into a warehouse, with kids bussed from 3 miles away in rush hour Rosslyn traffic.

I actually live in Rosslyn in one of the high rises (my kids are in high school now), and there are very few kids in any of the multi family housing in Rosslyn, at least middle school or high school age. So majority of a Rosslyn middle school would come from near the Stratford site

Sure, but some of them would have come from Lyon Village, the neighborhood north of Langston, etc. There would have been walkers.

Meanwhile all the parents who insisted that their kids needed to be able to walk to MS and therefore needed the site on Vacation Lane shifted gears as soon as the decision was made and insisted the site needed to provide convenient dropoff lanes.

My kids would have gone to the Wilson Blvd 1300-student middle school, and I would have been fine with that.

Ok now I’m back on your side 🤣. I wasn’t here for this situation. But a neighborhood school in Rosslyn a block from the metro in a county that is getting incredibly urban seems like a no-brained. And yes I agree North Highlands, Lyon Village, and maybe even parts of Lyon Park could have used this school if it were a MS.

Do any of you live in the urban bits? There almost ZERO families there. It’s all DINKS and singles. That’s partly why Arlington has such a low percentage of households that have children (19%), because of all these urban households without kids. There almost no 3 bedrooms. Most apartments don’t have any playspace. The only families are in affordable housing, because they don’t have better options.

There are a lot of kids in the urban bits even if the percentage per unit is low. Why do you think we did that whole switcheroo thing a few years ago? Apparently they aren’t the kids that you think count as real people with real needs.

Sorry I meant middle and high school kids. Even the affordable housing families tend to leave after a decade there for something bigger.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

That’s why they made Key leave its former location. Innovation and ASFS as neighborhood schools aren’t over capacity and can absorb the new students. And NES isn’t being torn down, it can be repurposed back to a neighborhood school if necessary in the future.

ASFS will be over capacity soon. The first year after the boundary change they were not, but the total number of kids there has skyrocketed right back up to capacity this past year; and expect to be over capacity in a few years given all the recent buildings opening up nearby. APS clearly mistook how many families would move to those apt buildings because they were new and in order to attend ASFS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

They don’t need the seats right now, that’s why they can use it as swing space for 5-10 years. Look at enrollment numbers, you can’t use crowding in Rosslyn to justify keeping Nottingham open in the near term. Nice try though.

Also - I would be shocked if Taylor wasn’t one of the first schools to use the swing space. The HVAC breakdown this year was ridiculous and the school still has pods that lack full walls to divide classrooms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

They don’t need the seats right now, that’s why they can use it as swing space for 5-10 years. Look at enrollment numbers, you can’t use crowding in Rosslyn to justify keeping Nottingham open in the near term. Nice try though.

Also - I would be shocked if Taylor wasn’t one of the first schools to use the swing space. The HVAC breakdown this year was ridiculous and the school still has pods that lack full walls to divide classrooms.

Prepare to be shocked. I think there are a few schools in the south older and in worse overall condition due for renovation ahead of Taylor. Plus, MPSA needs to go somewhere during redevelopment of the CC site.

[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:Build new facilities in South Arlington, where the county needs them, already!

Stop messing around with boundaries and whatnot to try to alleviate crowding in the south by moving kids north. Please.

And I live in North Arlington.

They can’t. APS has stated In published reports that they are beyond the point of building their way out of the capacity crisis. They have to work with the facilities that they have. Even if they had the capital, it takes 10 years to bring a new school online. I would expect boundary changes, relocatable classrooms, and potentially leased office space for schools in the future. They can’t build anything new. It’s not even worth discussing.

It really defies all logic to say Arlington county cannot fix this. Sure different entities within Arlington county own different parcels of land, but come on. It is all one county government.

The overcrowding has been an issue for more than a decade. Poor planning then, and continued poor planning now, makes the problem worse. Leasing space for schools is a good idea though. It would be quicker than building a new school.

I agree that that they have been terrible planners. The money spent on HB Woodlawn- a school in Rosslyn surrounded by current and projected affordable housing units- blows my mind. Those kids aren’t in the walk zone for anywhere and we could have had some type of neighborhood school there rather than a fancy option school for rich people. But I do take APS at face when they say they aren’t building more schools. I think they are going to try and be creative with existing schools and possibly leading vacant office space. G_d help us.

Do you not know the history? APS wanted to put a neighborhood school there. But the neighborhood around the now Hamm complained and lobbied very loudly, so APS caved, and they kicked HB to Rosslyn and put Hamm on HB's old site.

I remember this. The neighborhood around the then HB wanted the site, said their snowflakes couldn't go to school in Rosslyn, so they killed the plan to build a ms in Rosslyn. And we got Hamm.

I don't have a lot of sympathy for people in that neighborhood who now may have to take a bus to Williamsburg to balance capacity. They caused this situation!

I’m sure I’ll be sorry I asked, but what is wrong with Rosslyn? The new HB site is beautiful. That could have been a brand new neighborhood school in a community surrounded by multi family housing and around the corner from a metro stop (ideally it would be walkable for most but I think siting schools near public transit makes sense in our community).

If APS really caved to the parents, shame on them. I hope they repurpose that brand new school in the heart of Rosslyn as a true community resource. What a waste.

Yes HB Heights is amazing. That is NOT what the neighborhood school would have gotten. They were planning to include 300 more students for a 1000 student neighborhood school on the same plot. The airy spacious building would this be turned into a warehouse, with kids bussed from 3 miles away in rush hour Rosslyn traffic.

I actually live in Rosslyn in one of the high rises (my kids are in high school now), and there are very few kids in any of the multi family housing in Rosslyn, at least middle school or high school age. So majority of a Rosslyn middle school would come from near the Stratford site

Sure, but some of them would have come from Lyon Village, the neighborhood north of Langston, etc. There would have been walkers.

Meanwhile all the parents who insisted that their kids needed to be able to walk to MS and therefore needed the site on Vacation Lane shifted gears as soon as the decision was made and insisted the site needed to provide convenient dropoff lanes.

My kids would have gone to the Wilson Blvd 1300-student middle school, and I would have been fine with that.

Adorbs. Most of Lyon Village send their MS and HS kids to private. Even more so if they had zero field space in a Rosslyn warehouse.

North of Langston? You mean the Highlands neighborhood near Dawson Terrace? There are even fewer families and older kids there, nestled between Lee Highway and GW parkway.

Okay, you would have been fine? Sure? Most parents weren’t.

Most parents would, but the loudest parents are still trying to piss and moan about any change that means their kids' school won't look like the schools they attended 30 or 40 years earlier.

If putting a 1300-seat MS on Wilson would have gotten more parents to send their kids private, that's OK with me. I don't think most of the current batch of MS and HS parents send their kids to private, judging by bus stops and yard signs, but the parents who can afford the $2M+ houses are definitely choosing private for their kids just starting school. I loved it when people with anti-MM, "school overcrowding" signs in their yards had private school bumper stickers.

+1.

I would love to see that demographic breakdown because I don’t think it’s nearly as common as you think. I think a lot of families chose their neighborhood (yes, even the $2M ones) for the public school. If anything, an expensive house could be a big bet on the quality of the district, since people may choose between spending more on a house vs sending kids to private.

[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:Build new facilities in South Arlington, where the county needs them, already!

Stop messing around with boundaries and whatnot to try to alleviate crowding in the south by moving kids north. Please.

And I live in North Arlington.

They can’t. APS has stated In published reports that they are beyond the point of building their way out of the capacity crisis. They have to work with the facilities that they have. Even if they had the capital, it takes 10 years to bring a new school online. I would expect boundary changes, relocatable classrooms, and potentially leased office space for schools in the future. They can’t build anything new. It’s not even worth discussing.

It really defies all logic to say Arlington county cannot fix this. Sure different entities within Arlington county own different parcels of land, but come on. It is all one county government.

The overcrowding has been an issue for more than a decade. Poor planning then, and continued poor planning now, makes the problem worse. Leasing space for schools is a good idea though. It would be quicker than building a new school.

I agree that that they have been terrible planners. The money spent on HB Woodlawn- a school in Rosslyn surrounded by current and projected affordable housing units- blows my mind. Those kids aren’t in the walk zone for anywhere and we could have had some type of neighborhood school there rather than a fancy option school for rich people. But I do take APS at face when they say they aren’t building more schools. I think they are going to try and be creative with existing schools and possibly leading vacant office space. G_d help us.

Do you not know the history? APS wanted to put a neighborhood school there. But the neighborhood around the now Hamm complained and lobbied very loudly, so APS caved, and they kicked HB to Rosslyn and put Hamm on HB's old site.

I remember this. The neighborhood around the then HB wanted the site, said their snowflakes couldn't go to school in Rosslyn, so they killed the plan to build a ms in Rosslyn. And we got Hamm.

I don't have a lot of sympathy for people in that neighborhood who now may have to take a bus to Williamsburg to balance capacity. They caused this situation!

I’m sure I’ll be sorry I asked, but what is wrong with Rosslyn? The new HB site is beautiful. That could have been a brand new neighborhood school in a community surrounded by multi family housing and around the corner from a metro stop (ideally it would be walkable for most but I think siting schools near public transit makes sense in our community).

If APS really caved to the parents, shame on them. I hope they repurpose that brand new school in the heart of Rosslyn as a true community resource. What a waste.

Yes HB Heights is amazing. That is NOT what the neighborhood school would have gotten. They were planning to include 300 more students for a 1000 student neighborhood school on the same plot. The airy spacious building would this be turned into a warehouse, with kids bussed from 3 miles away in rush hour Rosslyn traffic.

I actually live in Rosslyn in one of the high rises (my kids are in high school now), and there are very few kids in any of the multi family housing in Rosslyn, at least middle school or high school age. So majority of a Rosslyn middle school would come from near the Stratford site

Sure, but some of them would have come from Lyon Village, the neighborhood north of Langston, etc. There would have been walkers.

Meanwhile all the parents who insisted that their kids needed to be able to walk to MS and therefore needed the site on Vacation Lane shifted gears as soon as the decision was made and insisted the site needed to provide convenient dropoff lanes.

My kids would have gone to the Wilson Blvd 1300-student middle school, and I would have been fine with that.

Adorbs. Most of Lyon Village send their MS and HS kids to private. Even more so if they had zero field space in a Rosslyn warehouse.

North of Langston? You mean the Highlands neighborhood near Dawson Terrace? There are even fewer families and older kids there, nestled between Lee Highway and GW parkway.

Okay, you would have been fine? Sure? Most parents weren’t.

Most parents would, but the loudest parents are still trying to piss and moan about any change that means their kids' school won't look like the schools they attended 30 or 40 years earlier.

If putting a 1300-seat MS on Wilson would have gotten more parents to send their kids private, that's OK with me. I don't think most of the current batch of MS and HS parents send their kids to private, judging by bus stops and yard signs, but the parents who can afford the $2M+ houses are definitely choosing private for their kids just starting school. I loved it when people with anti-MM, "school overcrowding" signs in their yards had private school bumper stickers.

+1.

I would love to see that demographic breakdown because I don’t think it’s nearly as common as you think. I think a lot of families chose their neighborhood (yes, even the $2M ones) for the public school. If anything, an expensive house could be a big bet on the quality of the district, since people may choose between spending more on a house vs sending kids to private.

That would be fascinating. In our neighborhood there have always been a significant chunk of private school families, but it does seem like it’s been increasing over the past 5 or so years (even pre-Covid). If we send our kids to public, I am legitimately wondering what nearby kids will actually be there. I suspect not many.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With the elem seats needed in Rosslyn, it doesn't make sense to close an elem school in North Arlington. They can send the Rosslyn overflow to Taylor and then shift everyone west but only IF they keep NES open.

They don’t need the seats right now, that’s why they can use it as swing space for 5-10 years. Look at enrollment numbers, you can’t use crowding in Rosslyn to justify keeping Nottingham open in the near term. Nice try though.

Also - I would be shocked if Taylor wasn’t one of the first schools to use the swing space. The HVAC breakdown this year was ridiculous and the school still has pods that lack full walls to divide classrooms.

Prepare to be shocked. I think there are a few schools in the south older and in worse overall condition due for renovation ahead of Taylor. Plus, MPSA needs to go somewhere during redevelopment of the CC site.

I don't know... I sub and was shocked at the condition of Taylor. Agree about MPSA but I think Taylor is next.

[Anonymous]

FYI. MPSA can stay in the Patrick Henry building until the old Career Center building is renovated. The program doesn’t need swing space. The new Career Center building is being built adjacent to MPSA and will not affect MPSA operations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FYI. MPSA can stay in the Patrick Henry building until the old Career Center building is renovated. The program doesn’t need swing space. The new Career Center building is being built adjacent to MPSA and will not affect MPSA operations.

That's the current plan without the swing space available. If this proposal is approved, they can revisit the CC plans because fitting that building to suit Montessori costs so much more than just fitting a regular elementary. MPSA wants a full k-12 program, or at least K-8; and I don't think they really want to do that at that site. Just saying, it's a possibility that plans will change a bit and I wouldn't be surprised. Moving MPSA off-site could facilitate the redevelopment of that site.