could West Potomac become a Marshall in 10 years?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The FCPS capacity dashboard ranks WestPo as 2 out of 25 (most crowded), and Mount Vernon as 25 out of 25 (least crowded); the schools are adjacent to one another; there is no proposal to redistrict part of West Po to Mount Vernon; and FCPS wants part of the 2017 bond offering to pay for an expansion at WestPo.

Sorry, that makes no sense, so I'll be voting against the 2017 school bond and urging others to do likewise.

It never makes sense to vote no on school bonds. If you need convincing, look at Arlington.

as a taxpayer I always voted NO on school bonds and meal tax. we are tax enough alreadly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nope, WestPo is still letting out of bound students in. I know of at least 5 rising freshman this year who live within Mt Vernon but are going to WestPo. Two coming from the Catholic elementary schools and 3 who were in the AAP program. I'm sure there are others I don't know about. One parent told me she didn't want her DD at Hayfield because it was out of her way to drive her to school so she insisted she had to be placed at WestPo.

Are you and the other MVHS PP aware that the principals HAVE TO accept curriculum transfer requests? If someone is zoned for MVHS (which is an IB school), they have an absolute right to opt out of the IB program school and into an AP school (i.e. West Po). I don't think you should be getting upset that people are allowed into West Po or allowed out of MVHS when it is simply the way the rules work. If you want to stop the practice, get a bunch of MVHS parents together and start pestering your school board reps to change MVHS into AP. That will stop the transfers immediately. The only remaining reasons for transfers will be the academy programs offered at West Po... so there may be an increase in the number of kids from MVHS who suddenly find a love of dance!

I'm not upset that people want out of Mt. Vernon. I say "good riddance." I'm upset that WestPo is overcrowded and has advertised that they are closed, but they still let students in when our next closest AP school, Hayfield, is also under enrolled. And the school board wants to spend $$ to expand WestPo. The students I know that are going to WestPo ARE NOT going for the academy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The FCPS capacity dashboard ranks WestPo as 2 out of 25 (most crowded), and Mount Vernon as 25 out of 25 (least crowded); the schools are adjacent to one another; there is no proposal to redistrict part of West Po to Mount Vernon; and FCPS wants part of the 2017 bond offering to pay for an expansion at WestPo.

Sorry, that makes no sense, so I'll be voting against the 2017 school bond and urging others to do likewise.

It never makes sense to vote no on school bonds. If you need convincing, look at Arlington.

I've always voted for school bonds and they always pass, because voters typically aren't familiar with the details, yet support public schools. However, knowing the lack of logic behind these proposed capital investments (expanding West Po when there are hundreds of empty seats at Mount Vernon; expanding Madison when there are still theoretically plans to build another high school in western Fairfax, etc.), I can't support this one and hope it fails.

[Anonymous]

Agree. We need a new Hugh school. Till that is firmly on the table I'm not sure I will vote for it either.

[Anonymous]

Maybe it's a blip that the last Capital Improvement Plan was prepared under an acting Superintendent who was the definition of an empty suit, but it's not obvious that money is being spent in the right places or on the right projects. The 2017 bond should be voted down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree. We need a new Hugh school. Till that is firmly on the table I'm not sure I will vote for it either.

Are you talking about APS? How's that working out for you? Oh, you're talking about FCPS. Then I'm sure doing the same thing, voting no on the bond, will have a different result in Fairfax than it has in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Isn't Marshall a wealthy school just like all of the other fcps high schools minus the Lee/Stewart/Mt. Vernon type schools?

This is a very affluent area and almost all of the high schools are overflowing with upper middle class kids.

FARMS Percentages at FCPS High Schools (Virginia DOE stats for October 2016)/# of $1.0 million property sales over past 12 months.

Langley 1.4 (350)
TJHSST 1.8 (n/a)
McLean 8.5 (267)
Madison 9.2 (169)
Robinson 9.2 (30)
West Springfield 10.8 (0)
Woodson 10.9 (17)
Oakton 11.7 (88)
Lake Braddock 13.8 (12)
South County 16.7 (17)
Chantilly 17.1 (6)
Marshall 17.3 (103)
Westfield 22.9 (10)
Fairfax 23.3 (17)
Centreville 24.2 (11)
South Lakes 27.9 (34)
Hayfield 28.3 (0)
Edison 34.4 (0)
Herndon 38.1 (8)
West Potomac 38.6 (32)
Falls Church 49.6 (8)
Mount Vernon 50.5 (12)
Lee 52.6 (0)
Annandale 53.7 (6)
Stuart 59.1 (20)

Langley and TJ are the outliers in terms of almost no poverty; Falls Church, Mount Vernon, Lee, Annandale and Stuart are the five schools with the most poverty. In terms of high-end property sales, however, there are five school districts with the lion's share; Langley, McLean, Madison, Marshall and Oakton. There's also another subset of schools with little poverty, but also few super-expensive neighborhoods, West Springfield being the prime example.

Marshall may roughly be in the middle of FCPS schools in terms of the percentage of lower-income students, but it's now 4 out of 25 in terms of the number of $1.0M-plus property sales. West Potomac won't "become a Marshall in 10 years" unless Route 1 becomes another Tysons, and there's next to no prospect of that happening.

Thank you for pulling this together, very interesting. We live in Falls Church pyramid and I went to West Springfield. I have a two year old. It's crazy to me that I need to worry if I am setting up my child to have a "worse" education than I had living 5 miles from my childhood home in the same school district. Such is the state of the American education and it makes no sense to me, we need more integration. There just shouldn't be these disparities in FARMS, it's shameful that most of us think its ok.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The FCPS capacity dashboard ranks WestPo as 2 out of 25 (most crowded), and Mount Vernon as 25 out of 25 (least crowded); the schools are adjacent to one another; there is no proposal to redistrict part of West Po to Mount Vernon; and FCPS wants part of the 2017 bond offering to pay for an expansion at WestPo.

Sorry, that makes no sense, so I'll be voting against the 2017 school bond and urging others to do likewise.

It never makes sense to vote no on school bonds. If you need convincing, look at Arlington.

Huh? Arlington has passed every school bond during the 12 years I've lived here. We have issues, but that is not one of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We live in Hollin Hall and yes it's wishful thinking but I see so much $$$ development in our area and so many young families moving in...just wondering if our high school is poised to dramatically improve by time our kids have to go there.....

Most likely not, because the perception of school quality is generally relative. So in order for West Potomac to "move up," other schools would have to "move down." I do agree with you that there is a lot of expensive development coming in, but that's the case in a LOT of places in Fairfax County. If anything, I think it would be more likely that a school like Falls Church, where new townhomes cost nearly $1 million, would make bigger gains than a school like West Potomac.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. We need a new Hugh school. Till that is firmly on the table I'm not sure I will vote for it either.

Are you talking about APS? How's that working out for you? Oh, you're talking about FCPS. Then I'm sure doing the same thing, voting no on the bond, will have a different result in Fairfax than it has in Arlington.

What the hell are you talking about?
Arlington has never voted no on a school bond.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We live in Hollin Hall and yes it's wishful thinking but I see so much $$$ development in our area and so many young families moving in...just wondering if our high school is poised to dramatically improve by time our kids have to go there.....

Most likely not, because the perception of school quality is generally relative. So in order for West Potomac to "move up," other schools would have to "move down." I do agree with you that there is a lot of expensive development coming in, but that's the case in a LOT of places in Fairfax County. If anything, I think it would be more likely that a school like Falls Church, where new townhomes cost nearly $1 million, would make bigger gains than a school like West Potomac.

Dp- umm no. Another nearby school doesn't have to move down. Jeez people.
Poverty, however does have to move away. Not just be redirected. I don't think you will see gentrification of those poorer areas anytime soon.

[Anonymous]

No. The closet comparison would be South Lakes or Herndon High. Both schools have a sizeable well-off population that does as well as their peers in more homogeneous schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. We need a new Hugh school. Till that is firmly on the table I'm not sure I will vote for it either.

Are you talking about APS? How's that working out for you? Oh, you're talking about FCPS. Then I'm sure doing the same thing, voting no on the bond, will have a different result in Fairfax than it has in Arlington.

What the hell are you talking about?
Arlington has never voted no on a school bond.

What don't you get? I want them to come up with another plan that I'll support. The bond referendum cost is huge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe it's a blip that the last Capital Improvement Plan was prepared under an acting Superintendent who was the definition of an empty suit, but it's not obvious that money is being spent in the right places or on the right projects. The 2017 bond should be voted down.

Agreed! Looking at the capacity projections for some of the schools slated for renovations/expansions, and then looking at school boundaries, this current CIP seems to be in direct conflict with what is actually needed in the county.

My kids are slated for Shrevewood/Kilmer/Marshall. All three are slated to be WAY overcapacity by 2021 (even though Marshall just finished its renovation). Yet these schools are not even being considered for expansion, and nothing has seriously been done about adjusting boundaries. Why should the kids that live in the housing at Dunn Loring metro go to Shrevewood when they can WALK to Stenwood? Similarly, there are some areas where it is obvious that boundary fixes could at least help with some overcrowding...and nothing is being done.

[Anonymous]

Maybe West Po could use expansion even without kids transferring in from other HSs. I doubt they're the sole cause of overcrowding. I will definitely vote yes on the bond, as someone with kids in West Po area.