APS: I can't keep up! (ASFS)

[Anonymous]

http://www.npr.org/2017/05/31/530843665/top-20-percent-of-americans-hoard-the-american-dream

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:



Worse yet, there are false narratives put forth about APS rushing this through or not looking at the numbers. If you see the big picture and understand how long these changes have been in the works, you will know the truth.

This is not to defend APS and say that they are blameless and have done everything right. They haven’t. One of the biggest mistakes they have made has been delaying these changes for as long as they have.

In the end, the proposed changes to the Enrollment and Transfer Policy are intended to BEGIN solving some really, really hard problems and it is long overdue. It is just the beginning and the solution is not perfect, but it is a step in the right direction. And even if it will stress certain areas a bit more, on the whole, it will begin the process of addressing some systemic problems that ultimately affect us all.

APS has been seriously considering changes to the Enrollment and Transfer Policy for quite a few years. APS has also been looking at the numbers very carefully. It may not always seem like it, when it may negatively affect a specific area that you care about, but it is true.

Here's the problem: APS has been so wrong about numbers for so long that people are (rightly) suspicious of any claims that they've gotten it right this time. And while a new transfer policy and new boundaries make sense, capitulating to Nancy Van Tantrum and the addition of sibling preference at the secondary level are the most significant and least logical changes.

We're in the Key/ASFS zone, and I support making Key countywide and ASFS neighborhood, but ONLY if ASFS's neighborhood becomes its actual neighborhood, with the boundaries redrawn to bring in some lower income kids who currently get shipped to Ashlawn. LV can go wherever, because virtually none of them are going to walk to ASFS (and note the "virtually" -- if you walk, good for you, but you are the exception and you know it). A short bus ride is not a problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG! These people are insufferable:

https://www.arlnow.com/2017/05/31/letter-to-the-editor-arlington-public-schools-turns-its-focus-away-from-science/

Well, they live in Doanldson Run, so they're just trying to protect their own access to ASFS. The rest is a smokescreen. Like The Chopras cared about any of this before junior's spot at ASFS was threatened. Hint: they did not. They were perfectly happy to engage in opportunity hoarding, just as long as they were part of the group with access to ASFS.

And yes, countywide there is more demand for Spanish Immersion than ASFS, and we can't have two option schools hoarded by one geographic area, so one has to become the neighborhood school.

I have little sympathy for them as well. I have long thought that ASFS should be county-wide. That its catchment area will be different only affects this small group.

Opportunity hoarders indeed!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG! These people are insufferable:

https://www.arlnow.com/2017/05/31/letter-to-the-editor-arlington-public-schools-turns-its-focus-away-from-science/

Well, they live in Doanldson Run, so they're just trying to protect their own access to ASFS. The rest is a smokescreen. Like The Chopras cared about any of this before junior's spot at ASFS was threatened. Hint: they did not. They were perfectly happy to engage in opportunity hoarding, just as long as they were part of the group with access to ASFS.

And yes, countywide there is more demand for Spanish Immersion than ASFS, and we can't have two option schools hoarded by one geographic area, so one has to become the neighborhood school.

I have little sympathy for them as well. I have long thought that ASFS should be county-wide. That its catchment area will be different only affects this small group.

Opportunity hoarders indeed!

That (small) set of parents is pushing to make it countywide.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG! These people are insufferable:

https://www.arlnow.com/2017/05/31/letter-to-the-editor-arlington-public-schools-turns-its-focus-away-from-science/

Well, they live in Doanldson Run, so they're just trying to protect their own access to ASFS. The rest is a smokescreen. Like The Chopras cared about any of this before junior's spot at ASFS was threatened. Hint: they did not. They were perfectly happy to engage in opportunity hoarding, just as long as they were part of the group with access to ASFS.

And yes, countywide there is more demand for Spanish Immersion than ASFS, and we can't have two option schools hoarded by one geographic area, so one has to become the neighborhood school.

I have little sympathy for them as well. I have long thought that ASFS should be county-wide. That its catchment area will be different only affects this small group.

Opportunity hoarders indeed!

That (small) set of parents is pushing to make it countywide.

Of course they are NOW, because they are going to be shut out of the school that they spent big $$$ on. But it can't become countywide, because there is no neighborhood school in that area, unless they relocate the Spanish Immersion program out of Key. But then where would that go?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG! These people are insufferable:

https://www.arlnow.com/2017/05/31/letter-to-the-editor-arlington-public-schools-turns-its-focus-away-from-science/

Well, they live in Doanldson Run, so they're just trying to protect their own access to ASFS. The rest is a smokescreen. Like The Chopras cared about any of this before junior's spot at ASFS was threatened. Hint: they did not. They were perfectly happy to engage in opportunity hoarding, just as long as they were part of the group with access to ASFS.

And yes, countywide there is more demand for Spanish Immersion than ASFS, and we can't have two option schools hoarded by one geographic area, so one has to become the neighborhood school.

I have little sympathy for them as well. I have long thought that ASFS should be county-wide. That its catchment area will be different only affects this small group.

Opportunity hoarders indeed!

That (small) set of parents is pushing to make it countywide.

Of course they are NOW, because they are going to be shut out of the school that they spent big $$$ on. But it can't become countywide, because there is no neighborhood school in that area, unless they relocate the Spanish Immersion program out of Key. But then where would that go?

Oh wait, they're not even asking to become countywide. They only want to open about 20% of spots for those living outside of a guaranteed attendance zone. NOPE. This is how we got into this mess in the first place. YOU MAY NOT BUY YOUR WAY INTO AN OPTION SCHOOL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG! These people are insufferable:

https://www.arlnow.com/2017/05/31/letter-to-the-editor-arlington-public-schools-turns-its-focus-away-from-science/

Well, they live in Doanldson Run, so they're just trying to protect their own access to ASFS. The rest is a smokescreen. Like The Chopras cared about any of this before junior's spot at ASFS was threatened. Hint: they did not. They were perfectly happy to engage in opportunity hoarding, just as long as they were part of the group with access to ASFS.

And yes, countywide there is more demand for Spanish Immersion than ASFS, and we can't have two option schools hoarded by one geographic area, so one has to become the neighborhood school.

I have little sympathy for them as well. I have long thought that ASFS should be county-wide. That its catchment area will be different only affects this small group.

Opportunity hoarders indeed!

That (small) set of parents is pushing to make it countywide.

Of course they are NOW, because they are going to be shut out of the school that they spent big $$$ on. But it can't become countywide, because there is no neighborhood school in that area, unless they relocate the Spanish Immersion program out of Key. But then where would that go?

Back in the days when ASFS was named Page, it actually was a neighborhood school, though I think ATS was temporarily located there as well.

[Anonymous]

WTH is that poster talking about? A good majority of neighbors and I walk our kids from LV to ASF. They can't do it alone because of busy Kirkwood ST with no flashing crosswalk or pedestrian bridge, but there is a large contingent that walks.

[Anonymous]

Peopla gushing about how their experience is so much better than after transferring doesn't do anything to help their cause. They don't want to be sent back to Jamestown or Taylor and want to keep their property values higher b/c they have the option to transfer in to ASFS. That option goes WAY down if it is opened to all students in APS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Peopla gushing about how their experience is so much better than after transferring doesn't do anything to help their cause. They don't want to be sent back to Jamestown or Taylor and want to keep their property values higher b/c they have the option to transfer in to ASFS. That option goes WAY down if it is opened to all students in APS.

Right, opportunity hoarders. Same old, same old. I'm not buying what they're selling.

[Anonymous]

None of it is relevant because the SB is just going to do what they want to do anyway.

[Anonymous]

That letter is an example of the misuse of statistics.
They try to say they have FARMS kids, so they are so great at closing the achievement gap, so don't make it a neighborhood school b/c what about the FARMS kids.
They conveniently ignore the fact that of the 140 FARMS kids, 135 of them are in the district- key zoned, what will now be ASFS zoned.
Similarly, no one has ever suggested that the curriculum at ASFS is changing.
This is really an effort to try and ensure that no more FARMS kids come to their school.
I find this letter despicable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That letter is an example of the misuse of statistics.
They try to say they have FARMS kids, so they are so great at closing the achievement gap, so don't make it a neighborhood school b/c what about the FARMS kids.
They conveniently ignore the fact that of the 140 FARMS kids, 135 of them are in the district- key zoned, what will now be ASFS zoned.
Similarly, no one has ever suggested that the curriculum at ASFS is changing.
This is really an effort to try and ensure that no more FARMS kids come to their school.
I find this letter despicable.

It's really more about this family trying to keep what they see as their due for living in their neighborhood. I think the county needs to do better - just redraw all of the boundaries.

[Anonymous]

I don't think the current arrangement with ASFS and KEY is such a problem that it needs to be changed. At the very least Key should continue to be a neighborhood school with automatic access to the kids in the apartments across the street, many of whom are spanish speakers (makes for a good fit with a spanish immersion school). I think the impetus for changing Key is a spillover from the increased demand for immersion by the neighborhoods assigned to Claremont. Rather than messing with ASFS and Key attendance zones to create the illusion of increased equity in access to choice schools - which doesn't really seem to help anyone very much - maybe they should open a third immersion school and an additional science-focus school?

[Anonymous]

9:18 - I don't know anyone who has bought into Jamestown or Taylor hoping to get into ASFS. Jamestown and Taylor are very good in their own right, and I don't think much of the high property values are related to the potential to get into ASFS. (I do think it drives the property values around Key, but that is also driven by metro proximity and how close-in it is to DC.)

Clearly there is a big demand for a choice school with a science focus - perhaps they should build one (Reed?) and let ASFS revert back to a purely neighborhood school, albeit one with a nicer lab than most.