The demise of McKinley ES (APS)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So now the McKinley parents are upset that they spent money on features for their public school and they might be moved out of that school?

Can we put them and the ASFS parents in a leaky boat and send them off somewhere?

Oh my! They invested in their school. Those monsters.

So did lots of other schools, to the extent families were able. This is not something unique to McKinley or ASFS, and therefore is not a valid consideration in this process.

So why is PP even bringing it up in such a nasty way?

McKinley walk zone folks are grasping at straws.

I agree. First, the lights or whatever could potentially be moved to another school, like what was referenced with ASFS. Next, the new PTAs will be raising $$ before Reed ben opens. Look at Discovery. Third, whatever school they move to will be welcoming them into their PTA before the school even opens. This is not a brand new scenario. Those DH?MM parents need to take a big breath and chill out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted this before but allow me to try again: would 'Partner-School Option' have a chance to be successful? Match up one S school with one N school and let families choose or lottery which one to go to and bus both ways. I think two buses would probably do.

really, who at Nottingham or Discovery is going to voluntarily ride a bus to Barcroft or Randolph? Families move to NA because they’ve decided “the schools” are worth the housing premium.

It could help fill seats in under enrolled N school by pairing up one overcrowding S school, say, Discovery & Randolph, without changing multiple boundaries. And if it stays 'one directional' forever so be it. But it reaches the critical mass it can be successful in other aspects too.

Isn't this simply a version of the old neighborhood transfer policy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm PP and I'm a McKinley parent fwiw.

I thought the McKinley PtA was targeting Tuckahoe. Is that not correct? Since at least half the school will be going to Reed (40% of McK as walkers), I'd be surprised if they tried to change the plan for Reed. Also, it would be extremely stupid since they need Reed to get them below 800.

I don’t know what you mean about targeting Tuckahoe, but my comment came from the idea that it now seems unlikely that the school board will allow both McKinley and Reed to be neighborhood schools — so if Mckinley talks itself and the board to keep McKinley — well then they/we really will be stuck with McKinley, no fields, too small lunchroom and all! Whereas Reed has trees and fields and a community that has food trucks and a farmers market on the weekends. Imagine a field day where you didn’t have to walk ten minutes and cross various roads first to get to your fields!

It could be nice, guys! Let’s make sure they haven’t biffed the numbers again, as always, sure! But it might be, dare I say it, an improvement?!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted this before but allow me to try again: would 'Partner-School Option' have a chance to be successful? Match up one S school with one N school and let families choose or lottery which one to go to and bus both ways. I think two buses would probably do.

really, who at Nottingham or Discovery is going to voluntarily ride a bus to Barcroft or Randolph? Families move to NA because they’ve decided “the schools” are worth the housing premium.

It could help fill seats in under enrolled N school by pairing up one overcrowding S school, say, Discovery & Randolph, without changing multiple boundaries. And if it stays 'one directional' forever so be it. But it reaches the critical mass it can be successful in other aspects too.

Isn't this simply a version of the old neighborhood transfer policy?

Except that at some point APS ran the numbers and found that option school applications really were driven to some large degree by proximity. So it’s not written in stone with quotas, but if the lottery applicants are primarily walkers, that’s who the lottery winners will turn out to be, primarily, as well. Obviously that will be more true with a generalized option school like ATS and less true with a specialized option school like immersion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So now the McKinley parents are upset that they spent money on features for their public school and they might be moved out of that school?

Can we put them and the ASFS parents in a leaky boat and send them off somewhere?

Oh my! They invested in their school. Those monsters.

So did lots of other schools, to the extent families were able. This is not something unique to McKinley or ASFS, and therefore is not a valid consideration in this process.

So why is PP even bringing it up in such a nasty way?

McKinley walk zone folks are grasping at straws.

By criticizing McKinley parents? That doesn't make any sense.

[Anonymous]

Because people on the other side of the county don’t want their kids to sit on a bus for 40 minutes to attend an option school. And I wouldn’t either.

[Anonymous]

23:25 - Thank you for being a voice of reason among the emotionally hijacked McKinley parents. Please make sure your voice is also heard by APS. The charge to "save McKinley" is being led by people who don't care about the community at large, or even half of our own school and who are in deep denial about the fact that the school was always going to split. Reed or Ashlawn would be a significant improvement from the McK facility and its shortcomings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:23:25 - Thank you for being a voice of reason among the emotionally hijacked McKinley parents. Please make sure your voice is also heard by APS. The charge to "save McKinley" is being led by people who don't care about the community at large, or even half of our own school and who are in deep denial about the fact that the school was always going to split. Reed or Ashlawn would be a significant improvement from the McK facility and its shortcomings.

+ 1

[Anonymous]

Could somebody update me on Ashlwan. I hear it's great but over populated. Will it get bigger or smaller under the two plans? Once its size changes, will it be at capacity or over/under?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted this before but allow me to try again: would 'Partner-School Option' have a chance to be successful? Match up one S school with one N school and let families choose or lottery which one to go to and bus both ways. I think two buses would probably do.

really, who at Nottingham or Discovery is going to voluntarily ride a bus to Barcroft or Randolph? Families move to NA because they’ve decided “the schools” are worth the housing premium.

It could help fill seats in under enrolled N school by pairing up one overcrowding S school, say, Discovery & Randolph, without changing multiple boundaries. And if it stays 'one directional' forever so be it. But it reaches the critical mass it can be successful in other aspects too.

Isn't this simply a version of the old neighborhood transfer policy?

the difference is the partnership between two schools and doing it in a 'group transfer' manner instead of 'individual transfers.'

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Could somebody update me on Ashlwan. I hear it's great but over populated. Will it get bigger or smaller under the two plans? Once its size changes, will it be at capacity or over/under?

My friends love Ashlawn. The boundaries will change, but I don’t expect it to be oversubscribed once the dust settles.

[Anonymous]

I'm also a McK parent and I support the school going to Reed --it seems to make a lot of sense. But since we've been burned by the school board before (hello, 800 students at McK) we just want to see some data showing how they came to these conclusions and who will go where. We don't want Reed to be over capacity in two years because they miscalculated...and we also don't want it to turn out that they really plan to send a bunch of walkable Reed planning units elsewhere to fill capacity at Discovery, Nottingham and Tuckahoe.
The biggest problem with the way they're doing this is the lack of transparency: they primed everyone for what was going to happen with all the previous studies and now they're saying oh, we're going to do the opposite! Just show us what you've got, and then I at least will be on board.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm also a McK parent and I support the school going to Reed --it seems to make a lot of sense. But since we've been burned by the school board before (hello, 800 students at McK) we just want to see some data showing how they came to these conclusions and who will go where. We don't want Reed to be over capacity in two years because they miscalculated...and we also don't want it to turn out that they really plan to send a bunch of walkable Reed planning units elsewhere to fill capacity at Discovery, Nottingham and Tuckahoe.
The biggest problem with the way they're doing this is the lack of transparency: they primed everyone for what was going to happen with all the previous studies and now they're saying oh, we're going to do the opposite! Just show us what you've got, and then I at least will be on board.

What do you think they primed you for and now are changing course on? They’ve been clear for months that Key is moving but not to ASFS, so it has to go somewhere but they didn’t propose a site until now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm also a McK parent and I support the school going to Reed --it seems to make a lot of sense. But since we've been burned by the school board before (hello, 800 students at McK) we just want to see some data showing how they came to these conclusions and who will go where. We don't want Reed to be over capacity in two years because they miscalculated...and we also don't want it to turn out that they really plan to send a bunch of walkable Reed planning units elsewhere to fill capacity at Discovery, Nottingham and Tuckahoe.
The biggest problem with the way they're doing this is the lack of transparency: they primed everyone for what was going to happen with all the previous studies and now they're saying oh, we're going to do the opposite! Just show us what you've got, and then I at least will be on board.

I get where you're coming from. In my opinion, the best way to make sure walkable PUs go to Reed is to move McK over to Reed. Otherwise, how would you fill both schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm also a McK parent and I support the school going to Reed --it seems to make a lot of sense. But since we've been burned by the school board before (hello, 800 students at McK) we just want to see some data showing how they came to these conclusions and who will go where. We don't want Reed to be over capacity in two years because they miscalculated...and we also don't want it to turn out that they really plan to send a bunch of walkable Reed planning units elsewhere to fill capacity at Discovery, Nottingham and Tuckahoe.
The biggest problem with the way they're doing this is the lack of transparency: they primed everyone for what was going to happen with all the previous studies and now they're saying oh, we're going to do the opposite! Just show us what you've got, and then I at least will be on board.

What do you think they primed you for and now are changing course on? They’ve been clear for months that Key is moving but not to ASFS, so it has to go somewhere but they didn’t propose a site until now.

I'm not the PP, but I think what she means is that APS did a study of a bunch of school locations in 2018 and concluded at that time that McKinley was a poor location for an option school site. You can find that study on Engage. I think its under the Key-ASFS swap initiative. Based on those metrics, APS concluded Nottingham was the best location for an option school. (At the time, it seemed that Nattress was looking at leaving ATS where it is, but opening a new IB school at Nottingham.) That one Nottingham mom organized a petition and got someone in Don Beyer's office involved. Then APS just pulled everything off the table and said they would revisit. So what changed? That's what people are asking. They want to make sure that this isn't behind the scenes politics. I agree with PP that if APS would explain what changed between 2018 and now, most people in Westover would be fine with the plan (all but a few neighbors immediately around McKinley anyway). But nobody wants Reed to open over-capacity. Starting at 725 student school at 702 kids doesn't seem like a great plan when they are still building new multi-family housing in Westover-- and that's not hypothetical, they are building it right now.