Boundaries assessment update 2023

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the assertion that wealthier people won’t send their kids to MVHS now is a reason not to focus on improving the school by reverting to AP and reassigning part of West Potomac there.

What part of West Potomac are you reassigning and how are balancing the increase in farms at West Po? You can easily reassign schools in Ft Hunt, but all that does is flip the farms rates at the two schools. Unless you take some of the low income housing along Rt 1 and push it to Hayfield, then you are just deciding which school between MVHS and WestPo is the high poverty and which one is the very high poverty. I guess it's a great debate for the rest of the county since it pulls attention away from the schools with negligible farms rates

I don’t think the argument that we take actions to improve Mount Vernon because Langley is 3% FARMS holds up either. This was a manageable situation that Democrats like Karen Corbett Sanders made worse.

How is it manageable? Even if you ignore capacity, any shifting of boundaries results in one high farms and one very high farms school. Shift a couple of Ft Hunt schools to MVHS and MVHS's new farms rate becomes WestPo's current rate WestPo becomes what MVHS is now and then people are complaining about how we need to fix WestPo. You cant take a school with a 57% farms rate and use a school with a 40% farms rate to fix it. No one talks about including Hayfield with a 28% farms rate because that just makes three failing schools instead of two.

I understand the challenges of teaching kids who live in poverty. I spent four years teaching kids who came from extreme poverty. However, boundary changes will not fix that. The only thing that will fix that is attention to the kids who need it and good, solid instruction.
Changing boundaries will not fix the problem. It just spreads it around.

What is the purpose of a school system? I think it is to educate every child to the best of their ability.

I've posted this before: my educational policy is to determine where the child is academically and then push and pull them as far as possible.

This means you expose them to instruction at a higher level, while working with them where they are. It does not mean throwing them into challenging classes with no support.

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

FCPS cemented MV’s pariah status when they expanded West Po even though MV has space. People like Corbett Sanders have no “education policy” other than protecting their friends and screwing others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the assertion that wealthier people won’t send their kids to MVHS now is a reason not to focus on improving the school by reverting to AP and reassigning part of West Potomac there.

What part of West Potomac are you reassigning and how are balancing the increase in farms at West Po? You can easily reassign schools in Ft Hunt, but all that does is flip the farms rates at the two schools. Unless you take some of the low income housing along Rt 1 and push it to Hayfield, then you are just deciding which school between MVHS and WestPo is the high poverty and which one is the very high poverty. I guess it's a great debate for the rest of the county since it pulls attention away from the schools with negligible farms rates

I don’t think the argument that we take actions to improve Mount Vernon because Langley is 3% FARMS holds up either. This was a manageable situation that Democrats like Karen Corbett Sanders made worse.

How is it manageable? Even if you ignore capacity, any shifting of boundaries results in one high farms and one very high farms school. Shift a couple of Ft Hunt schools to MVHS and MVHS's new farms rate becomes WestPo's current rate WestPo becomes what MVHS is now and then people are complaining about how we need to fix WestPo. You cant take a school with a 57% farms rate and use a school with a 40% farms rate to fix it. No one talks about including Hayfield with a 28% farms rate because that just makes three failing schools instead of two.

I understand the challenges of teaching kids who live in poverty. I spent four years teaching kids who came from extreme poverty. However, boundary changes will not fix that. The only thing that will fix that is attention to the kids who need it and good, solid instruction.
Changing boundaries will not fix the problem. It just spreads it around.

What is the purpose of a school system? I think it is to educate every child to the best of their ability.

I've posted this before: my educational policy is to determine where the child is academically and then push and pull them as far as possible.

This means you expose them to instruction at a higher level, while working with them where they are. It does not mean throwing them into challenging classes with no support.

So your solution is to ignore all data on the effect of high farms rates in schools and somehow staff advanced classes for one or two kids, or do you just say platitudes about meeting kids where they are and pushing them while being thankful that your own kids will never have to be in one of those schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the assertion that wealthier people won’t send their kids to MVHS now is a reason not to focus on improving the school by reverting to AP and reassigning part of West Potomac there.

What part of West Potomac are you reassigning and how are balancing the increase in farms at West Po? You can easily reassign schools in Ft Hunt, but all that does is flip the farms rates at the two schools. Unless you take some of the low income housing along Rt 1 and push it to Hayfield, then you are just deciding which school between MVHS and WestPo is the high poverty and which one is the very high poverty. I guess it's a great debate for the rest of the county since it pulls attention away from the schools with negligible farms rates

I don’t think the argument that we take actions to improve Mount Vernon because Langley is 3% FARMS holds up either. This was a manageable situation that Democrats like Karen Corbett Sanders made worse.

How is it manageable? Even if you ignore capacity, any shifting of boundaries results in one high farms and one very high farms school. Shift a couple of Ft Hunt schools to MVHS and MVHS's new farms rate becomes WestPo's current rate WestPo becomes what MVHS is now and then people are complaining about how we need to fix WestPo. You cant take a school with a 57% farms rate and use a school with a 40% farms rate to fix it. No one talks about including Hayfield with a 28% farms rate because that just makes three failing schools instead of two.

I understand the challenges of teaching kids who live in poverty. I spent four years teaching kids who came from extreme poverty. However, boundary changes will not fix that. The only thing that will fix that is attention to the kids who need it and good, solid instruction.
Changing boundaries will not fix the problem. It just spreads it around.

What is the purpose of a school system? I think it is to educate every child to the best of their ability.

I've posted this before: my educational policy is to determine where the child is academically and then push and pull them as far as possible.

This means you expose them to instruction at a higher level, while working with them where they are. It does not mean throwing them into challenging classes with no support.

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

FCPS cemented MV’s pariah status when they expanded West Po even though MV has space. People like Corbett Sanders have no “education policy” other than protecting their friends and screwing others.

Based on all of the metrics FCPS produces, students seem to be learning better at West Po than MVHS. If a small school actually helped learning, MVHS would be a amazing school that people were trying to get into not out of

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the assertion that wealthier people won’t send their kids to MVHS now is a reason not to focus on improving the school by reverting to AP and reassigning part of West Potomac there.

What part of West Potomac are you reassigning and how are balancing the increase in farms at West Po? You can easily reassign schools in Ft Hunt, but all that does is flip the farms rates at the two schools. Unless you take some of the low income housing along Rt 1 and push it to Hayfield, then you are just deciding which school between MVHS and WestPo is the high poverty and which one is the very high poverty. I guess it's a great debate for the rest of the county since it pulls attention away from the schools with negligible farms rates

I don’t think the argument that we take actions to improve Mount Vernon because Langley is 3% FARMS holds up either. This was a manageable situation that Democrats like Karen Corbett Sanders made worse.

How is it manageable? Even if you ignore capacity, any shifting of boundaries results in one high farms and one very high farms school. Shift a couple of Ft Hunt schools to MVHS and MVHS's new farms rate becomes WestPo's current rate WestPo becomes what MVHS is now and then people are complaining about how we need to fix WestPo. You cant take a school with a 57% farms rate and use a school with a 40% farms rate to fix it. No one talks about including Hayfield with a 28% farms rate because that just makes three failing schools instead of two.

I understand the challenges of teaching kids who live in poverty. I spent four years teaching kids who came from extreme poverty. However, boundary changes will not fix that. The only thing that will fix that is attention to the kids who need it and good, solid instruction.
Changing boundaries will not fix the problem. It just spreads it around.

What is the purpose of a school system? I think it is to educate every child to the best of their ability.

I've posted this before: my educational policy is to determine where the child is academically and then push and pull them as far as possible.

This means you expose them to instruction at a higher level, while working with them where they are. It does not mean throwing them into challenging classes with no support.

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

FCPS cemented MV’s pariah status when they expanded West Po even though MV has space. People like Corbett Sanders have no “education policy” other than protecting their friends and screwing others.

Pariah or not, how do you redraw the lines without just shifting which school is high farms rate and which one is very high? Unless you pull in Hayfield or accept busing, one of the two is going to have a very high poverty rate and the other just a high poverty rate. That's what happens when the county funnels most of its affordable housing into just one corridor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the assertion that wealthier people won’t send their kids to MVHS now is a reason not to focus on improving the school by reverting to AP and reassigning part of West Potomac there.

What part of West Potomac are you reassigning and how are balancing the increase in farms at West Po? You can easily reassign schools in Ft Hunt, but all that does is flip the farms rates at the two schools. Unless you take some of the low income housing along Rt 1 and push it to Hayfield, then you are just deciding which school between MVHS and WestPo is the high poverty and which one is the very high poverty. I guess it's a great debate for the rest of the county since it pulls attention away from the schools with negligible farms rates

I don’t think the argument that we take actions to improve Mount Vernon because Langley is 3% FARMS holds up either. This was a manageable situation that Democrats like Karen Corbett Sanders made worse.

How is it manageable? Even if you ignore capacity, any shifting of boundaries results in one high farms and one very high farms school. Shift a couple of Ft Hunt schools to MVHS and MVHS's new farms rate becomes WestPo's current rate WestPo becomes what MVHS is now and then people are complaining about how we need to fix WestPo. You cant take a school with a 57% farms rate and use a school with a 40% farms rate to fix it. No one talks about including Hayfield with a 28% farms rate because that just makes three failing schools instead of two.

I understand the challenges of teaching kids who live in poverty. I spent four years teaching kids who came from extreme poverty. However, boundary changes will not fix that. The only thing that will fix that is attention to the kids who need it and good, solid instruction.
Changing boundaries will not fix the problem. It just spreads it around.

What is the purpose of a school system? I think it is to educate every child to the best of their ability.

I've posted this before: my educational policy is to determine where the child is academically and then push and pull them as far as possible.

This means you expose them to instruction at a higher level, while working with them where they are. It does not mean throwing them into challenging classes with no support.

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

FCPS cemented MV’s pariah status when they expanded West Po even though MV has space. People like Corbett Sanders have no “education policy” other than protecting their friends and screwing others.

Based on all of the metrics FCPS produces, students seem to be learning better at West Po than MVHS. If a small school actually helped learning, MVHS would be a amazing school that people were trying to get into not out of

This goes back to AP vs IB. Just drop IB at Mount Vernon, create a robust trade program, and provide bus transportation for students taking AP classes, to West Potomac.

Demand for trade is met, and students not looking for a classical liberal college prep education have other options and incentives to stay in school. Kids are employable upon graduation.

[Anonymous]

So your solution is to ignore all data on the effect of high farms rates in schools and somehow staff advanced classes for one or two kids, or do you just say platitudes about meeting kids where they are and pushing them while being thankful that your own kids will never have to be in one of those schools?

How do you intend to fix the high FARMS rate when surrounding schools also have high FARMS? That is not a solution to helping kids who are struggling.

The effect of the high FARMS rate is to make the school's average worse. Moving the kids around does not help them.

[Anonymous]

So your solution is to ignore all data on the effect of high farms rates in schools and somehow staff advanced classes for one or two kids, or do you just say platitudes about meeting kids where they are and pushing them while being thankful that your own kids will never have to be in one of those schools?

Please ssource that the advanced classes are only getting one or two kids. Maybe, if MV had AP, there would be more opportunities for the kids in advanced classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

So your solution is to ignore all data on the effect of high farms rates in schools and somehow staff advanced classes for one or two kids, or do you just say platitudes about meeting kids where they are and pushing them while being thankful that your own kids will never have to be in one of those schools?

Please ssource that the advanced classes are only getting one or two kids. Maybe, if MV had AP, there would be more opportunities for the kids in advanced classes.

Post calculus math classes are not IB. MVHS has less than 10 kids (the minimum reporting threshold) in all of those classes combined.

[Anonymous]

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

There are definitely people at Chantilly unhappy about the size of the school. Same at Centreville. But in these cases, unlike at West Potomac, there also wasn't really anywhere else for the kids to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

There are definitely people at Chantilly unhappy about the size of the school. Same at Centreville. But in these cases, unlike at West Potomac, there also wasn't really anywhere else for the kids to go.

That's easy to say. Kind of interesting that someone has such a finger on the pulse of Chantilly, Centreville, and West Potomac.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live in Western Fairfax and do not know the neighborhoods in Mt Vernon area well.

Some questions:
would redistricting keep neighborhoods together or divide them?
would it result in split feeders?
From looking at the maps, it appears that W Potomac lines are reasonable. But, I don't know all the caveats.

How many Mt Vernon kids are pp at West Potomac or other nearby schools for AP?

I would suggest by getting rid of IB at Mt Vernon sooner rather than later. Go from there. But, as long as it is IB, people will have an "out."

The largest group leaving MVHS is military and FCPS has a policy of letting them choose high schools. As many go to west Springfield as westpo. The boundaries make sense, but you could move Ft Hunt and Waynewood to MVHS and the boundaries would still make sense. All that would do is flip the farms percentages and then people would be upset about West Potomac being high farms. Both schools are high farms and you aren’t going to create to schools with rates the county finds acceptable unless you involve more schools and that doesn’t make geographic sense

The other reality is - the "wealthy" part of Mount Vernon is not nearly as large as the wealthy part of West Po. Housing values are significantly cheaper in the Mount Vernon pyramid - I have a 1960's colonial (3 finished levels) in Mount Vernon with a 2 car garage on a 1/4 acre lot. You put my house in Ft. Hunt and it is probably ate least $200K more expensive. So what happens is families move to the Mount Vernon area with the intention of NEVER sending their children to public school. They are spending less on a better house and using that savings to send their children to private schools. I don't know how long it takes housing values to readjust but its definitely not overnight and changing MVHS from IB to AP is not going to be a magically bring back the private school families.

Most families flee long before ES if they aren't zoned to Washington Mill, even then a lot flee. Any that remain get out before Whitman if they can afford private. Neither of those decisions is impacted by AP or IB. Look at Woodley Hilles ES. The catchment has plenty of middle class neighborhoods, but none of them go there if they have the means to avoid it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

There are definitely people at Chantilly unhappy about the size of the school. Same at Centreville. But in these cases, unlike at West Potomac, there also wasn't really anywhere else for the kids to go.

That's easy to say. Kind of interesting that someone has such a finger on the pulse of Chantilly, Centreville, and West Potomac.

It's not unimportant to look at situations across the county, as opposed to just letting individual politicians like Corbett Sanders get what they want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

There are definitely people at Chantilly unhappy about the size of the school. Same at Centreville. But in these cases, unlike at West Potomac, there also wasn't really anywhere else for the kids to go.

That's easy to say. Kind of interesting that someone has such a finger on the pulse of Chantilly, Centreville, and West Potomac.

It's not unimportant to look at situations across the county, as opposed to just letting individual politicians like Corbett Sanders get what they want.

Well. I live in the Chantilly community. Honestly, no one i know complains about the size. There is something for everyone there. The kids find their niche. I will admit that graduation exercises get a little too long.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Students don’t learn well in a school as big as West Potomac and there are areas near MV zoned to West Po.

Tell that to the families at Chantilly who are glad their kids go there. 2914 at last count. West Potomac: 2679

There are definitely people at Chantilly unhappy about the size of the school. Same at Centreville. But in these cases, unlike at West Potomac, there also wasn't really anywhere else for the kids to go.

That's easy to say. Kind of interesting that someone has such a finger on the pulse of Chantilly, Centreville, and West Potomac.

It's not unimportant to look at situations across the county, as opposed to just letting individual politicians like Corbett Sanders get what they want.

Well. I live in the Chantilly community. Honestly, no one i know complains about the size. There is something for everyone there. The kids find their niche. I will admit that graduation exercises get a little too long.

Another thing going on w/Chantilly is that the boundaries are fairly compact and people don't necessarily want to get bussed a long way to Westfield or Oakton, neither of which has much extra space anyway.

Kind of a different situation than West Po, where the boundaries aren't as compact, some areas are about the same distance to MV and West Po, and there's space at a nearby school.