Spanish Immersion Community Table Session

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Honestly? I think it was because immersion parents sent a large list of questions including pointing out some inaccurate data re: transportation Friday or Thursday and they likely needed time to answer questions and correct the data

So are current immersion parents opposed to the potential move?

Not most of the ones I've talked to, and they run the gamut of kids currently in middle and ones who will be impacted by this move. Some aren't super happy about current 6th graders moving schools for 8th grade, but at the same time they realize it's not a reason to stall it.

I suspect the Hamm/Williamsburg parents throwing tantrums about their boundaries being moved have maybe been louder than "eh fine" from the Immersion community. That would be unfortunate.

Why? If immersion parents don’t really care where their OPTION program is located, then the county should listen to “neighborhood schools” and let them actually attend the schools in their neighborhoods.

Because Williamsburg's boundaries should be re-drawn as it's under capacity. This will effect Hamm. It's just part of life in Arlington, it's a constant juggle to utilize resources. The ONLY reason those parents are fighting the Immersion move is because it's being coupled with their boundaries being re-drawn. It's the classic Arlington fight. No one wants their schools to change ever. And yet, it needs to happen. But the current parents will fight tooth and nail to stop something until their kid isn't going to be effected, and then they don't care one bit. That's not how we should decide things.

APS has explicitly tied moving immersion with the middle school boundary process. It's in the Pre-CIP. Look at page A-111 (pg 153 of the PDF). There is a table trying to justify why moving immersion to Kenmore will cause less disturbance overall than leaving it at Gunston. They conveniently did not include a column showing the impact of moving it to Williamsburg because that's the scenario that actually impacts the fewest students.

Except for the students currently in the immersion program -- moving a Spanish immersion program to a corner of the county with very few native Speakers would almost certainly have a detrimental effect. Williamsburg is not on the table because it is not an option that would work with the school's focus.

Exactly what would be the detrimental effect? Moving the middle school program would mean moving families who are already entrenched in the program having invested in sending their kids to immersion programming since kindergarten presumably. Further, the breakdown of Hispanic to non-Hispanic in the immersion program is targeted at 50%/50%. It is not as though the entire immersion program is Hispanic. Have you engaged the Hispanic community on the matter? Or are you just assuming. Further, per Great Schools, Williamsburg' demographics is currently at 12% Hispanic population. Last, there are plenty of ethnic pockets all over NOVA. That's how it goes in dense urban areas. Frankly, I think it would go a long way to shake up and break down the disparities between N and S Arlington to relocate the program to a school like Williamsburg.

Different poster than the one you are responding to, but you really don't see a problem with sending a large group of students from one end of the county to another? Do you actually want parents involved in their child's education, or just the parents who live close enough to Williamsburg that they can make it to school events without a SAHP?

How many school events do you go to in middle school really? Answer - not many. This is just an excuse. Parents in NW were already going to the far corner of the county to get to Gunston. What's the difference moving it to the other corner?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Reminder that native Spanish speaking is NOT the same thing as low income, especially in the context of Immersion at APS.

True, but again, in this context it is important since the immersion program is supposed to be 50/50.

It's important because the main argument against moving Immersion to Williamsburg is that it's inaccessible to the poor Hispanic community. The thing is, Claremont is 27% FARMS, so the kids going to the middle school that live closest to Gunston probably aren't poor anyway! The map in the Pre-CIP shows a lot come from Fairlington and Shirlington. There are definitely some lower income families from near Courthouse and Rosslyn, but Williamsburg isn't any further away from there than Gunston. Same for Buckingham.

[Anonymous]

It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

[Anonymous]

The County should put immersion where it makes sense to put immersion long-term and not do a bunch of pretzel twisting to appease parents of current students affected by changes that a couple years from now no one will even think twice about. If some future kid goes to Swanson instead of Kenmore or Williamsburg instead of Hamm, no one will give a shite.

That is APS's problem. They listen to current whiners over long-term strategic decision making.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly? I think it was because immersion parents sent a large list of questions including pointing out some inaccurate data re: transportation Friday or Thursday and they likely needed time to answer questions and correct the data

So are current immersion parents opposed to the potential move?

Not most of the ones I've talked to, and they run the gamut of kids currently in middle and ones who will be impacted by this move. Some aren't super happy about current 6th graders moving schools for 8th grade, but at the same time they realize it's not a reason to stall it.

I suspect the Hamm/Williamsburg parents throwing tantrums about their boundaries being moved have maybe been louder than "eh fine" from the Immersion community. That would be unfortunate.

Why? If immersion parents don’t really care where their OPTION program is located, then the county should listen to “neighborhood schools” and let them actually attend the schools in their neighborhoods.

It's still the school in your freaking neighborhood. Look left instead of right or up instead of down. It's just a different school close by.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

Because the Immersion “Visioning” team isn’t self interested at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

Because the Immersion “Visioning” team isn’t self interested at all.

Everyone agrees they need to leave Gunston. They'd probably rather stay at Gunston and kick out the neighborhood kids. That would be self-interest.

Instead you all want to move them to the complete opposite end of the County where their program is pretty sure to fail over time. And then if the current and future students don't try hard enough to get there this proves the program was a waste of time and people didn't really want to go all that much. That's the actual argument!!

And the main reason is you don't want Boopsy and Schmoospy to be separated from even some of their friends or have to ride a bus.

It's pretty fantastic to watch though.

[Anonymous]

I think there is an idea that moving to a more centralized location. Which some have deemed kenmore to be they will attract more Key families to continue with Immersion. We are Claremont, I know maybe 10 families that left immersion. I heard with key nearly 50% of families left immersion this year. Gunston is mainly Claremont families supposedly..

Some key parents said they don't go to gunston due to location but I think everyone ignores the elephant in the room for not going to Gunston. One that Kenmore won't solve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

It’s a “spin” to move a program to the school with the most capacity and minimize the boundary changes and additional busing required for other sites?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly? I think it was because immersion parents sent a large list of questions including pointing out some inaccurate data re: transportation Friday or Thursday and they likely needed time to answer questions and correct the data

So are current immersion parents opposed to the potential move?

Not most of the ones I've talked to, and they run the gamut of kids currently in middle and ones who will be impacted by this move. Some aren't super happy about current 6th graders moving schools for 8th grade, but at the same time they realize it's not a reason to stall it.

I suspect the Hamm/Williamsburg parents throwing tantrums about their boundaries being moved have maybe been louder than "eh fine" from the Immersion community. That would be unfortunate.

Why? If immersion parents don’t really care where their OPTION program is located, then the county should listen to “neighborhood schools” and let them actually attend the schools in their neighborhoods.

It's still the school in your freaking neighborhood. Look left instead of right or up instead of down. It's just a different school close by.

You can literally say the same thing about WMS vs Kenmore. Look up. It’s a small county as you say, and most immersion are bused anyways.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

It’s a “spin” to move a program to the school with the most capacity and minimize the boundary changes and additional busing required for other sites?

It’s spin to act like moving immersion to Williamsburg wouldn’t blow up their program.

[Anonymous]

Moving immersion to WM is long term bad for that program. Moving some current students around to different neighborhood schools to minimize boundary changes is a short-term issue that is driven by current parents freaking out about change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think there is an idea that moving to a more centralized location. Which some have deemed kenmore to be they will attract more Key families to continue with Immersion. We are Claremont, I know maybe 10 families that left immersion. I heard with key nearly 50% of families left immersion this year. Gunston is mainly Claremont families supposedly..

Some key parents said they don't go to gunston due to location but I think everyone ignores the elephant in the room for not going to Gunston. One that Kenmore won't solve.

Exactly NA families at Key aren’t sending their kids to KENMORE.

WMS would be a BIG draw for immersion from SA families too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is fascinating to me how people have spun this issue into somehow Williamsburg should take a Spanish immersion program.

I don’t have a dog in this fight and it won’t affect my kids but if you people get your way it will be a real exhibit for APS’s dysfunction.

Stop listening to the self-interested parents APS. They are dogged and will never quit. Ultimate entitled behavior.

+100. Moving Immersion to Williamsburg makes no sense to anyone else in the county but the handful of WMS and HMS parents who are up in arms about being moved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think there is an idea that moving to a more centralized location. Which some have deemed kenmore to be they will attract more Key families to continue with Immersion. We are Claremont, I know maybe 10 families that left immersion. I heard with key nearly 50% of families left immersion this year. Gunston is mainly Claremont families supposedly..

Some key parents said they don't go to gunston due to location but I think everyone ignores the elephant in the room for not going to Gunston. One that Kenmore won't solve.

Exactly NA families at Key aren’t sending their kids to KENMORE.

WMS would be a BIG draw for immersion from SA families too.

I am a SA Immersion family and WMS has NO draw for me.