Woodward HS boundary study - BCC, Blair, Einstein, WJ, Kennedy, Northwood, Wheaton, Whitman impacts

[Anonymous]

Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

The monied interests in Gaithersburg (Harriet Tubman ES), Montgomery Village (South Lake ES), and Wheaton (Northwood HS)?

[Anonymous]

Can't comment on HTES or SLES, but have you seen what Northwood is going to look like/what will be available to students there and compared it with Woodward?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

Then you don't have a problem moving the Blair magnet closer to mid-county where all students can access them? Same distance from every corner of MC?

And schools like Wootton crumbing? Schools with asbestos? You don't care about them?

Please. Save it for someone who's a bit more naive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

The monied interests in Gaithersburg (Harriet Tubman ES), Montgomery Village (South Lake ES), and Wheaton (Northwood HS)?

And yes, placing the Poolesville Magnet in Gaithersburg HS would be an example of making it more accessible.

[Anonymous]

Blair is overcrowded, correct? So why are you busing magnet kids to Silver Spring? Move the magnet to Woodward, then you have more room at Blair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Blair is overcrowded, correct? So why are you busing magnet kids to Silver Spring? Move the magnet to Woodward, then you have more room at Blair.

Woodward is not even going to have enough seats for the local kids being reassigned from WJ, Wheaton and Einstein. There will be no room for a magnet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

Then you don't have a problem moving the Blair magnet closer to mid-county where all students can access them? Same distance from every corner of MC?

And schools like Wootton crumbing? Schools with asbestos? You don't care about them?

Please. Save it for someone who's a bit more naive.

All red herrings, there. The point was that Silver Spring isn't getting the dough any more than other places. The Potomac example, and others, were thown in for color. Wooton might not be having their problems addressed, either, but significant $ differentials going to less-well-off communities to provide reasonably equivalent educational experiences just isn't happening.

The magnet doesn't need to be at Blair, but what makes more sense than moving it or Poolesville is to create many more. There's a higher number of kids than when the magnets were created, and the seats were too few back then. A Whitman magnet of another sort. -- one that would tend to draw more from overcrowded DCC than other, less crowded schools -- also makes sense. Stopping the gravy train for developers by re-establishing burdens to fund, fully, proper school and other infrastructure makes even more sense.

As for naivete, I'd place that squarely on the one(s) suggesting that politicians (and others with authority) don't end up nodding to wealth more often than to poverty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

Then you don't have a problem moving the Blair magnet closer to mid-county where all students can access them? Same distance from every corner of MC?

And schools like Wootton crumbing? Schools with asbestos? You don't care about them?

Please. Save it for someone who's a bit more naive.

Wootton is fine and the Blair magnet is not movable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

Then you don't have a problem moving the Blair magnet closer to mid-county where all students can access them? Same distance from every corner of MC?

And schools like Wootton crumbing? Schools with asbestos? You don't care about them?

Please. Save it for someone who's a bit more naive.

More students can access it where it is now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much price in WJ may go down due to boundary change? 10% , 20% ??

I don't care much about demography of schools changing but I have enough stress in my life to not add possibility of 25% decline after buying a house.

This is what structural racism looks like. “I’m not a racist but I don’t want my home value to go down if those kids are in my school.”

Are you out of your mind? There is nothing racist about not wanting to lose 25% of biggest purchase of your life.

Not the PP, but their comment was about structural racism, not individual racism. Structural racism in this case is a school zoning map that has traditionally been designed to preserve segregation. If that zoning is disrupted and integration ensues, then housing prices will drop.

If both residential zoning and school boundaries had included integration from the beginning, there would not have been an artificially inflated "zone" of high-priced segregated communities.

The Montgomery County school boundaries are not drawn to “include segregation” and the big report they did a few years found it would be difficult to have more diverse schools without busing, which is why that whole project died with a whimper. The main problem is zoning and not allowing more housing types in the most desirable areas. The other problem is that developers don’t build many family-sized units where multifamily housing is allowed.

Not to mention that 90 or 95% of the people surveyed said they wanted their kids to remain at their current school or be moved to a closer school if they had to move. They didn't care about diversity at all. The only people who wanted kids bused based on diversity were a few BOE members without kids in MCPS and the SMOB who was graduating in a few months.

Diversity is MCPS's #1 mission. Education is much further down the list. The boundaries should reflect this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:BCC, WJ and Woodward should become a part of DCC.

Whitman boundaries should be adjusted to include as much diversity as possible even though it's hard due to where its located.

That is never going to happen

I agree. Even in the most progressive areas, adjusting boundaries to improve diversity at schools without diversity is extremely unpopular. Also, gerrymandering and bussing for diversity is becoming less politically palatable. Back in the 70s and 80s it was de rigueur but not today. So I doubt Whitman will become more diverse and in fact may become less diverse, more wealthy, or stay the same.

Just look across the river for recent (w/in the pat 5 years) efforts to relieve overcrowding in popular schools that only further concentrated wealth in the less crowded and wealthiest schools: Redistricting in Fairfax County between McLean and Langley high schools pushed even more affluent neighborhoods to Langley. In Arlington, redistricting between W-L and Yorktown rezoned the most affluent W-L neighborhoods to Yorktown.

How long have you lived in Montgomery County (the one in Maryland)?

I grew up going to the crappy B-CC McDonalds and the old, musty Hot Shoppes with the grandparents. I know this area backwards and forwards. Optimistically, MCPS will balance demographics, but Whitman is just too far removed geographically. I don’t see it happening unless there is some major cultural-political shift. Even progressive San Fransisco reprioritized family preference in its school assignment lottery overhaul in 2011. Schools rapidly re-segregated.

Easy to solve. Just put a vocational magnet at Whitman.

Now that is brilliant and it would be more accessible too!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blair is overcrowded, correct? So why are you busing magnet kids to Silver Spring? Move the magnet to Woodward, then you have more room at Blair.

Woodward is not even going to have enough seats for the local kids being reassigned from WJ, Wheaton and Einstein. There will be no room for a magnet.

This is because they reduced the size of it to cut costs. Thank Andrew Friedson, who has been steadily cutting fees developers pay so the county can build new schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blair is overcrowded, correct? So why are you busing magnet kids to Silver Spring? Move the magnet to Woodward, then you have more room at Blair.

Woodward is not even going to have enough seats for the local kids being reassigned from WJ, Wheaton and Einstein. There will be no room for a magnet.

Shifting magnet out of Blair will open up seats for Wheaton and Einstein.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Strange take about the system catering to Silver Spring. If that were the case, you'd see resources going there instead of, say, to the brand new elementary in Potomac and the upcoming brand new high school in Bethesda, the subject of this thread.

Instead, we see no high school options pursued inside the beltway where one is desperately needed, SSIMS/SCES treated like a redheaded stepchild, HVES given the three-card Monty and Eastern downright ignored. TPMS, Pinecrest and Woodlin, you say? Well, shucks, it helps to have some wealthy folks in certain catchments...

Hey, waaaaaiit a minute...could it be that politicians pay lip service to the bulk of the electorate to garner the popular vote but bend to monied interests when it comes to brass tacks? Nah, couldn't be!

Then you don't have a problem moving the Blair magnet closer to mid-county where all students can access them? Same distance from every corner of MC?

And schools like Wootton crumbing? Schools with asbestos? You don't care about them?

Please. Save it for someone who's a bit more naive.

Wootton is fine and the Blair magnet is not movable.

Everything is movable. If it means it's equitable bus ride for entire county, then it should move.