Barcroft elementary/ south Arlington crisis

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters here could live on Mars. The end result is the same. Liberals are mad they're getting what they asked for. Instead of having sour grapes now, you should probably think through exactly what you say you stand for.

I think there have been some very informed and reasoned arguments on this thread. There's been some crazies ^^^ but I think for the most part people here see the problems and are looking a for a solution. Crazy pants conservative poster can't honestly be blaming the problems of south Arlington on Millenials, surely? Most of us have been here way less that 10 years. We haven't had the time to impact much. I haven't seen much bleeding heart liberalism from that group. Most seem pretty pragmatic without being completely heartless. Not so myopic that we can't see the end result of current policy, but not so ideologically bone headed that we would throw out any sort of social safety net.

Oh, the I wan't my cake and it it too type. You guys are losers too! You're not reinventing the wheel, Mr. Millenial. You're just getting crushed by it! It's about time. Just love it when you cerebral rational fill-in-the-blank NIMBYs get egg in your face. While you're busy balancing being "heartless" with being "sound", etc... your school are getting jam-packed. It'll take a few generations perhaps, but eventually basic common sense will persevere. You can't absorb more and more human bodies without the resources to fully fund them. At some point you have to acknowledge this isn't working and the resources are there. The human bodies in need are going to have to stop consuming without compensating for that and start producing. When you don't have that feedback mechanism, you start to stress the infrastructure. That's what we have here. What we also have here is the experience in socialism that you said you wanted. How you like it now, mutha!

You do understand that is the argument being made right? Our specific area can't absorb all of the affordable housing the county has planned. That is in a nutshell what we are saying.
Did you perhaps attend an overcrowded school? Because if you did you are illustrating our point beautifully about how detrimental it can be to child's education, and how lasting those effects are.

You're so dense it's getting beyond ridiculous. Once affordable housing is spread out, as you think it needs to be, it's going to crush those areas as well. The population growth at its current rate simply cannot be sustained on the current coffers. If N. Arlington was opened up to the disadvantaged, it wouldn't be long before the education system up there suffered as well. It's your short-sightedness that has created this problem. And now your children stand to lose. I just feel sorry for your kids. They'll likely be as uninformed and as ideological as you, accept they won't likely have the luxury. The chickens will have come home to roost by then. Your children will be dealing with economic disaster that resulted from your unsustainable policies. Not my kids though!!!

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You people are an absolute joke. You cry cry cry about everything for every body on the government's dime (taxpayers' back). You encourage undocumented immigrants to come and actually reward them with services available to them no questions asked. You get exactly what that causes- overcrowding in schools and poverty confined to ghettoized apartments, which brings down the socioeconomics in that area. Then you're mad. Think long and hard about where you stand and then project that instead of a fake agenda, which you don't really want. Stop being NIMBY! If you don't want overcrowded schools and concentrated poverty than stop voting for policies that cause that very thing. Maybe now that your child's education is on the chopping block and it is in your backyard you'll back away from being a hypocrite. It's about time!

[phone]

I think you two are missing the point, which is that decisions affecting the south alone are being made by the richer and more populous north.

No your missing the point. That is exactly what the poster is saying.

At the fed and state level, you need to stop voting for liberals who support such policies.

On the local level, if you live in south arl and you keep voting for all those people running for offices in the north arl, then you get the result the poster explained. If you want to change, then you need to start nominating and voting for those who are not liberal.

I'm a S Arl resident who voted for Vihstadt. The county thought I was voting against the streetcar when what I actually wanted is more accountability around the project. What I learned is that voting is a shitty instrument for expressing oneself. Hence OP's OP about community involvement.

As for "such policies" do any parties support the concentration of poverty these days?

Vihstadt is a huge disappointment if that's what you thought. You basically voted against the street car and for affordable housing. He is in the record as saying that all of the concentrated affordable housing in the western end of the PiKe is something, " we will all have to come to grips with"
Seriously- that's what he said.


All of the democratic candidates vying for one of the two spots on the board have come out loud and strong for their support for affordable housing. All of them.
I think there is one indepdent with his hat in the ring, but if he's anything like Vihstadt all your going to get is no money for infrastructure and more people crammed in, and vying for resources.

So tell me again how we've been voting against our best intestate. No one running is looking out for them. No one.

[Anonymous]

Really? Is this really a real post? Lady, do yourself a favor and read the thread. This is a discussion about how overcrowding is negatively impacting south Arlington schools. I'm not sure you understand basic English, but I'll try to explain. Because of the overcrowding there is not an equal education for all. There's a watered down curriculum that's becoming mediocre at best because teachers are overwhelmed trying to meet the needs of disadvantaged largely ESL kids to the detriment of middle class Arlingtonians families. Does this help? Geesh!

Yes, I understand that part and have been reading the thread. But what is YOUR solution for overcrowding and its negative impact? "Flight"? All you've done is come on this discussion and spew ill-informed, conservative crap; you don't offer any insight or any solution to the problem, but you offer plenty of insults.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Really? Is this really a real post? Lady, do yourself a favor and read the thread. This is a discussion about how overcrowding is negatively impacting south Arlington schools. I'm not sure you understand basic English, but I'll try to explain. Because of the overcrowding there is not an equal education for all. There's a watered down curriculum that's becoming mediocre at best because teachers are overwhelmed trying to meet the needs of disadvantaged largely ESL kids to the detriment of middle class Arlingtonians families. Does this help? Geesh!

Yes, I understand that part and have been reading the thread. But what is YOUR solution for overcrowding and its negative impact? "Flight"? All you've done is come on this discussion and spew ill-informed, conservative crap; you don't offer any insight or any solution to the problem, but you offer plenty of insults.

PS - the thread keeps refusing to quote the junk you post after some point - I think it's rebelling against the overcrowding of your ignorance...

[Anonymous]

I think this has turned into hot topics on the view- everyone is talking over each other and in some cases ideas are being attributed to the wrong poster. Par for the course, but it's confused some of the discussion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

New poster here: What N Arl school has the capacity to absorb more students other than Jamestown? Several N Arl schools are already VERY overcrowded and that's not really going to get better with the opening of Discovery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters here could live on Mars. The end result is the same. Liberals are mad they're getting what they asked for. Instead of having sour grapes now, you should probably think through exactly what you say you stand for.

I think there have been some very informed and reasoned arguments on this thread. There's been some crazies ^^^ but I think for the most part people here see the problems and are looking a for a solution. Crazy pants conservative poster can't honestly be blaming the problems of south Arlington on Millenials, surely? Most of us have been here way less that 10 years. We haven't had the time to impact much. I haven't seen much bleeding heart liberalism from that group. Most seem pretty pragmatic without being completely heartless. Not so myopic that we can't see the end result of current policy, but not so ideologically bone headed that we would throw out any sort of social safety net.

Oh, the I wan't my cake and it it too type. You guys are losers too! You're not reinventing the wheel, Mr. Millenial. You're just getting crushed by it! It's about time. Just love it when you cerebral rational fill-in-the-blank NIMBYs get egg in your face. While you're busy balancing being "heartless" with being "sound", etc... your school are getting jam-packed. It'll take a few generations perhaps, but eventually basic common sense will persevere. You can't absorb more and more human bodies without the resources to fully fund them. At some point you have to acknowledge this isn't working and the resources are there. The human bodies in need are going to have to stop consuming without compensating for that and start producing. When you don't have that feedback mechanism, you start to stress the infrastructure. That's what we have here. What we also have here is the experience in socialism that you said you wanted. How you like it now, mutha!

You do understand that is the argument being made right? Our specific area can't absorb all of the affordable housing the county has planned. That is in a nutshell what we are saying.
Did you perhaps attend an overcrowded school? Because if you did you are illustrating our point beautifully about how detrimental it can be to child's education, and how lasting those effects are.

You're so dense it's getting beyond ridiculous. Once affordable housing is spread out, as you think it needs to be, it's going to crush those areas as well. The population growth at its current rate simply cannot be sustained on the current coffers. If N. Arlington was opened up to the disadvantaged, it wouldn't be long before the education system up there suffered as well. It's your short-sightedness that has created this problem. And now your children stand to lose. I just feel sorry for your kids. They'll likely be as uninformed and as ideological as you, accept they won't likely have the luxury. The chickens will have come home to roost by then. Your children will be dealing with economic disaster that resulted from your unsustainable policies. Not my kids though!!!

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

it sounds like you're suggesting that poor children up and move because they're not convenient for you. Disgusting! You move! We need to stop scapegoating poor families here. They need our commitment and humanity towards their basic needs- the same way you would expect for your family and your self. I'm disgusted reading this thread!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters here could live on Mars. The end result is the same. Liberals are mad they're getting what they asked for. Instead of having sour grapes now, you should probably think through exactly what you say you stand for.

I think there have been some very informed and reasoned arguments on this thread. There's been some crazies ^^^ but I think for the most part people here see the problems and are looking a for a solution. Crazy pants conservative poster can't honestly be blaming the problems of south Arlington on Millenials, surely? Most of us have been here way less that 10 years. We haven't had the time to impact much. I haven't seen much bleeding heart liberalism from that group. Most seem pretty pragmatic without being completely heartless. Not so myopic that we can't see the end result of current policy, but not so ideologically bone headed that we would throw out any sort of social safety net.

Oh, the I wan't my cake and it it too type. You guys are losers too! You're not reinventing the wheel, Mr. Millenial. You're just getting crushed by it! It's about time. Just love it when you cerebral rational fill-in-the-blank NIMBYs get egg in your face. While you're busy balancing being "heartless" with being "sound", etc... your school are getting jam-packed. It'll take a few generations perhaps, but eventually basic common sense will persevere. You can't absorb more and more human bodies without the resources to fully fund them. At some point you have to acknowledge this isn't working and the resources are there. The human bodies in need are going to have to stop consuming without compensating for that and start producing. When you don't have that feedback mechanism, you start to stress the infrastructure. That's what we have here. What we also have here is the experience in socialism that you said you wanted. How you like it now, mutha!

You do understand that is the argument being made right? Our specific area can't absorb all of the affordable housing the county has planned. That is in a nutshell what we are saying.
Did you perhaps attend an overcrowded school? Because if you did you are illustrating our point beautifully about how detrimental it can be to child's education, and how lasting those effects are.

You're so dense it's getting beyond ridiculous. Once affordable housing is spread out, as you think it needs to be, it's going to crush those areas as well. The population growth at its current rate simply cannot be sustained on the current coffers. If N. Arlington was opened up to the disadvantaged, it wouldn't be long before the education system up there suffered as well. It's your short-sightedness that has created this problem. And now your children stand to lose. I just feel sorry for your kids. They'll likely be as uninformed and as ideological as you, accept they won't likely have the luxury. The chickens will have come home to roost by then. Your children will be dealing with economic disaster that resulted from your unsustainable policies. Not my kids though!!!

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

it sounds like you're suggesting that poor children up and move because they're not convenient for you. Disgusting! You move! We need to stop scapegoating poor families here. They need our commitment and humanity towards their basic needs- the same way you would expect for your family and your self. I'm disgusted reading this thread!

I'm beginning to think this is all the same poster. " crazy pants conservation" " knee jerk liberal"
I think someone is having a fun little creative trolling exercise on this thread....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Really? Is this really a real post? Lady, do yourself a favor and read the thread. This is a discussion about how overcrowding is negatively impacting south Arlington schools. I'm not sure you understand basic English, but I'll try to explain. Because of the overcrowding there is not an equal education for all. There's a watered down curriculum that's becoming mediocre at best because teachers are overwhelmed trying to meet the needs of disadvantaged largely ESL kids to the detriment of middle class Arlingtonians families. Does this help? Geesh!

Yes, I understand that part and have been reading the thread. But what is YOUR solution for overcrowding and its negative impact? "Flight"? All you've done is come on this discussion and spew ill-informed, conservative crap; you don't offer any insight or any solution to the problem, but you offer plenty of insults. There's no more opportunity for solution in my opinion. The hole got dug deeper and deeper by a well-meaning but naive electorate. Now we're at a breaking point. Any "solution" now would be downright in humane to certain populations and I could never be a part of that. The chickens are returning home to roost now. We'll just have to deal with it. Blame your older and more liberal constituents if you like. That won't accomplish much. The problem is not going away. We as a family predicted this disaster and saved to by a home in N. Arlington. That is my solution- moving!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Really? Is this really a real post? Lady, do yourself a favor and read the thread. This is a discussion about how overcrowding is negatively impacting south Arlington schools. I'm not sure you understand basic English, but I'll try to explain. Because of the overcrowding there is not an equal education for all. There's a watered down curriculum that's becoming mediocre at best because teachers are overwhelmed trying to meet the needs of disadvantaged largely ESL kids to the detriment of middle class Arlingtonians families. Does this help? Geesh!

Yes, I understand that part and have been reading the thread. But what is YOUR solution for overcrowding and its negative impact? "Flight"? All you've done is come on this discussion and spew ill-informed, conservative crap; you don't offer any insight or any solution to the problem, but you offer plenty of insults. There's no more opportunity for solution in my opinion. The hole got dug deeper and deeper by a well-meaning but naive electorate. Now we're at a breaking point. Any "solution" now would be downright in humane to certain populations and I could never be a part of that. The chickens are returning home to roost now. We'll just have to deal with it. Blame your older and more liberal constituents if you like. That won't accomplish much. The problem is not going away. We as a family predicted this disaster and saved to by a home in N. Arlington. That is my solution- moving!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

New poster here: What N Arl school has the capacity to absorb more students other than Jamestown? Several N Arl schools are already VERY overcrowded and that's not really going to get better with the opening of Discovery.

Then the next logical step becomes - don't have more students than capacity to hold them. This gets closer to what "crazy pants" is talking about. What that specific poster doesn't seem to get, is that most of us don't believe in overwhelming the system. I think we should take on as many as we can, until we can't. The tipping point should be before the schools start sliding down hill for all students... And it appears to have been reached at Barcroft.
Busing was brought up earlier and I don't agree with it. People spent a million bucks to live in 22207- good for them. They should be able to walk their kids to school.
However, the people who spent half a million+ on their homes deserve some consideration too. There isn't much we can do about the recently added housing, but we need to speak up about the additional Housing that is planned, and the lack of foresight into overcrowded schools with high poverty.
This won't go over well with the further left, but it needs to start being said.
What exactly is the plan for all of these people on the Pike?
Transportation that is projected to be inadequate to move the number of people needing it within a decade.
Schools that can't handle the capacity of harder to serve students
Don't forget -These Neighborhoods are full of older people who need assistance to age in place.

We can't do it all. The Pike is going to continue to gentrify, there is no stopping progress. The older apartments will come down one by one. That's why the board is so hot to get up all of this committed affordable housing. The way they are going about it isn't smart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What are the politicians supposed to do? I mean, really? Elementary schools in south Arlington have, until very recently, been way less crowded than north Arlington schools and had smaller class sizes because they haven't all been at the max, but their scores are lower. The traditional program at Drew has 14 kids in a class and the lowest SOL scores in the county. They have additional staff through Title I. APS added preschool 10 years ago and continues to fund it despite the overcrowding issues. They have very low teacher ratios for kids learning English, which is a lot of the kids in several schools. Given the underlying demographics, what do people want the county to do to make the schools better? (I get that not adding more affordable housing in areas that already have a lot of it will help keep the problems from getting worse, but doesn't solve the problems with the status quo.)

redistrict high schools.

[Anonymous]

So, I just saw this meeting is now the 28th at Carlin Hall? Is this true?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Get a grip! We aren't talking about saddling n arl schools with 40% + FARMs rates. Take a look at very desirable schools in Fairfax. I'm talking 8+ great schools ratings. They have approx 10-15 % Farms rates. That's not going to impact a school. The precious snowflakes of north Arlington can easily absorb a small percentage.
And guess what- it's often north arlington limousine liberals ( boomers and older gen xer's ) that have created these policies. Not the middle class south Arlington Millenials who are trying to dig us out of this.

New poster here: What N Arl school has the capacity to absorb more students other than Jamestown? Several N Arl schools are already VERY overcrowded and that's not really going to get better with the opening of Discovery.

Then the next logical step becomes - don't have more students than capacity to hold them. This gets closer to what "crazy pants" is talking about. What that specific poster doesn't seem to get, is that most of us don't believe in overwhelming the system. I think we should take on as many as we can, until we can't. The tipping point should be before the schools start sliding down hill for all students... And it appears to have been reached at Barcroft.
Busing was brought up earlier and I don't agree with it. People spent a million bucks to live in 22207- good for them. They should be able to walk their kids to school.
However, the people who spent half a million+ on their homes deserve some consideration too. There isn't much we can do about the recently added housing, but we need to speak up about the additional Housing that is planned, and the lack of foresight into overcrowded schools with high poverty.
This won't go over well with the further left, but it needs to start being said.
What exactly is the plan for all of these people on the Pike?
Transportation that is projected to be inadequate to move the number of people needing it within a decade.
Schools that can't handle the capacity of harder to serve students
Don't forget -These Neighborhoods are full of older people who need assistance to age in place.

We can't do it all. The Pike is going to continue to gentrify, there is no stopping progress. The older apartments will come down one by one. That's why the board is so hot to get up all of this committed affordable housing. The way they are going about it isn't smart.

So what would you do with the kids that represent the over-capacity? Ship them off somewhere? That's ridiculous. And let's say you do ship them off, what happens when the schools that take them on are overcrowded? Ship the "extra" kids across state lines? What if that was your child they were talking about? What needs to happen is people need to become a little more flexible in what they are expecting from schools. It's entirely possible to meet all of the kids where they are. More affluent families are expecting extras. That needs to stop. If you can pay for the extras, then by all means supplement in your private time. There needs to be a basic core that everyone benefits from that is what is happening in these so-called over-capacity schools. No one is turned away and the kids are all doing fine. Just up-thread the notion that kids in South Arlington were doing worse than their north peers was debunked. It's also been debunked that all of these middle class kids are suffering from being schooled with brown kids. The kids do fine with parental involvement. You just have a lot of parents who want to opt out of parenting and expect the schools to take over. The schools most definitely can't accommodate that, so you have these gentrifiers crying about their schools getting over-run, etc... We need to all take a deep breath and really guage what's going on. But, by all means, don't think that it's acceptable to push around disadvantaged kids.

[Anonymous]

Yes, the meeting is now on the 28th at Carlin Hall at 7:30 p.m.