Please be aware of what is about to go away:

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also there is no reason why you can't move to the regional model and still keep consortia. The new regions could be structured as consortia too. The last time the transportation budget for the consortia was estimated it was quite small, just a tiny drop in the bucket of MCPS's total budget, and the added cost would be even less now since they'll already be paying to run buses all across each region for the regional programs anyway.

In no way do I want to live in a consortium. I like the way they are doing it -- people go to their home school unless they want a speciality program. I want to know that my neighbors who choose public will be at our school--and that they kids we went to middle school will be, too--unless they make the choice to apply and then get into a magnet.

In a consortium you can still be guaranteed your home school. So are you saying you don't want.a consortium because you want to force your neighbors' kids into the same school your kids are going to, whether they want to or not? Lovely of you (And still doesn't even work because all your kid's middle school friends could still choose to go to a regional program at a different school anyway. So it has all the downsides of a consortia model without the benefits.)

Correct. I want my kids to go to a neighborhood school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also there is no reason why you can't move to the regional model and still keep consortia. The new regions could be structured as consortia too. The last time the transportation budget for the consortia was estimated it was quite small, just a tiny drop in the bucket of MCPS's total budget, and the added cost would be even less now since they'll already be paying to run buses all across each region for the regional programs anyway.

In no way do I want to live in a consortium. I like the way they are doing it -- people go to their home school unless they want a speciality program. I want to know that my neighbors who choose public will be at our school--and that they kids we went to middle school will be, too--unless they make the choice to apply and then get into a magnet.

In a consortium you can still be guaranteed your home school. So are you saying you don't want.a consortium because you want to force your neighbors' kids into the same school your kids are going to, whether they want to or not? Lovely of you (And still doesn't even work because all your kid's middle school friends could still choose to go to a regional program at a different school anyway. So it has all the downsides of a consortia model without the benefits.)

Correct. I want my kids to go to a neighborhood school.

Adding: We specifically chose not to live in the DCC because we didn't want to live in a consortium. One reason we left the District was how much we hated lotteries and what we saw it do to neighborhood schools. We are here so that our kids can go to their zoned schools with most of their neighbors. There is a huge benefit to that in terms of friendships and community-building. Yes, some will leave with more regional options, but those who don't will be able to build the community in our neighborhood schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also there is no reason why you can't move to the regional model and still keep consortia. The new regions could be structured as consortia too. The last time the transportation budget for the consortia was estimated it was quite small, just a tiny drop in the bucket of MCPS's total budget, and the added cost would be even less now since they'll already be paying to run buses all across each region for the regional programs anyway.

In no way do I want to live in a consortium. I like the way they are doing it -- people go to their home school unless they want a speciality program. I want to know that my neighbors who choose public will be at our school--and that they kids we went to middle school will be, too--unless they make the choice to apply and then get into a magnet.

In a consortium you can still be guaranteed your home school. So are you saying you don't want.a consortium because you want to force your neighbors' kids into the same school your kids are going to, whether they want to or not? Lovely of you (And still doesn't even work because all your kid's middle school friends could still choose to go to a regional program at a different school anyway. So it has all the downsides of a consortia model without the benefits.)

Correct. I want my kids to go to a neighborhood school.

Adding: We specifically chose not to live in the DCC because we didn't want to live in a consortium. One reason we left the District was how much we hated lotteries and what we saw it do to neighborhood schools. We are here so that our kids can go to their zoned schools with most of their neighbors. There is a huge benefit to that in terms of friendships and community-building. Yes, some will leave with more regional options, but those who don't will be able to build the community in our neighborhood schools.

So you have the opinion that you don’t want to live in a consortium. Many of us have the opinion that we and our kids benefit from a consortium and we still have a strong community. Nevertheless, MCPS has taken neither of our opinions into account. They have created a plan and aim to start putting it in motion by December.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These changes are going to devastate Einstein which will be left with graphic arts.

Einstein seems to disproportionally lose in all this. Their performing arts are really strong and often celebrated by MCPS (including in today’s social media feed). I understand gradually tweaking the programs to make more sense but not taking two major programs out of Einstein, not replacing them, and significantly reducing its student population which in turn means fewer teachers and fewer offerings. I have a kid at Einstein who loves it and another headed there next year. I want to trust that the offerings will be the same for 8th graders but of course they won’t be. It would be great if we could help build programs at more schools but not by taking it away from others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also there is no reason why you can't move to the regional model and still keep consortia. The new regions could be structured as consortia too. The last time the transportation budget for the consortia was estimated it was quite small, just a tiny drop in the bucket of MCPS's total budget, and the added cost would be even less now since they'll already be paying to run buses all across each region for the regional programs anyway.

In no way do I want to live in a consortium. I like the way they are doing it -- people go to their home school unless they want a speciality program. I want to know that my neighbors who choose public will be at our school--and that they kids we went to middle school will be, too--unless they make the choice to apply and then get into a magnet.

In a consortium you can still be guaranteed your home school. So are you saying you don't want.a consortium because you want to force your neighbors' kids into the same school your kids are going to, whether they want to or not? Lovely of you (And still doesn't even work because all your kid's middle school friends could still choose to go to a regional program at a different school anyway. So it has all the downsides of a consortia model without the benefits.)

Correct. I want my kids to go to a neighborhood school.

Adding: We specifically chose not to live in the DCC because we didn't want to live in a consortium. One reason we left the District was how much we hated lotteries and what we saw it do to neighborhood schools. We are here so that our kids can go to their zoned schools with most of their neighbors. There is a huge benefit to that in terms of friendships and community-building. Yes, some will leave with more regional options, but those who don't will be able to build the community in our neighborhood schools.

So you have the opinion that you don’t want to live in a consortium. Many of us have the opinion that we and our kids benefit from a consortium and we still have a strong community. Nevertheless, MCPS has taken neither of our opinions into account. They have created a plan and aim to start putting it in motion by December.

Oh, I don't like this plan or the process they have put in place. I'm of the opinion that MCPS should be improving local schools and core programming, not adding more programming. But to the extent that it moves forward--and it seems clear to me that MCPS does not care what the public thinks; it is moving forward--I am very glad they are not using the consortium model.

[Anonymous]

MCPS sure does seem to love their lotteries and dividing up kids. I’m so tired of how they seem to feel the need to shift kids around every couple of years for what seems like no good reason when they could just provide the classes at the local school. There’s the CES, which I think is awful for the local school community. And then again with the middle school magnets. Both lotteries. And then if you’re in a consortium in high school, the friend groups get divided up again, and it’s all so arbitrary. Why should where you live or how you place in a lottery decide what access you get to certain classes? Can’t they just offer the same classes at all the schools and skip all this nonsense? Hopefully the new system they’re implementing for high school is closer to that, but I won’t hold my breath.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also there is no reason why you can't move to the regional model and still keep consortia. The new regions could be structured as consortia too. The last time the transportation budget for the consortia was estimated it was quite small, just a tiny drop in the bucket of MCPS's total budget, and the added cost would be even less now since they'll already be paying to run buses all across each region for the regional programs anyway.

In no way do I want to live in a consortium. I like the way they are doing it -- people go to their home school unless they want a speciality program. I want to know that my neighbors who choose public will be at our school--and that they kids we went to middle school will be, too--unless they make the choice to apply and then get into a magnet.

In a consortium you can still be guaranteed your home school. So are you saying you don't want.a consortium because you want to force your neighbors' kids into the same school your kids are going to, whether they want to or not? Lovely of you (And still doesn't even work because all your kid's middle school friends could still choose to go to a regional program at a different school anyway. So it has all the downsides of a consortia model without the benefits.)

Correct. I want my kids to go to a neighborhood school.

Most people do but the problem is not all schools are equal in offerings, which is why some families choose other schools to meet their kids needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MCPS sure does seem to love their lotteries and dividing up kids. I’m so tired of how they seem to feel the need to shift kids around every couple of years for what seems like no good reason when they could just provide the classes at the local school. There’s the CES, which I think is awful for the local school community. And then again with the middle school magnets. Both lotteries. And then if you’re in a consortium in high school, the friend groups get divided up again, and it’s all so arbitrary. Why should where you live or how you place in a lottery decide what access you get to certain classes? Can’t they just offer the same classes at all the schools and skip all this nonsense? Hopefully the new system they’re implementing for high school is closer to that, but I won’t hold my breath.

This! They are offering a minimum of classes but those are the classes we have now so its not gaining anything for the "lesser" schools and its going to to destroy some of the schools vs. make them better. I'm glad my youngest would be graduating or we'd be bailing as our home school doesn't have a lot of offerings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually, what probably has to go away are all of the special-interest "academies" in the DCC or the NEC that were open to anyone who lotteried into a given school. That matters to my performing-arts kid A LOT. But since nothing matters except STEM I can't even get a straight answer out of DCCAPS.

Northwood is getting a criteria based performing arts magnet. That's great, actually.

It is good but it's going to greatly hurt Einstein.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Actually, what probably has to go away are all of the special-interest "academies" in the DCC or the NEC that were open to anyone who lotteried into a given school. That matters to my performing-arts kid A LOT. But since nothing matters except STEM I can't even get a straight answer out of DCCAPS.

STEM only matters at two schools in the DCC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually, what probably has to go away are all of the special-interest "academies" in the DCC or the NEC that were open to anyone who lotteried into a given school. That matters to my performing-arts kid A LOT. But since nothing matters except STEM I can't even get a straight answer out of DCCAPS.

Northwood is getting a criteria based performing arts magnet. That's great, actually.

It’s not great from the perspective of the teachers who have been building up Einstein’s programs for years and years. So does the district just shuffle them around? Or do they hang on trying to keep their great programs while some of their local kids leave for Northwood? They would be tearing down what took years to build.

This is another reason why keeping consortia would be better. In a consortium, you can probably support decently strong performing arts programs at two of five schools, even if one is criteria-based and the other isn't, because the other school will still likely draw a disproportionately large number of kids interested in performing arts but who prefer the 2nd school (say, Einstein) over the first school (say, Northwood) for any of a number of reasons. But if Einstein is just for in-bounds Einstein kids, minus the most passionate and talented who leave for the Northwood program instead, that makes it much harder to imagine.

This will make Northwood the "better school" and strip down Einstein, which is really unfortunate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These changes are going to devastate Einstein which will be left with graphic arts.

Einstein seems to disproportionally lose in all this. Their performing arts are really strong and often celebrated by MCPS (including in today’s social media feed). I understand gradually tweaking the programs to make more sense but not taking two major programs out of Einstein, not replacing them, and significantly reducing its student population which in turn means fewer teachers and fewer offerings. I have a kid at Einstein who loves it and another headed there next year. I want to trust that the offerings will be the same for 8th graders but of course they won’t be. It would be great if we could help build programs at more schools but not by taking it away from others.

But their goal is to only have a number of students that will fit within the capacity of the building--and not have to have FIFTEEN portables surrounding the school. That's a good thing, in the opinion of this Einstein parent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These changes are going to devastate Einstein which will be left with graphic arts.

Einstein seems to disproportionally lose in all this. Their performing arts are really strong and often celebrated by MCPS (including in today’s social media feed). I understand gradually tweaking the programs to make more sense but not taking two major programs out of Einstein, not replacing them, and significantly reducing its student population which in turn means fewer teachers and fewer offerings. I have a kid at Einstein who loves it and another headed there next year. I want to trust that the offerings will be the same for 8th graders but of course they won’t be. It would be great if we could help build programs at more schools but not by taking it away from others.

I know nothing is set in stone, but I would be surprised if the Einstein community allowed VAPA and VAC to be taken away. It took years to build these programs, and they are a big part of the school’s reputation today. My son graduated from Einstein’s VAC program and now works for Disney+, and has a friend who is a background dancer for Kendrick Lamar, along with other friends who have built amazing careers in the arts. They wouldn’t be where they are today without the training they received at Einstein. This is devastating, VAPA and VAC must stay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These changes are going to devastate Einstein which will be left with graphic arts.

Einstein seems to disproportionally lose in all this. Their performing arts are really strong and often celebrated by MCPS (including in today’s social media feed). I understand gradually tweaking the programs to make more sense but not taking two major programs out of Einstein, not replacing them, and significantly reducing its student population which in turn means fewer teachers and fewer offerings. I have a kid at Einstein who loves it and another headed there next year. I want to trust that the offerings will be the same for 8th graders but of course they won’t be. It would be great if we could help build programs at more schools but not by taking it away from others.

I know nothing is set in stone, but I would be surprised if the Einstein community allowed VAPA and VAC to be taken away. It took years to build these programs, and they are a big part of the school’s reputation today. My son graduated from Einstein’s VAC program and now works for Disney+, and has a friend who is a background dancer for Kendrick Lamar, along with other friends who have built amazing careers in the arts. They wouldn’t be where they are today without the training they received at Einstein. This is devastating, VAPA and VAC must stay.

Neither of them have to go away. They can remain as regional (VAC) or local (VAPA) programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These changes are going to devastate Einstein which will be left with graphic arts.

Einstein seems to disproportionally lose in all this. Their performing arts are really strong and often celebrated by MCPS (including in today’s social media feed). I understand gradually tweaking the programs to make more sense but not taking two major programs out of Einstein, not replacing them, and significantly reducing its student population which in turn means fewer teachers and fewer offerings. I have a kid at Einstein who loves it and another headed there next year. I want to trust that the offerings will be the same for 8th graders but of course they won’t be. It would be great if we could help build programs at more schools but not by taking it away from others.

I know nothing is set in stone, but I would be surprised if the Einstein community allowed VAPA and VAC to be taken away. It took years to build these programs, and they are a big part of the school’s reputation today. My son graduated from Einstein’s VAC program and now works for Disney+, and has a friend who is a background dancer for Kendrick Lamar, along with other friends who have built amazing careers in the arts. They wouldn’t be where they are today without the training they received at Einstein. This is devastating, VAPA and VAC must stay.

Neither of them have to go away. They can remain as regional (VAC) or local (VAPA) programs.

But the proposal moves the performing arts pathway to Northwood. How do you maintain that level of performing arts when the curriculum that supports it is intentionally moved?