APS Interesting Responses to Walk Zone Survey
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
Half of Lyon Village is zoned for Key, the other for Taylor. First PP is right -- by default the majority of the Key neighborhood went to ASFS because they either could not or did not want to do immersion. You cannot force someone to do immersion -- there has to be a regular run of the mill neighborhood school. The vast majority of the school at science focus is is from the key zone, because that was the neighborhood school for that zone. Literally 3/4 of the school lives in the key zone. You never had to lottery in from key -- you just showed them a lease/deed and registered. Saying that Science Focus was not Key's neighborhood school because of the team schools is like saying that taylor never had a neighborhood school, or that jamestown didn't. You can argue that there was some "team" designation when people bought their houses, but honestly I live in Courthouse/Clarendon, and I never thought that I would have guaranteed admission into Taylor. I would have bought in the Taylor zone if I wanted to go there. If you don't want to move immersion to the asfs site because people in that neighborhood are sick of having a school in their neighborhood that they can't go to, that's fine. But it doesn't benefit the majority of kids who currently go to that school (since they live in the key neighborhood and would not be zoned for science focus), and it doesn't benefit the majority of kids who currently go to key immersion since the immersion program would likely get moved somewhere further away. The only way I can see ASFS staying where it is is if they decide to swap immersion with long branch. Even if they did that though, asfs would not serve the majority of kids that currently attend it. Stuff like that really makes me wonder where the asfs administration's head is when they yell at parents at pta meetings about even suggesting swapping school sites. They obviously don't care about the current school population at all. |
Anonymous
Being rezoned to a much, much lower performing school like Drew or Randolph when Henry moves to Fleet. |
Anonymous
Yup, at least half of Lyon Village is zoned to Taylor currently: https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/ESZones_Letter_2017_Revised2-1.pdf Also, the concentration of kids in Key Zone isn't even that high in the Lyon village portion, comparatively: https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Stu17K5_PP.jpg And yes, 510 of the kids at ASFS are from Key zone, vs 280 kids from the Key zone at Key... and that's was before the transfer policy when Key zone could go to Key automatically. The number of Key kids in immersion will go down without that preference. There is a strong preference for non-immersion in the neighborhood, and it's not originating solely from Lyon Village. https://www.apsva.us/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Transfer-Report-2016-17.pdf I don't know what they are going to decide to do, but there is absolutely a strong case for making Key into a walkable neighborhood school without saying that it's Lyon village getting their way. No, I don't live in Lyon Village, I live in Rosslyn. And yes, I would love to not have to travel 2.5 miles (ASFS) or 3.5 miles (Taylor) to my neighborhood school for aftercare pickup. I realize it's not all about me and that we're going to a strong school no matter what, so we're fortunate it that regard. |
Anonymous
I wonder why, as you say, there is a strong preference for nonimmersion in “the neighborhood.” I hear lots of talk about giving the gift of a second language, but then people don’t follow through. Key gets screwed in this plan. |
Anonymous
| If they made Key into a neighborhood school, would it likely be drawn along the lines of the current Key-ASF boundary--essentially the Key/ASF swap--or would they prioritize drawing a boundary around the walk zone / expanded walk zone? If APS really wants to prioritize increasing walkers, it seems silly not to have a neighborhood school serving one of the most walkable parts of Arlington. Especially now that they have done away with neighborhood preference for Key (so local families are not guaranteed a spot at an easily walkable school). |
Anonymous
I don't know the full history, but I think in the past there just weren't as many school age kids living in the zone and the ones that did live there were more likely to be Spanish speaking. There are so many condos, townhouses, and apartments that have been built in the last 10-15 years and the assumption was that families with children would move away when they hit school age. Surprise! We're still here! |
Anonymous
|
^ I imagine neighborhood school Key's boundary would be pretty much identical to the existing ASF/Key boundary. More of Lyon Village would get pulled in since the half currently zoned for Taylor is walkable to Key, and there might be parts of Rosslyn that get zoned somewhere else. Rosslyn is tricky since they are technically bus riders everywhere, and though key is the closest school, including all of rosslyn would make some key walkers into bus riders for another school.
Its hard for me to say that you can keep ASFS, Taylor, Glebe, and Long Branch where they are and still have Key be a neightborhood school. I think the immersion program needs to move to one of those schools. If you want to bow to the Cherrydale contingency, it probably should move to Taylor. People at Taylor could get absorbed into Jamestown and ASFS, and there were no calls on its survey results for expanding its walk zone. People love taylor though so I can't see that going over well. |
Anonymous
| I'm a Nottingham parent and can definitely say the community has not been paying close attention to this, hence the low response rate. Nottingham has such a high number of walkers, I think most parents have put trust in APS to do what is best for the community as a whole. We don't need to drown the survey with responses. The numbers speak for themselves. A lot of this is common sense, really.... |
Anonymous
| How about APS offer an immersion besides Spanish? If you offer French,?arabic, Mandarin people will come. Enough with the Spanish it isn’t the only language! |
Anonymous
You need roughly 50% of the students to be native speakers of the language to have a good immersion program. Spanish is the only language that will work in Arlington. |
Anonymous
Is that actually true? Fairfax has French and Japanese immersion! |
Anonymous
| That's a sweet response from the Nottingham parent. Definitely spoken like someone from a school that hasn't been ambushed by APS under the radar engagement process. It's a big county-there's more than just the N Arl schools-- and other schools have some history with this. |
Anonymous
|
Anonymous
Love all of those programs. Not the “war” poster, but really would like to see Traditional get moved. It is a made-up “option” - sane curriculum as rest of APS - move it South. |
Anonymous
Key is not at all getting screwed. If you look at the transfer report, two-thirds of Key is coming from outside the Key zone (so therefore being bused or driven). Key has students from every single elementary in Arlington. Moving it nearer to a large Spanish-speaking population could be positive. Many of the Spanish-speaking community has migrated out of the neighborhood immediately surrounding Key. |