Taylor Meeting at Wootton

[Anonymous]

The wootton walkers without any kids in school anymore complained about the wootton sidewalks. Soooo do we like walking or not? I didn’t see that one coming

[Anonymous]

I love reading this thread. It’s like an amazing episode of Jerry Springer but it keeps going! Thank goodness our Churchill cluster is intact. Can’t wait for the next study to see everyone here get all pissed off all over again! 🤣

That Taylor running video is the best! He’s living his best life, probably eating his popcorn reading this thread!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe this would have ended up in a sh-- storm no matter what, but it would help if Taylor knew how to engage communities to bring them along with his vision. He sows division, because he doesn't give communities the time to process his plan, and then he wonders why people hate his plan and him.

This was always going to be a shirtshow because Crown abuts the Wootton boundary and any boundary change was probably going to remove a community from Wootton's boundaries and the Wootton community is very vocal and engaged. They had the numbers of survey responses for options 1-4 and there was a disproportionately large response from the Wootton cluster.

The boundary ended up not changing much; outside of Cold Spring, everybody is staying at Wootton, but it's still a shirtshow.

P.S. Agreed that Taylor isn't good at this, but even the most charismatic leader is not going to get a good result with this much change.

And we get to do this all over again in a year when the ES/MS boundary study starts.

You are right. This was always going to be a shit show but I think Taylor made a woefully wrong calculus and made it into a bigger shit show.

His strategy seemed to have been avoid engagement as much as possible, and do things as fast as possible. (He came to Wootton nine days before the vote!!!)

What he should have done is come to the community before option H came out and start campaigning for the cause. It didn’t have to be this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is with the hyperbole? 250 new buses on Wootton Parkway? 37 stops for one bus?! Making up BS just further undermines your argument. Clearly you're unfamiliar with how public school busing works here, because they don't go from house to house picking up each kid. LOL. There are things called "bus stops" where they pick up dozens of kids at one place, for efficiency. The Wootton bus schedule is a public document, and you can see for yourself that every bus makes just a handful of stops - with one outlier at 16 stops. Oh, and it's 22 buses for Wootton. Moving Wootton to Crown will not make that number jump to 250. Even if none of these groups turn to walkers at Crown (which some of them will), it still will not require another 228 buses to transport the Wootton walkers to Crown. And since MCPS already said that Wootton wouldn't be used as a holding school for several years, you don't have to worry about another 22-30 (not 228) buses from another high school coming. IF and when it is used as a holding school, there will be plenty of time to stagger the holding school start time from Wootton. https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/Transportation/busroutes/04234bus.pdf

If Wootton isn’t going to be used as a holding school for several years, what is the plan for Magruder and why is this plan equitable?

It isn’t. Moving Wootton to Crown kills 2 birds with one stone for Taylor (really 3 birds). First, he fills Crown with high achieving kids, instant academic reputation that would otherwise take 20 years (if ever) to develop (and speaking of developers, they will be very happy). Second, it avoids MCPS having to spend money remediating Wootton, so it can spend that money on more sole source contracts that violate procurement regulations. Third, it means there isn’t a holding school for Magruder, so MCPS can delay that $300M+ renovation for years (if Crown was a holding school for Magruder, MCPS would have to find the money to begin renovations).

Nobody is talking about the staffing elephant in the room. What happens when Wootton's teachers leave?

And they will. I would know since I am one. Teachers with 15-20 years in a community don't just pick up and relocate because a superintendent drew a new line on a map. Many of them chose Wootton specifically for the culture, the community, the commute from where they actually live. When this "relocation" happens and half the faculty walks out the door, suddenly you don't have Wootton at Crown. You have Crown with a Wootton nameplate.

My kids had some of those teachers (my colleagues) over a decade ago. The institutional knowledge, the relationships, the culture we've all built... it's not a building. That's years of investment that evaporates the moment this vote passes and the resignation letters start.

MCPS keeps saying this is a move, not a closure. Fine. But a school is its people, not its address. When you force a relocation without meaningful faculty buy-in and lose half your experienced staff in the process, you've effectively closed the school everyone knew and opened a new one with a familiar logo. We've had very little engagement from the county other than with each other as peers. There are mixed feelings of course, but nobody took our pulse at the county level.

That's not a relocation. That's a rebranding. And the kids who show up at Crown in 2027 expecting Wootton deserve to know the difference.

That sucks but there is no money to do major renovations of two high schools in horrible condition while using a brand new school that has already been built as a holding school.

I have watched this county find money for a great many things over the years. Rarely has critical infrastructure been among them. Not for us, not for Magruder, and I suspect not for a number of schools most of us never hear about because we are all, as you say, in our own little bubbles.

I chose this school. I chose this neighborhood. Fifteen years ago I moved within walking distance of Wootton specifically because I wanted to be part of something - not just a building I drove to and left. I have walked home alongside students. I have stayed late for clubs and tutoring and the quiet conversations that happen after the bell rings, precisely because home was close enough to make that possible. Those things are not nothing. Those things are, in my experience, everything.

With this move, that chapter will have to close without me. I am not angry about it. I am simply telling you plainly what will be lost. Not in a spreadsheet, not in a facilities utilization table, but in the daily fabric of a school community that took a very long time to build.

The county has made its priorities clear over many years. I suppose I should not be surprised that the people closest to the school, both literally and figuratively, are the last ones consulted about its future.

I will miss the walk home most of all. I'm sure someone will attack my post as well as it seems to be a common theme, but I wish all of the Wootton community well after next school year. Maybe there can be some St. Patty's day luck from yesterday shone on the vote, but I'm not holding my breath.

I will say that when they idiotically moved Northwood 30 min away (driving) from the home school for a minimum of 3 years, many teachers threatened to quit but in the end, almost no one quit or retired. I bet the same thing will happen at Wooton.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Full recording of the Q&A is up thanks to Save Wootton.

At what minute did Taylor tell the audience that he was adding a bus depot to their neighborhoid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bunch of racist, entitled crappy people. Wooton does not belong to you. Things change and you don’t have a right to act like you own the school and can decide what happens to it. You people are freaking pathetic. Your kids deserve to move so they get mixed in with other kids and don’t turn out like you!

This alllll day. You shoulders the WhatsApp groups these crazy people create 100-200 messages a day. Do ther people even have jobs? How could you possibly fixate on something like this with so much intensity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe this would have ended up in a sh-- storm no matter what, but it would help if Taylor knew how to engage communities to bring them along with his vision. He sows division, because he doesn't give communities the time to process his plan, and then he wonders why people hate his plan and him.

This was always going to be a shirtshow because Crown abuts the Wootton boundary and any boundary change was probably going to remove a community from Wootton's boundaries and the Wootton community is very vocal and engaged. They had the numbers of survey responses for options 1-4 and there was a disproportionately large response from the Wootton cluster.

The boundary ended up not changing much; outside of Cold Spring, everybody is staying at Wootton, but it's still a shirtshow.

P.S. Agreed that Taylor isn't good at this, but even the most charismatic leader is not going to get a good result with this much change.

And we get to do this all over again in a year when the ES/MS boundary study starts.

You are right. This was always going to be a shit show but I think Taylor made a woefully wrong calculus and made it into a bigger shit show.

His strategy seemed to have been avoid engagement as much as possible, and do things as fast as possible. (He came to Wootton nine days before the vote!!!)

What he should have done is come to the community before option H came out and start campaigning for the cause. It didn’t have to be this way.

You people are ridiculous. Taylor is not an elected official. He’s a hired executive. The written materials explaining the rationale for Option H were detailed and persuasive. The Wootton community is getting a sweet deal, all things considered. You have built up such a head of steam in your meetings that you have lost all sense of perspective, and have no idea how entitled you’re coming off to everyone else in the county (and region, as word gets out about your antics).

[Anonymous]

At 1hr 2min on the video the sidewalks rant lady with kids who graduated 13 years ago is a trip.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe this would have ended up in a sh-- storm no matter what, but it would help if Taylor knew how to engage communities to bring them along with his vision. He sows division, because he doesn't give communities the time to process his plan, and then he wonders why people hate his plan and him.

This was always going to be a shirtshow because Crown abuts the Wootton boundary and any boundary change was probably going to remove a community from Wootton's boundaries and the Wootton community is very vocal and engaged. They had the numbers of survey responses for options 1-4 and there was a disproportionately large response from the Wootton cluster.

The boundary ended up not changing much; outside of Cold Spring, everybody is staying at Wootton, but it's still a shirtshow.

P.S. Agreed that Taylor isn't good at this, but even the most charismatic leader is not going to get a good result with this much change.

And we get to do this all over again in a year when the ES/MS boundary study starts.

You are right. This was always going to be a shit show but I think Taylor made a woefully wrong calculus and made it into a bigger shit show.

His strategy seemed to have been avoid engagement as much as possible, and do things as fast as possible. (He came to Wootton nine days before the vote!!!)

What he should have done is come to the community before option H came out and start campaigning for the cause. It didn’t have to be this way.

You people are ridiculous. Taylor is not an elected official. He’s a hired executive. The written materials explaining the rationale for Option H were detailed and persuasive. The Wootton community is getting a sweet deal, all things considered. You have built up such a head of steam in your meetings that you have lost all sense of perspective, and have no idea how entitled you’re coming off to everyone else in the county (and region, as word gets out about your antics).

The operative word is “persuasive” - but to whom? Certainly not to the people opposed to Option H. Perhaps it is you who has lost all sense of perspective in immediately believing MCPS is infallible, as well as lacking the ability to see any other perspective other than that of MCPS. As for entitlement, that is a loaded word meant to imply those opposing Option H are acting inappropriately en masse. MCPS did not engage the community appropriately and this is why they are upset, not acting entitled. The fact that you cannot see this, and dismiss their complaints out of hand, says more about you than it does them.

[Anonymous]

The video had a lot more pro-H people in the audience than I expected based on the description. I haven’t watched the whole thing but I saw 3: a current student, parent, and counselor who talked about the impact of the condition of the school on their work.

[Anonymous]

Ansolutely abhorrent behavior. Do you care at all about other kids in the county and whole school system or just your previous snowflakes? Did you peep a word when Northwood kids got moved to Woodward or are you okay with that move and other kids suffering? There are a ton of decrepit buildings and issues in MCPS but this showed how entitled you all are and how you care only about your kids and your community. I hope you all get everything you deserve in life. Karma is a b—tch.. So if it works out for you, leave your kids in a moldy building and see what happens to them..

[Anonymous]

Amazing to me is that the Wootton community has managed to get all the attention, and the biggest sh*tshow of all, the Programatic changes, are being ignored. That is what the entire community should be protesting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ansolutely abhorrent behavior. Do you care at all about other kids in the county and whole school system or just your previous snowflakes? Did you peep a word when Northwood kids got moved to Woodward or are you okay with that move and other kids suffering? There are a ton of decrepit buildings and issues in MCPS but this showed how entitled you all are and how you care only about your kids and your community. I hope you all get everything you deserve in life. Karma is a b—tch.. So if it works out for you, leave your kids in a moldy building and see what happens to them..

So you wish harm to children to punish their parents?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Amazing to me is that the Wootton community has managed to get all the attention, and the biggest sh*tshow of all, the Programatic changes, are being ignored. That is what the entire community should be protesting

Protest the programmatic changes? Why would we do that? I thought MCPS was infallible!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ansolutely abhorrent behavior. Do you care at all about other kids in the county and whole school system or just your previous snowflakes? Did you peep a word when Northwood kids got moved to Woodward or are you okay with that move and other kids suffering? There are a ton of decrepit buildings and issues in MCPS but this showed how entitled you all are and how you care only about your kids and your community. I hope you all get everything you deserve in life. Karma is a b—tch.. So if it works out for you, leave your kids in a moldy building and see what happens to them..

Actually was crappy for Northwood. Woodward is still a construction zone.