General Frustration and Disappointment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is what FCPS has become. Slide started before COVID and continues.

Most problems due to a succession of progressively more incompetent superintendents and a dysfunctional school board.

Your kids will have some good teachers but it will be necessary to supplement with tutors. Cheaper than private school and there may be areas where parental tutoring can work.

Weakest areas in FCPS are math and science. Your kids won’t be reading books unless that is done at home. Hit and miss on writing instruction so may need help in that area as well.

Good luck.

I mostly agree with this.

Elected school boards sound great, but the local outcomes from local school boards mostly have been bad. Running for school board is now just the first rung on the ladder of partisan elected positions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No standards in elementary. Passing kids that should be held back. No more classroom novels with discussions. No spelling tests. Kids can’t read and write on grade-level and are pushed through the system.

Escape if you can.

This is utter BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is what FCPS has become. Slide started before COVID and continues. Most problems due to a succession of progressively more incompetent superintendents and a dysfunctional school board. Your kids will have some good teachers but it will be necessary to supplement with tutors. Cheaper than private school and there may be areas where parental tutoring can work.

Weakest areas in FCPS are math and science. Your kids won’t be reading books unless that is done at home. Hit and miss on writing instruction so may need help in that area as well.

Good luck.

This is such BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it is very common for parents to remember their own experiences with rose-colored glasses. When my kids started in FCPS I was very wary of certain ways of doing things that were different from when I was in school. I had a hard time with the lack of physical text books and differentiated learning was a very new type of learning than I had experienced.

But what I have come to learn is that different doesn't mean worse and that education is an evolving discipline. There is a lot in 2026 that is different than it was in the 1990s. Namely, the internet and computers have reshaped education completely.

Now as the parent of two FCPS educated college students both of whom are at universities that attract students from all over the country, I can say that comparatively speaking, my students are better prepared than many of their peers. Not just in the knowledge accrued, but in work habits and their approach to education.

If you look at statistics of outcomes, FCPS also ranks very well when compared across the country.

I think it's easy to criticize without fully understanding the whole picture. But also, comparing today's educational landscape to the landscape of 30 years ago when most of us were just children ourselves and probably didn't grasp the larger picture of what was going on around us is probably not the most accurate assessment of the reality and the evolution.

See, you were doing real well until this. I had four kids go to various colleges, including highly prestigious ones, and I couldn't tell you how prepared they are compared to their peers. How on earth can you possibly know that?

Not the PP, but my kids told me that they felt better prepared than their peers in college and that they were often asked to help their friends with their studies. My DD graduated from college a year early.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My students who come back to visit me their freshman year of college largely report that college is much easier than their high school experience, so I think they're well prepared.

I also think the experience (especially in elementary) is very non-standardized. My own child has been writing 5 paragraph essays since 3rd grade, so the anecdote about being overwhelmed by an essay is odd to me.

My now 9th and 11th graders, who were in AAP, barely wrote anything through middle school and I have been surprised at how little they write in HS.

Wow. My kids write ALL THE TIME. Have done so all along. You should complain to the administration if yours aren’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it is very common for parents to remember their own experiences with rose-colored glasses. When my kids started in FCPS I was very wary of certain ways of doing things that were different from when I was in school. I had a hard time with the lack of physical text books and differentiated learning was a very new type of learning than I had experienced.

But what I have come to learn is that different doesn't mean worse and that education is an evolving discipline. There is a lot in 2026 that is different than it was in the 1990s. Namely, the internet and computers have reshaped education completely.

Now as the parent of two FCPS educated college students both of whom are at universities that attract students from all over the country, I can say that comparatively speaking, my students are better prepared than many of their peers. Not just in the knowledge accrued, but in work habits and their approach to education.

If you look at statistics of outcomes, FCPS also ranks very well when compared across the country.

I think it's easy to criticize without fully understanding the whole picture. But also, comparing today's educational landscape to the landscape of 30 years ago when most of us were just children ourselves and probably didn't grasp the larger picture of what was going on around us is probably not the most accurate assessment of the reality and the evolution.

See, you were doing real well until this. I had four kids go to various colleges, including highly prestigious ones, and I couldn't tell you how prepared they are compared to their peers. How on earth can you possibly know that?

Not the PP, but my kids told me that they felt better prepared than their peers in college and that they were often asked to help their friends with their studies. My DD graduated from college a year early.

Another poster with nerdy kids. WTF?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No standards in elementary. Passing kids that should be held back. No more classroom novels with discussions. No spelling tests. Kids can’t read and write on grade-level and are pushed through the system.

Escape if you can.

This is utter BS.

Nope. Facts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My students who come back to visit me their freshman year of college largely report that college is much easier than their high school experience, so I think they're well prepared.

I also think the experience (especially in elementary) is very non-standardized. My own child has been writing 5 paragraph essays since 3rd grade, so the anecdote about being overwhelmed by an essay is odd to me.

My now 9th and 11th graders, who were in AAP, barely wrote anything through middle school and I have been surprised at how little they write in HS.

Wow. My kids write ALL THE TIME. Have done so all along. You should complain to the administration if yours aren’t.

Which schools have kids write ALL THE TIME? My now-high schoolers barely wrote anything in elementary school (post-covid, everything was on google slides). Barely any writing in middle. Even humanities APs don't have the amount of writing I was expecting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:the county is poorer than its ever been and FARMs have more than doubled since the 90s. It is what it is.

Generally speaking, these trends are also national regarding lack of accountability and lowering of standards.

And while some MC/UMC children are well prepared compared to peers from somewhere like rural NC, thats just relative and I think all groups are worse than even 15 years ago.

I would love to see the data and sources on your claim that the county is poorer than it's ever been.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My students who come back to visit me their freshman year of college largely report that college is much easier than their high school experience, so I think they're well prepared.

I also think the experience (especially in elementary) is very non-standardized. My own child has been writing 5 paragraph essays since 3rd grade, so the anecdote about being overwhelmed by an essay is odd to me.

My now 9th and 11th graders, who were in AAP, barely wrote anything through middle school and I have been surprised at how little they write in HS.

Wow. My kids write ALL THE TIME. Have done so all along. You should complain to the administration if yours aren’t.

Which schools have kids write ALL THE TIME? My now-high schoolers barely wrote anything in elementary school (post-covid, everything was on google slides). Barely any writing in middle. Even humanities APs don't have the amount of writing I was expecting.

DP but I have a 4th grader who does a lot of writing (I know you all hate Benchmark, but it's so much more rigorous than the non-existent language arts curriculum my older child had at the same school).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My students who come back to visit me their freshman year of college largely report that college is much easier than their high school experience, so I think they're well prepared.

I also think the experience (especially in elementary) is very non-standardized. My own child has been writing 5 paragraph essays since 3rd grade, so the anecdote about being overwhelmed by an essay is odd to me.

My now 9th and 11th graders, who were in AAP, barely wrote anything through middle school and I have been surprised at how little they write in HS.

Wow. My kids write ALL THE TIME. Have done so all along. You should complain to the administration if yours aren’t.

Which schools have kids write ALL THE TIME? My now-high schoolers barely wrote anything in elementary school (post-covid, everything was on google slides). Barely any writing in middle. Even humanities APs don't have the amount of writing I was expecting.

DP but I have a 4th grader who does a lot of writing (I know you all hate Benchmark, but it's so much more rigorous than the non-existent language arts curriculum my older child had at the same school).

If pp has high schoolers, she is correct: they did almost zero writing in elementary school. The curriculum was terrible and there were years of Covid disruption and then teachers using their TPS google slides.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the county is poorer than its ever been and FARMs have more than doubled since the 90s. It is what it is.

Generally speaking, these trends are also national regarding lack of accountability and lowering of standards.

And while some MC/UMC children are well prepared compared to peers from somewhere like rural NC, thats just relative and I think all groups are worse than even 15 years ago.

I would love to see the data and sources on your claim that the county is poorer than it's ever been.

New poster here. That poster may not have been being very precise, but if we're talking about the school system itself it's absolutely true: the proportion of low income students in FCPS has doubled over the last 20 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's a you problem, OP.

Back in the day when you yourself was in school you didn't think of these things. Now that you're a parent, you do.

As someone who is now on the other side, I can assure you that 10 or 20 years from now--when you're on the other side--you're gonna realize that 99 percent of the things you worry about now will have been meaningless. Your kids will be fine.

np and honestly I’m starting to believe this. The standards are low but it doesn’t matter. I have one who is out and one still in HS. Your kids are going to be who they are going to be. You really want to teach them to be hard workers and be responsible in life. We learned that and need our kids to learn that. Those are skills that are not only taught in school.

For me, personally, I don’t remember any of the classic novels and most of what I did in my traditional HS. They won’t either.

Spelling tests are irrelevant. I had them weekly and still rely on spellcheck.

[Anonymous]

It’s 1:1 devices and the push of edu tech pretending to improve scores. See the I ready lawsuit the screen pushback - join DMV Unplugged and the FCPS for intentional use of technology. It’s inappropriate standards and testing, nothing about kindergarten is developmentally appropriate which pushed up grades then you sprinkle in the stop start stop of the FCPS calendar and us getting a curriculum like benchmark that MCPS ditched… it’s a long road of very bad decisions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My students who come back to visit me their freshman year of college largely report that college is much easier than their high school experience, so I think they're well prepared.

I also think the experience (especially in elementary) is very non-standardized. My own child has been writing 5 paragraph essays since 3rd grade, so the anecdote about being overwhelmed by an essay is odd to me.

My now 9th and 11th graders, who were in AAP, barely wrote anything through middle school and I have been surprised at how little they write in HS.

Wow. My kids write ALL THE TIME. Have done so all along. You should complain to the administration if yours aren’t.

Which schools have kids write ALL THE TIME? My now-high schoolers barely wrote anything in elementary school (post-covid, everything was on google slides). Barely any writing in middle. Even humanities APs don't have the amount of writing I was expecting.

DP but I have a 4th grader who does a lot of writing (I know you all hate Benchmark, but it's so much more rigorous than the non-existent language arts curriculum my older child had at the same school).

My first grader in FCPS brings home a stack of one page writing every week. And he wrote up a multipage report he worked on as part of an extended project.

I've been really happy with FCPS.