Anonymous wrote:Expansions take precedence over refurbishment. That's the difference - see Paintbranch, Gaithersburg and many others
Wootton and Damascus HS, not to mention Eastern MS all need a lot of help. But they aren't overcrowded. So, Northwood, Woodward and Crown wil get built first, to relieve overcrowding, long before any of those schools get refurbished
Damascus is being expanded by 700 seats in part to relieve Clarksburg's overcrowding.
Huh? I thought the Seneca Valley upcounty boundary study took care of the overcrowding at Clarksburg?
That helped a little, but Clarksburg is already 210 students over capacity and that number is projected to be 613 in 5 years.
Well, they didn't do a good job with the boundary study then because Seneca Valley has room to accommodate those students.
Anonymous wrote:Expansions take precedence over refurbishment. That's the difference - see Paintbranch, Gaithersburg and many others
Wootton and Damascus HS, not to mention Eastern MS all need a lot of help. But they aren't overcrowded. So, Northwood, Woodward and Crown wil get built first, to relieve overcrowding, long before any of those schools get refurbished
Damascus is being expanded by 700 seats in part to relieve Clarksburg's overcrowding.
Huh? I thought the Seneca Valley upcounty boundary study took care of the overcrowding at Clarksburg?
That helped a little, but Clarksburg is already 210 students over capacity and that number is projected to be 613 in 5 years.
Well, they didn't do a good job with the boundary study then because Seneca Valley has room to accommodate those students.
Seneca Valley does not. Capacity 2,520; 2022-2023 enrollment 2,239. And that's with the seniors still partly under the old boundaries, and before the new magnet programs.
Last year there were 346 students in Grade 12, 551 in Grade 11, 638 in Grade 10, and 704 in Grade 9.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
There will be fewer than 200 empty seats at Springbrook, and the 2 other NEC schools will be overcapacity by 500+. They're not giving those seats to the DCC.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Springbrook is not downcounty, it's east county.
And North Bethesda is not Bethesda. Springbrook shares boundaries with two DCC schools. Sherwood, which is not in the NEC but I’d adjacent to it also has empty seats.
I would have rather Woodward not been reduced by 540 seats so it could accommodate DCC but our county politicians prioritize building schools behind other things.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Springbrook is not downcounty, it's east county.
And North Bethesda is not Bethesda. Springbrook shares boundaries with two DCC schools. Sherwood, which is not in the NEC but I’d adjacent to it also has empty seats.
I would have rather Woodward not been reduced by 540 seats so it could accommodate DCC but our county politicians prioritize building schools behind other things.
You're right, North Bethesda is not Bethesda.
The shared boundary is also the Northwest Branch, which is, at minimum, inconvenient for transportation.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
The "arts program" is a theoretical possibility, not a reality. Any new magnet program at Woodward should take a back seat to providing relief for the ovcrowded schools.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
The "arts program" is a theoretical possibility, not a reality. Any new magnet program at Woodward should take a back seat to providing relief for the ovcrowded schools.
It should take a back seat, but MCPS has kept recommitting to it, even when they voted to make the school smaller.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Springbrook is not downcounty, it's east county.
And North Bethesda is not Bethesda. Springbrook shares boundaries with two DCC schools. Sherwood, which is not in the NEC but I’d adjacent to it also has empty seats.
I would have rather Woodward not been reduced by 540 seats so it could accommodate DCC but our county politicians prioritize building schools behind other things.
You're right, North Bethesda is not Bethesda.
The shared boundary is also the Northwest Branch, which is, at minimum, inconvenient for transportation.
Northwest Branch is no more a barrier than Rock Creek so be careful what you wish for.
Anonymous wrote:So much of this is because of poor planning. Some of that is on MCPS, but most of that is on the county (M-NCPPC/Planning Board/County Council). It only takes one period of time where development-favorable policies are enacted -- increased density allowances, reprieve of impact taxes, exceptions to land set-asides for municipal needs (schools among them) -- and developers jump, with there really being no way to unwind it later. Throw in some short-sighted school closures that came with long-term, giveaway leases to favored special interests by the county executive/council. Then cook that up with 25 years of chronic council underfunding of capital projects ("Hey, let's just ask them to push these out a few years..."), and you get too many students and not enough school spaces.
This has happened in many areas of the county, but down-county, most especially Wheaton & below, was particularly affected because of the relative scarcity of undeveloped land combined with relatively high density. And when Blair got moved to its current outside-the-beltway location, it was during that facility closure period, so they weren't attending to back-filling to cover the deeper inside-the-beltway area. West of the tracks still had Whitman & BCC, and they got insulated (what a shock!).
Similarly shocking is that MCPS, when faced with the cost of provisioning a new HS closer to downtown SS/Takoma Park, elected to turn their efforts towards relief of WJ, instead -- the Woodward solution was less expensive and posed far fewer problems, despite the community complaints (that happens no matter the location/configuration -- can't please 'em all). They had to sell that with the nod to some kind of relief for DCC -- more crowded, in general, than anything to the west of the tracks, with more coming from demographics and the differential effects of the noted development-friendly policies; however, the nature of that might be just from the marginal pull of a Woodward magnet.
If that ends up being the case, and if more holistic boundary shifts are avoided, it will be because of the fine efforts of the W-area contingent, those here and elsewhere. Like it or not, the Federal government delegates school administration to the states (or, perhaps more Constitutionally precise, it is reserved to the states, despite any Federal funding/regulation), and MD delegates it to county-level districts, not town. MCPS, then, has the responsibility to provide reasonably equivalent educational services to all of its students (equal protection). Neighborhood schools, sensible boundaries and easily-accessible magnets are great ideas, but only if you're making sure to get your county decision-makers in line to pony up to provide that to everybody, not just ensure/preserve that for yourself.
There's no land in SS for a high school, and MoCo doesn't have the stomach to spend the tens of million to acquire (and still more to deal with all the lawsuits when they use adverse possession to assemble a property) when the Woodward property was already in the portfolio.
As to WJ - this year it's 650 students over capacity. That's more than half the entire DCC overage across all 5 high schools.
I don't begrudge them doing something to relieve WJ's overcrowding. That is clearly necessary. But they should have built the addition at Einstein regardless, which makes much more sense than having Woodward as a solution for the DCC. The new seats at Northwood and Kennedy aren't enough.
You can just bus the DCC kids all over the county. It's not like they're W students or anything.
I have never understood this "all over the county" rhetoric on DCUM, when it comes to the DCC. Wheaton HS is less than 2 miles from Kennedy HS. Northwood HS is less than a mile and a half from Blair HS. Northwood HS is 3 miles from Einstein HS. And Einstein HS is less than 4 miles from Woodward HS. I guess if it's not literally the absolutely closest high school, it's "all over the county"?
DP - I can't speak for the PP who referenced DCC kids being bussed all over the county, but I've heard that crack before. Typically it's said by W-school parents who deign to allow DCC kids bussed to their schools but refuse the same for their kids. So, DCC kids' time is less valuable or... something? Anyway, it's not about bussing within the DCC, it's to other schools outside the DCC, e.g., Woodward, which would be a schlep for kids in-bounds for Kennedy or Northwood.
Or even the further areas zoned for Einstein, some of which are 7+ miles from Woodward.
Is anybody saying, "Oh! Let's rezone DTSS for Woodward!"? I haven't heard it.
But that's just it--there really isn't any part of the DCC that makes sense to be rezoned to Woodward. Some of the closest DCC areas to Woodward are within the walk zones for Wheaton and/or Einstein, so they're not being rezoned. So you've got to look at areas that are already getting bus service to their base HS, and those areas also happen to be farther from Woodward.
Any talk of putting DCC kids at Woodward is just empty promises. They’re going to need Woodward for all the new housing around Pike and Rose and Grosvenor. Once you account for that housing and ease the crowding at WJ, Woodward will be out of space.
Another crystal ball heard from.
You don’t need a crystal ball. You just need to look at what’s already permitted and do the math on student generation. If you think you need a crystal ball you’re not very smart.
Yes but MCPS is pretty poor at this sort of thing. And I thought they intended for Woodward to also help relieve the overcrowding in the DCC? Einstein especially. I still think they will try to reshuffle sone students on the western boundaries of Wheaton and Einstein to Woodward. Obviously what they really need to do is build another high school down county, but they haven’t found a way to do that and they need to put the kids somewhere.
Yes they said that before they shrunk Woodward. Now nearly half of the seats there will be filled by WJ overflow alone.
Springbrook and Kennedy both are under capacity. Northwood is being expanded and will be under capacity. Those are the solutions to DCC crowding.
Wrong. Springbrook has nothing to do with this. Kennedy will be at capacity by the time Woodward opens. The Northwood seats will help some, but are not enough for all of the DCC overcrowding.
And Woodward won’t have enough seats for the arts program, WJ overflow, and students from new construction. They’re going to have to look elsewhere for DCC relief and the downcounty school with empty seats seems like an obvious place to start.
DP. Which "downcounty school with empty seats" are you referring to?
it’s not DCC, but Springbrook is downcounty and is about 10 percent under enrolled.
Springbrook is not downcounty, it's east county.
And North Bethesda is not Bethesda. Springbrook shares boundaries with two DCC schools. Sherwood, which is not in the NEC but I’d adjacent to it also has empty seats.
I would have rather Woodward not been reduced by 540 seats so it could accommodate DCC but our county politicians prioritize building schools behind other things.
You're right, North Bethesda is not Bethesda.
The shared boundary is also the Northwest Branch, which is, at minimum, inconvenient for transportation.
Northwest Branch is no more a barrier than Rock Creek so be careful what you wish for.
I'm the PP you're responding to. I don't have a dog in this fight. In general, I think there are more options for crossing Rock Creek than for crossing the Northwest Branch.
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