FCPS HS Boundary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't say that I understand why FCPS is looking at changing boundaries. Isn't the problem with Lewis is that kids that already live within Lewis's boundaries find ways not to attend Lewis--e.g., to take AP classes, Japanese, etc.? If FCPS simply switches a part of WSHS to Lewis without stopping methods of transferring, won't students within those new boundaries similarly find ways to not attend Lewis.

If you look at the latest student mobility stats (2022-2023), the schools with the highest mobility rates tend to be the ones that are more poorly regarded: Falls Church 23.10%, Justice 22.13%, Mount Vernon 20.30%, Annandale 19.86%, Lewis 19.29%, Herndon 18.36%.

Schools with the lowest mobility rates tend to be the ones that are well regarded: TJ 1.52%, Langley 4.77%, Robinson 5.51%, Madison 5.79%, Woodson 6.34%, Lake Braddock 6.44%, West Springfield 6.83%, South County 7.62%, McLean 7.86%, Oakton 7.86%.

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

Where can you find the mobility stats?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s not 7% - you’re just lying at this point.

https://www.greatschools.org/virginia/springfield/514-Hunt-Valley-Elementary-School/#Students

do you have a better source, or do you just accuse people of lying based on facts you make up?

Sure.

A better source than great schools would be the official FCPS school profile:

https://schoolprofiles.fcps.edu/schlprfl/f?p=108:13::::0_CURRENT_SCHOOL_ID,P0_EDSL:378,0

In the 2022-23 school year, Hunt Valley had 11.16% of students qualify for free and reduced lunch.

The number has been slowly increasing, so it is likely that when the 2023-24 school year stats are updated, Hunt Valley's free and reduced lunch will sit closer to 11.5%.

West Springfield Elementary is a hair poorer than Hunt Valley, at 11.36%

https://schoolprofiles.fcps.edu/schlprfl/f?p=108:13::::0_CURRENT_SCHOOL_ID,P0_EDSL:152,0

Orange Hunt has the 2nd lowest free and reduced lunch percentage at 8.72%

https://schoolprofiles.fcps.edu/schlprfl/f?p=108:13::::0_CURRENT_SCHOOL_ID,P0_EDSL:374,0

Sangster, which feeds one neighborhood to WSHS, is the lowest at 3.72%

https://schoolprofiles.fcps.edu/schlprfl/f?p=108:13::::0_CURRENT_SCHOOL_ID,P0_EDSL:154,0


Cardinal Forest has the highest free and reduced percentage at 32.37%, essentially 1/3 of the school.

https://schoolprofiles.fcps.edu/schlprfl/f?p=108:13::::0_CURRENT_SCHOOL_ID,P0_EDSL:154,0

Rolling Valley has around 23%, Keene Mill around 18%


From wealthiest to poorest:

Sangster 3.72%
Orange Hunt 8.72%
Hunt Valley 11.16%
West Springfield 11.36%
Keene Mill 18.56%
Rolling Valley 22.86%
Cardinal Forest 32.37%

So based on FCPS official data, Sangster and Orange Hunt are the wealthiest WSHS feeders, clustered in the single digits for free and reduced lunch.

Hunt Valley, West Springfield and Keene Mill are all in the middle grouping, clustered in the teens/low fouble digits.

Rolling Valley and Cardinal Forest ate the "poor" schools, sitting at almost a quarter, and roughly 1/3 of their studdnts on free and reduced lunch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

And so your solution is to try and prevent those parents from sending their kids to a crappy school? The same crappy schools that many in this thread are trying to keep their kids from attending? 🥴

What people are saying is that it is ridiculous to rezone kids from an adjacent pyramid to Lewis to fill the slots of Lewis zoned kids who are pupil placing out of Lewis to other kids.

There are hundreds of Lewis zoned students pupil placing to other high schools. Yet FCPS wants to rezone a different group of kids to take the spots of the students who are actually living in boundary for Lewis?

Fix the reasons why hundreds of kids transfer out of Lewis first.

See how that works for a few years before even discussing rezoning kids from other schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

And so your solution is to try and prevent those parents from sending their kids to a crappy school? The same crappy schools that many in this thread are trying to keep their kids from attending? 🥴

What people are saying is that it is ridiculous to rezone kids from an adjacent pyramid to Lewis to fill the slots of Lewis zoned kids who are pupil placing out of Lewis to other kids.

There are hundreds of Lewis zoned students pupil placing to other high schools. Yet FCPS wants to rezone a different group of kids to take the spots of the students who are actually living in boundary for Lewis?

Fix the reasons why hundreds of kids transfer out of Lewis first.

See how that works for a few years before even discussing rezoning kids from other schools.

How many kids transfer out of Lewis each year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have the stats for pupil placements? I can never find that in the FCPS website. I’m interested to see how many students follow their AAP pyramid and pupil place to that high school to stay with their cohorts. I still think a huge program reform would be to make sure there’s a dedicated AAP center in every high school pyramid, and to either put AAP into every middle school, or drop the program at that level. The AAP clusters bounce all over the place.

Why doesn’t Wolftrap go to Westbriar to follow cohorts to Kilmer? Why does Forestville go to Forest Edge instead of Colvin Run to tie into Cooper? Why does Wales Mill go to Hunters Woods instead of Navy to feed into Carson? And those are the easy ones…

Wolftrap primarily feeds to Madison and is in the Madison pyramid so it goes to an AAP center (Archer) that is also in the Madison pyramid, not one in the Marshall pyramid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have the stats for pupil placements? I can never find that in the FCPS website. I’m interested to see how many students follow their AAP pyramid and pupil place to that high school to stay with their cohorts. I still think a huge program reform would be to make sure there’s a dedicated AAP center in every high school pyramid, and to either put AAP into every middle school, or drop the program at that level. The AAP clusters bounce all over the place.

Why doesn’t Wolftrap go to Westbriar to follow cohorts to Kilmer? Why does Forestville go to Forest Edge instead of Colvin Run to tie into Cooper? Why does Wales Mill go to Hunters Woods instead of Navy to feed into Carson? And those are the easy ones…

Wolftrap primarily feeds to Madison and is in the Madison pyramid so it goes to an AAP center (Archer) that is also in the Madison pyramid, not one in the Marshall pyramid.

But its AAP students go to Kilmer and not Jackson like all the other Louise Archer AAP feeders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The differences for WSHS feeders is really small as far as drive time and makeup. They could send any one of them, but OH would be an island and WSES boundary is directly across the street from Irving. The others are closer to WSHS than HV and HV shares a border with Lewis. Saying one school is 5 minutes closer actually doesnt help any case and really just highlights how feasible it is. It’s no really a crapshoot.

They could cut everything off south of the parkway and send them to Saratoga, redo all the OH/HV elem boundaries, and send all of Sangster to LB. Then stop transfers out of Lewis and this would end up probably at a desired enrollment result? For both HS.

Or, you could move that chunk of HVES south of the Parkway to SCHS, which is much closer to those neighborhoods than Lewis and is under enrolled by a similar amount.

Yep that could work too, but Lewis is exhibiting more troubling signs like lower graduation rates and higher chronic absenteeism rates. I suspect the numbers of students in actual school are lower than the picture membership numbers paints. There is a tipping point study that was done that is helping drive some of these considerations that relates to FARMs numbers and a schools ability to perform as a whole. So while SoCo would be fine, it makes more sense to support Lewis at this juncture.

Could you share this study? This tipping point has been mentioned by a couple of posters, but I have not been able to find the study that supports the idea. As someone whose kids are in the group who are being eyed to move to Lewis to help or support it, I want to understand this better. How will moving my kids have a positive impact on the outcomes of individual students at Lewis? I get that WSHS is overcrowded, and would understand a move to SCHS for the reasons I have stated. Lewis feels very disconnected from this part of the county and is not in a great location in terms of commute. I know of people who bike from my neighborhood to SCHS. Not even remotely doable for Lewis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have the stats for pupil placements? I can never find that in the FCPS website. I’m interested to see how many students follow their AAP pyramid and pupil place to that high school to stay with their cohorts. I still think a huge program reform would be to make sure there’s a dedicated AAP center in every high school pyramid, and to either put AAP into every middle school, or drop the program at that level. The AAP clusters bounce all over the place.

Why doesn’t Wolftrap go to Westbriar to follow cohorts to Kilmer? Why does Forestville go to Forest Edge instead of Colvin Run to tie into Cooper? Why does Wales Mill go to Hunters Woods instead of Navy to feed into Carson? And those are the easy ones…

Wolftrap primarily feeds to Madison and is in the Madison pyramid so it goes to an AAP center (Archer) that is also in the Madison pyramid, not one in the Marshall pyramid.

But its AAP students go to Kilmer and not Jackson like all the other Louise Archer AAP feeders.

The easy answer is to give Westbriar all of Wolftrap’s Marshall students and give Wolftrap all of Westbriar’s Madison students and drop the Kilmer/Thoreau split feeders (Stenwood to Kilmer and Vienna to Thoreau while we’re at it.)

These are logical adjustments that should be looked at.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

And so your solution is to try and prevent those parents from sending their kids to a crappy school? The same crappy schools that many in this thread are trying to keep their kids from attending? 🥴

What people are saying is that it is ridiculous to rezone kids from an adjacent pyramid to Lewis to fill the slots of Lewis zoned kids who are pupil placing out of Lewis to other kids.

There are hundreds of Lewis zoned students pupil placing to other high schools. Yet FCPS wants to rezone a different group of kids to take the spots of the students who are actually living in boundary for Lewis?

Fix the reasons why hundreds of kids transfer out of Lewis first.

See how that works for a few years before even discussing rezoning kids from other schools.

How many kids transfer out of Lewis each year?

226 as of 2023-24

https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/fcps.fts/viz/SY2023-24StudentTransfersDashboard/ReadMe

The smallest WSHS feeder and closest to Lewis is West Springfield Elementary.

West Springfield Elementary has roughly 275 to 320 students in a given year that follow on to WSHS.

So if FCPS rezoned WSES TO Lewis, what they are essentially doing is replacing the 226 Lewis zoned students who actually live in the Lewis catchment, with 275-320 West Springfield Elementary students.

It is not quite an even exchange, but the numbers are close enough that FCPS needs to look at filling that gap with students who are actually zoned for Lewis, before disrupting the lives of students whose families purchased in other pyramids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

And so your solution is to try and prevent those parents from sending their kids to a crappy school? The same crappy schools that many in this thread are trying to keep their kids from attending? 🥴

What people are saying is that it is ridiculous to rezone kids from an adjacent pyramid to Lewis to fill the slots of Lewis zoned kids who are pupil placing out of Lewis to other kids.

There are hundreds of Lewis zoned students pupil placing to other high schools. Yet FCPS wants to rezone a different group of kids to take the spots of the students who are actually living in boundary for Lewis?

Fix the reasons why hundreds of kids transfer out of Lewis first.

See how that works for a few years before even discussing rezoning kids from other schools.

How many kids transfer out of Lewis each year?

226 as of 2023-24

https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/fcps.fts/viz/SY2023-24StudentTransfersDashboard/ReadMe

The smallest WSHS feeder and closest to Lewis is West Springfield Elementary.

West Springfield Elementary has roughly 275 to 320 students in a given year that follow on to WSHS.

So if FCPS rezoned WSES TO Lewis, what they are essentially doing is replacing the 226 Lewis zoned students who actually live in the Lewis catchment, with 275-320 West Springfield Elementary students.

It is not quite an even exchange, but the numbers are close enough that FCPS needs to look at filling that gap with students who are actually zoned for Lewis, before disrupting the lives of students whose families purchased in other pyramids.

Exactly. And then the mobility number will jump to 500+. And round and round we go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have the stats for pupil placements? I can never find that in the FCPS website. I’m interested to see how many students follow their AAP pyramid and pupil place to that high school to stay with their cohorts. I still think a huge program reform would be to make sure there’s a dedicated AAP center in every high school pyramid, and to either put AAP into every middle school, or drop the program at that level. The AAP clusters bounce all over the place.

Why doesn’t Wolftrap go to Westbriar to follow cohorts to Kilmer? Why does Forestville go to Forest Edge instead of Colvin Run to tie into Cooper? Why does Wales Mill go to Hunters Woods instead of Navy to feed into Carson? And those are the easy ones…

Wolftrap primarily feeds to Madison and is in the Madison pyramid so it goes to an AAP center (Archer) that is also in the Madison pyramid, not one in the Marshall pyramid.

But its AAP students go to Kilmer and not Jackson like all the other Louise Archer AAP feeders.

There was a time when Wolftrap split to Thoreau and Kilmer and the AAP kids went to Archer. And there was no AAP center in the Marshall pyramid at the ES level and the kids went to either Archer or Haycock.

Then the part of Wolftrap that went to Thoreau got moved to Hughes, and they made Westbriar and Lemon Road AAP centers. There may have been some concern at first about overcrowding Westbriar or making the AAP program too large relative to the Gen Ed program. Another issue is but why there is still a Westbriar attendance island where kids get bussed past Colvin Run on their way to Westbriar.

If they do a big boundary change maybe they'll change both the AAP assignment for Wolftrap and move the Westbriar island to either Colvin Run or Sunrise Valley.

[Anonymous]

Close Lewis. Just close it. Send those kids to better schools. There’s your equitable solution with equal outcomes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

Yep. A friend of mine rented a house in the WSHS district and went to register her own child for kindergarten and was asked how she knew such and such who lived at the same address. Her landlord was using the rental address to send the rental address to send their kids or grandchildren to a WSHS pyramid elementary. I’m sure this is not an isolated incident. Not sure how this situation was resolved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't say that I understand why FCPS is looking at changing boundaries. Isn't the problem with Lewis is that kids that already live within Lewis's boundaries find ways not to attend Lewis--e.g., to take AP classes, Japanese, etc.? If FCPS simply switches a part of WSHS to Lewis without stopping methods of transferring, won't students within those new boundaries similarly find ways to not attend Lewis.

If you look at the latest student mobility stats (2022-2023), the schools with the highest mobility rates tend to be the ones that are more poorly regarded: Falls Church 23.10%, Justice 22.13%, Mount Vernon 20.30%, Annandale 19.86%, Lewis 19.29%, Herndon 18.36%.

Schools with the lowest mobility rates tend to be the ones that are well regarded: TJ 1.52%, Langley 4.77%, Robinson 5.51%, Madison 5.79%, Woodson 6.34%, Lake Braddock 6.44%, West Springfield 6.83%, South County 7.62%, McLean 7.86%, Oakton 7.86%.

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

Can you find a current definition of "mobility"? At least in the past, it meant the percentage of students who started at a school who left over the course of a school year. So it was less about pupil placements, and more about kids moving to different neighborhoods or jurisdictions, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I think that the overcrowding problem is due to the fact that it is just too easy for a motivated family to not attend a poorly ranked school, and I would look to fix that before addressing geographic boundaries.

And so your solution is to try and prevent those parents from sending their kids to a crappy school? The same crappy schools that many in this thread are trying to keep their kids from attending? 🥴

What people are saying is that it is ridiculous to rezone kids from an adjacent pyramid to Lewis to fill the slots of Lewis zoned kids who are pupil placing out of Lewis to other kids.

There are hundreds of Lewis zoned students pupil placing to other high schools. Yet FCPS wants to rezone a different group of kids to take the spots of the students who are actually living in boundary for Lewis?

Fix the reasons why hundreds of kids transfer out of Lewis first.

See how that works for a few years before even discussing rezoning kids from other schools.

How many kids transfer out of Lewis each year?

226 as of 2023-24

https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/fcps.fts/viz/SY2023-24StudentTransfersDashboard/ReadMe

The smallest WSHS feeder and closest to Lewis is West Springfield Elementary.

West Springfield Elementary has roughly 275 to 320 students in a given year that follow on to WSHS.

So if FCPS rezoned WSES TO Lewis, what they are essentially doing is replacing the 226 Lewis zoned students who actually live in the Lewis catchment, with 275-320 West Springfield Elementary students.

It is not quite an even exchange, but the numbers are close enough that FCPS needs to look at filling that gap with students who are actually zoned for Lewis, before disrupting the lives of students whose families purchased in other pyramids.

I didn't realize that so many kids transferred out of Lewis. I doubt FCPS would add another ES to Lewis if 19% of Lewis' existing student body transfers out. Seems silly.