Mythical Western HS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just looked up the latest CIP. They still don’t have the site!

Are the FCPS really going to build this? A few years ago CIP indicated that the new school would be built near Hutchison to provide the relief to Chantilly, Southlakes, Westfield, Oakton and Centreville. Now it looks like we are back to square one. The CIP doesn’t say much about the new HS other than the site has not been determined.

This was discussed on another thread.

The latest CIP indicates for the first time that the upcoming Centreville expansion will build that school out to 3000 seats. And, as you point out, they have no site for Western HS.

Granted, it's not easy to find a site with enough land for a new high school now. The best site was sold to the Saudis years ago. In addition, you have people who are worried that a new HS would be less attractive than their current high school, or that it might lead to a series of boundary changes that moves some kids from Langley to Herndon. Those people have every incentive to oppose the construction of a new high school, especially if it were built near Hutchison.

As a practical matter, what that means is that people with younger kids in the Centreville, Chantilly, Herndon, Oakton, South Lakes, and Westfield pyramids should make sure they are comfortable with sending their kids to a school that may each have more than 2600 kids. Western HS is not going to happen for many years, if ever. Some will give up on FCPS and move to Loudoun, where they are disciplined and build new schools regularly to keep the individual HS enrollments down.

So Langley parents prevailed in the end? Many posters on this board were absolutely sure that once the new Western HS gets built the boundary change would happen and Great Falls kids be reassigned to Herndon High.

Yes.

Back in 2018 when the School Board started to talk about boundary policy, Janie Strauss made a comment to the effect that she'd told Langley parents in Great Falls to expect to be redistricted when a new western high school was built. She didn't say where, but it was interpreted to mean that the Great Falls neighborhoods that had attended Herndon prior to 1994 (i.e., an area west of Springvale Road) would be moved back to Herndon.

That infuriated those parents, who created a group ("One Great Falls," which changed its name to "Voices of Fairfax") to protest any such idea. It culminated in a meeting at Forestville ES in June 2019, in which several dozen Langley parents screamed at Strauss about how hard they'd worked to afford a house in the Langley district, how Herndon was dangerous and not as academically rigorous, and how they'd leave the county or pull their kids out of FCPS if they were moved to Herndon. It was not a pleasant gathering.

None of this was lost on Elaine Tholen, the Great Falls resident running to replace Strauss on 2019. Like any good Democrat, Tholen had originally expressed her support for the county's "One Fairfax" policy, which some believed called for a county-wide boundary review in FCPS. When her neighbors gave her an earful, she pulled the reference to "One Fairfax" off her web page, and then did two things with her Great Falls/Langley neighbors primarily in mind. First, she made sure that not too many kids ended up getting redistricted from overcrowded McLean to Langley, as a result of which Langley remains below capacity and FCPS continues to project that McLean will remain well over capacity for years to come. Second, she has consistently downplayed the likelihood that a new Western high school would ever get built.

I'm not aware of any public indication that Tholen has been working behind the scenes to kill (or further delay) the western high school or to expand a school like Centreville to 3000 seats. But the continued lack of real activity towards a new Western high school, along with the recently announced big planned expansion of Centreville, which is in the southwestern part of the county far from Great Falls, are great news if you're one of the Great Falls parents who wants to stay at Langley for years to come.

I mean, a couple of things:
-she doesn't single-handedly control whether or not this happens, i.e. Mythical HS.
-she's responding to her constituents, yes? I didn't think she was "at large" (but maybe I'm wrong and that would change my view some).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Great Falls only wishes they had that level of control.

Nuking the boundaries for the entire county was widely unpopular. The school board’s adamant refusal to grant Jane Strauss’ early 2019 request to move some apartments from overcrowded McLean to underenrolled Langley was proof that they were serious.

At least, they were serious while no one was looking.

A few YouTube videos with clips of their sessions helped spread awareness and the board heard from parents across the county.

It was always why Brabrand put out a desperate newsletter to every parent in the county lol.

LOL. It was classic School Board behavior.

When no one was paying attention, they were talking big, at least to each other.

So much so that they wouldn't let Strauss advance a Langley/McLean boundary change that actually would have added more kids and some housing diversity to Langley because they wanted to hold those two schools hostage to a bigger county-wide study.

Which never happened, of course, because they got cold feet very fast. And then they were quiet as lambs when Tholen pushed through the smaller boundary change a few years later that increases the demographic gap between Langley and every other school, including McLean.

At this point, Great Falls should be as supportive as anyone else of McLean's repeated cries for an addition, because without it there's always the possibility that the next School Board member will try to move more McLean kids to Langley and then they'd have all the same concerns again. But right now they are sitting pretty because the western HS is going nowhere, Centreville is getting a huge addition instead, and the next kids moved out of McLean will probably get sent to Falls Church, not Langley.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just looked up the latest CIP. They still don’t have the site!

Are the FCPS really going to build this? A few years ago CIP indicated that the new school would be built near Hutchison to provide the relief to Chantilly, Southlakes, Westfield, Oakton and Centreville. Now it looks like we are back to square one. The CIP doesn’t say much about the new HS other than the site has not been determined.

This was discussed on another thread.

The latest CIP indicates for the first time that the upcoming Centreville expansion will build that school out to 3000 seats. And, as you point out, they have no site for Western HS.

Granted, it's not easy to find a site with enough land for a new high school now. The best site was sold to the Saudis years ago. In addition, you have people who are worried that a new HS would be less attractive than their current high school, or that it might lead to a series of boundary changes that moves some kids from Langley to Herndon. Those people have every incentive to oppose the construction of a new high school, especially if it were built near Hutchison.

As a practical matter, what that means is that people with younger kids in the Centreville, Chantilly, Herndon, Oakton, South Lakes, and Westfield pyramids should make sure they are comfortable with sending their kids to a school that may each have more than 2600 kids. Western HS is not going to happen for many years, if ever. Some will give up on FCPS and move to Loudoun, where they are disciplined and build new schools regularly to keep the individual HS enrollments down.

So Langley parents prevailed in the end? Many posters on this board were absolutely sure that once the new Western HS gets built the boundary change would happen and Great Falls kids be reassigned to Herndon High.

Yes.

Back in 2018 when the School Board started to talk about boundary policy, Janie Strauss made a comment to the effect that she'd told Langley parents in Great Falls to expect to be redistricted when a new western high school was built. She didn't say where, but it was interpreted to mean that the Great Falls neighborhoods that had attended Herndon prior to 1994 (i.e., an area west of Springvale Road) would be moved back to Herndon.

That infuriated those parents, who created a group ("One Great Falls," which changed its name to "Voices of Fairfax") to protest any such idea. It culminated in a meeting at Forestville ES in June 2019, in which several dozen Langley parents screamed at Strauss about how hard they'd worked to afford a house in the Langley district, how Herndon was dangerous and not as academically rigorous, and how they'd leave the county or pull their kids out of FCPS if they were moved to Herndon. It was not a pleasant gathering.

None of this was lost on Elaine Tholen, the Great Falls resident running to replace Strauss on 2019. Like any good Democrat, Tholen had originally expressed her support for the county's "One Fairfax" policy, which some believed called for a county-wide boundary review in FCPS. When her neighbors gave her an earful, she pulled the reference to "One Fairfax" off her web page, and then did two things with her Great Falls/Langley neighbors primarily in mind. First, she made sure that not too many kids ended up getting redistricted from overcrowded McLean to Langley, as a result of which Langley remains below capacity and FCPS continues to project that McLean will remain well over capacity for years to come. Second, she has consistently downplayed the likelihood that a new Western high school would ever get built.

I'm not aware of any public indication that Tholen has been working behind the scenes to kill (or further delay) the western high school or to expand a school like Centreville to 3000 seats. But the continued lack of real activity towards a new Western high school, along with the recently announced big planned expansion of Centreville, which is in the southwestern part of the county far from Great Falls, are great news if you're one of the Great Falls parents who wants to stay at Langley for years to come.

I mean, a couple of things:
-she doesn't single-handedly control whether or not this happens, i.e. Mythical HS.
-she's responding to her constituents, yes? I didn't think she was "at large" (but maybe I'm wrong and that would change my view some).

No, of course not. There are plenty of other people besides those in western Great Falls who could have their own reasons for wanting to kill or further delay the western HS. It would be silly to suggest she's some type of invisible hand who pulls all the strings. She mostly only seems to have influence over a few things that other members don't care that much about.

And she's been responsive to some of her constituents, just not the ones who actually most needed her advocacy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Great Falls only wishes they had that level of control.

Nuking the boundaries for the entire county was widely unpopular. The school board’s adamant refusal to grant Jane Strauss’ early 2019 request to move some apartments from overcrowded McLean to underenrolled Langley was proof that they were serious.

At least, they were serious while no one was looking.

A few YouTube videos with clips of their sessions helped spread awareness and the board heard from parents across the county.

It was always why Brabrand put out a desperate newsletter to every parent in the county lol.

LOL. It was classic School Board behavior.

When no one was paying attention, they were talking big, at least to each other.

So much so that they wouldn't let Strauss advance a Langley/McLean boundary change that actually would have added more kids and some housing diversity to Langley because they wanted to hold those two schools hostage to a bigger county-wide study.

Which never happened, of course, because they got cold feet very fast. And then they were quiet as lambs when Tholen pushed through the smaller boundary change a few years later that increases the demographic gap between Langley and every other school, including McLean.

At this point, Great Falls should be as supportive as anyone else of McLean's repeated cries for an addition, because without it there's always the possibility that the next School Board member will try to move more McLean kids to Langley and then they'd have all the same concerns again. But right now they are sitting pretty because the western HS is going nowhere, Centreville is getting a huge addition instead, and the next kids moved out of McLean will probably get sent to Falls Church, not Langley.

^ I apologize if this suggests in any way that decisions about a western HS should be based on what's in the interests of Langley or McLean. They should be based on what's in the interests of people in western Fairfax. It's just that there are a lot of spillover effects with any big decision and it's already affected the tone of prior discussions around a new school.

To me, the fact that they've announced they plan to build Centreville out to 3000 kids is a huge signal that they'll keep finding reasons NOT to build a western HS, at least not for a long, long time. I hope they had conversations with people in that area to find out whether they want Centreville to be that large. When Centreville was originally built, it was designed as a 2000-student school. It's become common to expand schools to 2500 seats during school renovations, and some schools have even more seats now, but 3000 is really big.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just looked up the latest CIP. They still don’t have the site!

Are the FCPS really going to build this? A few years ago CIP indicated that the new school would be built near Hutchison to provide the relief to Chantilly, Southlakes, Westfield, Oakton and Centreville. Now it looks like we are back to square one. The CIP doesn’t say much about the new HS other than the site has not been determined.

This was discussed on another thread.

The latest CIP indicates for the first time that the upcoming Centreville expansion will build that school out to 3000 seats. And, as you point out, they have no site for Western HS.

Granted, it's not easy to find a site with enough land for a new high school now. The best site was sold to the Saudis years ago. In addition, you have people who are worried that a new HS would be less attractive than their current high school, or that it might lead to a series of boundary changes that moves some kids from Langley to Herndon. Those people have every incentive to oppose the construction of a new high school, especially if it were built near Hutchison.

As a practical matter, what that means is that people with younger kids in the Centreville, Chantilly, Herndon, Oakton, South Lakes, and Westfield pyramids should make sure they are comfortable with sending their kids to a school that may each have more than 2600 kids. Western HS is not going to happen for many years, if ever. Some will give up on FCPS and move to Loudoun, where they are disciplined and build new schools regularly to keep the individual HS enrollments down.

So Langley parents prevailed in the end? Many posters on this board were absolutely sure that once the new Western HS gets built the boundary change would happen and Great Falls kids be reassigned to Herndon High.

Yes.

Back in 2018 when the School Board started to talk about boundary policy, Janie Strauss made a comment to the effect that she'd told Langley parents in Great Falls to expect to be redistricted when a new western high school was built. She didn't say where, but it was interpreted to mean that the Great Falls neighborhoods that had attended Herndon prior to 1994 (i.e., an area west of Springvale Road) would be moved back to Herndon.

That infuriated those parents, who created a group ("One Great Falls," which changed its name to "Voices of Fairfax") to protest any such idea. It culminated in a meeting at Forestville ES in June 2019, in which several dozen Langley parents screamed at Strauss about how hard they'd worked to afford a house in the Langley district, how Herndon was dangerous and not as academically rigorous, and how they'd leave the county or pull their kids out of FCPS if they were moved to Herndon. It was not a pleasant gathering.

None of this was lost on Elaine Tholen, the Great Falls resident running to replace Strauss on 2019. Like any good Democrat, Tholen had originally expressed her support for the county's "One Fairfax" policy, which some believed called for a county-wide boundary review in FCPS. When her neighbors gave her an earful, she pulled the reference to "One Fairfax" off her web page, and then did two things with her Great Falls/Langley neighbors primarily in mind. First, she made sure that not too many kids ended up getting redistricted from overcrowded McLean to Langley, as a result of which Langley remains below capacity and FCPS continues to project that McLean will remain well over capacity for years to come. Second, she has consistently downplayed the likelihood that a new Western high school would ever get built.

I'm not aware of any public indication that Tholen has been working behind the scenes to kill (or further delay) the western high school or to expand a school like Centreville to 3000 seats. But the continued lack of real activity towards a new Western high school, along with the recently announced big planned expansion of Centreville, which is in the southwestern part of the county far from Great Falls, are great news if you're one of the Great Falls parents who wants to stay at Langley for years to come.

I mean, a couple of things:
-she doesn't single-handedly control whether or not this happens, i.e. Mythical HS.
-she's responding to her constituents, yes? I didn't think she was "at large" (but maybe I'm wrong and that would change my view some).

She theoretically represents 3 HS pyramids. Shhhh.

[Anonymous]

At these large sizes, HSs land up with schools with in schoo with less overlapping populations.

[Anonymous]

Expanding Centreville makes no sense. There is no new housing/developments in that area-it is built out and no one wants a 3000 kid high school.

[Anonymous]

We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

We also live in Centreville/zoned for Westfield. Our schools are already enormous. Is the community polled on whether they want a giant mega school? I certainly do NOT. Its already hard for kids to get leadership positions, play on sports teams, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

We also live in Centreville/zoned for Westfield. Our schools are already enormous. Is the community polled on whether they want a giant mega school? I certainly do NOT. Its already hard for kids to get leadership positions, play on sports teams, etc.

I find it hard to believe the plan to build Centreville out to 3000 could have made its way into the draft 2024-28 CIP without Stella Pekarsky having been aware of it. So either she’s asleep and wasn’t asking the right questions or thinks it’s just fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

We also live in Centreville/zoned for Westfield. Our schools are already enormous. Is the community polled on whether they want a giant mega school? I certainly do NOT. Its already hard for kids to get leadership positions, play on sports teams, etc.

I find it hard to believe the plan to build Centreville out to 3000 could have made its way into the draft 2024-28 CIP without Stella Pekarsky having been aware of it. So either she’s asleep and wasn’t asking the right questions or thinks it’s just fine.

A new high school means county wide redistricting which is probably a horrifying thought for most of the board

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

We also live in Centreville/zoned for Westfield. Our schools are already enormous. Is the community polled on whether they want a giant mega school? I certainly do NOT. Its already hard for kids to get leadership positions, play on sports teams, etc.

I find it hard to believe the plan to build Centreville out to 3000 could have made its way into the draft 2024-28 CIP without Stella Pekarsky having been aware of it. So either she’s asleep and wasn’t asking the right questions or thinks it’s just fine.

First, Chantilly is already at or over 3000 kids. And growing, especially as fewer Carson and RRMS kids go to Carson

Second, Chantilly has the smallest footprint of any HS in the County. There is literally no place to build it out. It’s also a modular building, which apparently also is an issue. It’s not inThe CIP because the school is in decent shape and it cannot be expanded in any real way on the property they have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are zoned for cvhs and i have not heard anything about expanding the school. Thats terrible for our centreville kids. No kids benefit from a 3000 kid school. Why are we punishing poor and middle class centreville kids to protect the property values in great falls and mclean?

We also live in Centreville/zoned for Westfield. Our schools are already enormous. Is the community polled on whether they want a giant mega school? I certainly do NOT. Its already hard for kids to get leadership positions, play on sports teams, etc.

I find it hard to believe the plan to build Centreville out to 3000 could have made its way into the draft 2024-28 CIP without Stella Pekarsky having been aware of it. So either she’s asleep and wasn’t asking the right questions or thinks it’s just fine.

First, Chantilly is already at or over 3000 kids. And growing, especially as fewer Carson and RRMS kids go to Carson

Second, Chantilly has the smallest footprint of any HS in the County. There is literally no place to build it out. It’s also a modular building, which apparently also is an issue. It’s not inThe CIP because the school is in decent shape and it cannot be expanded in any real way on the property they have.

Chantilly is slightly over 2900 kids, not 3000. I assume you mean it's growing as fewer Carson and Rocky Run kids go to TJ now (not Carson).

Not sure what you mean when you say Chantilly has the smallest footprint of any HS in the county. It has substantially more acreage than Justice and Lewis and about the same acreage as Centreville. So if Centreville is getting built out, it appears they could replace the current 14-classroom modular at Chantilly with an addition.

However, it appears the plan is to expand Centreville, which again has about the same "footprint" as Chantilly, to 3000 seats, move some Chantilly kids to Centreville, and continue to leave Chantilly very big (though perhaps not quite as big) with a long-term modular.

That's not what was envisioned when people talked about a new western HS, but it's probably what the community is looking at.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just looked up the latest CIP. They still don’t have the site!

Are the FCPS really going to build this? A few years ago CIP indicated that the new school would be built near Hutchison to provide the relief to Chantilly, Southlakes, Westfield, Oakton and Centreville. Now it looks like we are back to square one. The CIP doesn’t say much about the new HS other than the site has not been determined.

This was discussed on another thread.

The latest CIP indicates for the first time that the upcoming Centreville expansion will build that school out to 3000 seats. And, as you point out, they have no site for Western HS.

Granted, it's not easy to find a site with enough land for a new high school now. The best site was sold to the Saudis years ago. In addition, you have people who are worried that a new HS would be less attractive than their current high school, or that it might lead to a series of boundary changes that moves some kids from Langley to Herndon. Those people have every incentive to oppose the construction of a new high school, especially if it were built near Hutchison.

As a practical matter, what that means is that people with younger kids in the Centreville, Chantilly, Herndon, Oakton, South Lakes, and Westfield pyramids should make sure they are comfortable with sending their kids to a school that may each have more than 2600 kids. Western HS is not going to happen for many years, if ever. Some will give up on FCPS and move to Loudoun, where they are disciplined and build new schools regularly to keep the individual HS enrollments down.

So Langley parents prevailed in the end? Many posters on this board were absolutely sure that once the new Western HS gets built the boundary change would happen and Great Falls kids be reassigned to Herndon High.

Yes.

Back in 2018 when the School Board started to talk about boundary policy, Janie Strauss made a comment to the effect that she'd told Langley parents in Great Falls to expect to be redistricted when a new western high school was built. She didn't say where, but it was interpreted to mean that the Great Falls neighborhoods that had attended Herndon prior to 1994 (i.e., an area west of Springvale Road) would be moved back to Herndon.

That infuriated those parents, who created a group ("One Great Falls," which changed its name to "Voices of Fairfax") to protest any such idea. It culminated in a meeting at Forestville ES in June 2019, in which several dozen Langley parents screamed at Strauss about how hard they'd worked to afford a house in the Langley district, how Herndon was dangerous and not as academically rigorous, and how they'd leave the county or pull their kids out of FCPS if they were moved to Herndon. It was not a pleasant gathering.

None of this was lost on Elaine Tholen, the Great Falls resident running to replace Strauss on 2019. Like any good Democrat, Tholen had originally expressed her support for the county's "One Fairfax" policy, which some believed called for a county-wide boundary review in FCPS. When her neighbors gave her an earful, she pulled the reference to "One Fairfax" off her web page, and then did two things with her Great Falls/Langley neighbors primarily in mind. First, she made sure that not too many kids ended up getting redistricted from overcrowded McLean to Langley, as a result of which Langley remains below capacity and FCPS continues to project that McLean will remain well over capacity for years to come. Second, she has consistently downplayed the likelihood that a new Western high school would ever get built.

I'm not aware of any public indication that Tholen has been working behind the scenes to kill (or further delay) the western high school or to expand a school like Centreville to 3000 seats. But the continued lack of real activity towards a new Western high school, along with the recently announced big planned expansion of Centreville, which is in the southwestern part of the county far from Great Falls, are great news if you're one of the Great Falls parents who wants to stay at Langley for years to come.

I mean, a couple of things:
-she doesn't single-handedly control whether or not this happens, i.e. Mythical HS.
-she's responding to her constituents, yes? I didn't think she was "at large" (but maybe I'm wrong and that would change my view some).

No, of course not. There are plenty of other people besides those in western Great Falls who could have their own reasons for wanting to kill or further delay the western HS. It would be silly to suggest she's some type of invisible hand who pulls all the strings. She mostly only seems to have influence over a few things that other members don't care that much about.

And she's been responsive to some of her constituents, just not the ones who actually most needed her advocacy.

On any issue, someone is going to be unhappy. That doesn't mean she deserves the scorn being heaped on her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just looked up the latest CIP. They still don’t have the site!

Are the FCPS really going to build this? A few years ago CIP indicated that the new school would be built near Hutchison to provide the relief to Chantilly, Southlakes, Westfield, Oakton and Centreville. Now it looks like we are back to square one. The CIP doesn’t say much about the new HS other than the site has not been determined.

This was discussed on another thread.

The latest CIP indicates for the first time that the upcoming Centreville expansion will build that school out to 3000 seats. And, as you point out, they have no site for Western HS.

Granted, it's not easy to find a site with enough land for a new high school now. The best site was sold to the Saudis years ago. In addition, you have people who are worried that a new HS would be less attractive than their current high school, or that it might lead to a series of boundary changes that moves some kids from Langley to Herndon. Those people have every incentive to oppose the construction of a new high school, especially if it were built near Hutchison.

As a practical matter, what that means is that people with younger kids in the Centreville, Chantilly, Herndon, Oakton, South Lakes, and Westfield pyramids should make sure they are comfortable with sending their kids to a school that may each have more than 2600 kids. Western HS is not going to happen for many years, if ever. Some will give up on FCPS and move to Loudoun, where they are disciplined and build new schools regularly to keep the individual HS enrollments down.

So Langley parents prevailed in the end? Many posters on this board were absolutely sure that once the new Western HS gets built the boundary change would happen and Great Falls kids be reassigned to Herndon High.

Yes.

Back in 2018 when the School Board started to talk about boundary policy, Janie Strauss made a comment to the effect that she'd told Langley parents in Great Falls to expect to be redistricted when a new western high school was built. She didn't say where, but it was interpreted to mean that the Great Falls neighborhoods that had attended Herndon prior to 1994 (i.e., an area west of Springvale Road) would be moved back to Herndon.

That infuriated those parents, who created a group ("One Great Falls," which changed its name to "Voices of Fairfax") to protest any such idea. It culminated in a meeting at Forestville ES in June 2019, in which several dozen Langley parents screamed at Strauss about how hard they'd worked to afford a house in the Langley district, how Herndon was dangerous and not as academically rigorous, and how they'd leave the county or pull their kids out of FCPS if they were moved to Herndon. It was not a pleasant gathering.

None of this was lost on Elaine Tholen, the Great Falls resident running to replace Strauss on 2019. Like any good Democrat, Tholen had originally expressed her support for the county's "One Fairfax" policy, which some believed called for a county-wide boundary review in FCPS. When her neighbors gave her an earful, she pulled the reference to "One Fairfax" off her web page, and then did two things with her Great Falls/Langley neighbors primarily in mind. First, she made sure that not too many kids ended up getting redistricted from overcrowded McLean to Langley, as a result of which Langley remains below capacity and FCPS continues to project that McLean will remain well over capacity for years to come. Second, she has consistently downplayed the likelihood that a new Western high school would ever get built.

I'm not aware of any public indication that Tholen has been working behind the scenes to kill (or further delay) the western high school or to expand a school like Centreville to 3000 seats. But the continued lack of real activity towards a new Western high school, along with the recently announced big planned expansion of Centreville, which is in the southwestern part of the county far from Great Falls, are great news if you're one of the Great Falls parents who wants to stay at Langley for years to come.

I mean, a couple of things:
-she doesn't single-handedly control whether or not this happens, i.e. Mythical HS.
-she's responding to her constituents, yes? I didn't think she was "at large" (but maybe I'm wrong and that would change my view some).

She theoretically represents 3 HS pyramids. Shhhh.

And?