FCPS Boundary Review Updates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone tell me what’s up with Armstrong elementary? It seems like they are getting a renovation and expansion that will bring them from 74% capacity to 41% capacity. At a cost of over $116 million.

Good news, I think I found a line item that would go a long way toward solving the budget shortfall.

Why in the world are they expanding a school at 74% capacity?

Got to get below 60% so they can trigger moving in all those Forestville homes south of Rt. 7

Even setting aside the potential equity play for the moment, these are the people saying they have a huge budget shortfall.

I’ve always been a fan of paying teachers well and I generally have supported public schools, but man, expanding a school for $59 million so that it can be 2/5 full, that’s enough to turn even me into a rabid libertarian.

No board member should keep their job after that horrendous decision.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They could have avoided all this controversy if they revised 8130 to say:

A) A review will occur when a school building grows beyond 110% capacity.

B) The first step of the review process requires a full residency check of all students attending this school. Students shown to reside out of the school zone will be returned to their home school the following school year and the school population will be recounted with the accurate student enrollment.

C) All schools slated for rezoning must return student transfers to their base school before starting the rezoning process, so that the incoming transfer number is zero students. No incoming transfer students may be counted in the numbers used for rezoning. Only students residing in the base school zone may be counted for rezoning purposes.

D) All students enrolling in the transition years of kindergarten, 7th grade and 9th grade will be required to submit proof of residency to enroll in school.

E) All rezoning will allow grandfathering for any residency confirmed students currently enrolled at the school, with rezoning occuring when the student transitions to a new MS (7th) or HS (9th) school level.

F) FCPS is required to hold the rezoning information meetings at the schools directly impacted by rezoning.

Everyone wants to reverse engineer the policy to minimize their own chances of being redistricted.

They currently have, and should continue to have, the ability to consider boundary changes when schools are under-enrolled as well as over capacity.

I do agree they should hold information meetings at the schools potentially directly impacted by rezoning. They seem to be going out of their way to hold them at schools not impacted in order to make it as difficult as possible for some to comment in person. It's all of a piece with their limiting speaker time during SB meetings to two minutes (down from three) and not showing the faces of those who are speaking.

I actually live close enough to the schools that rezoning is not an issue for my family.

I stand by my suggestions.

Creating a policy with a set, concrete policy that makes sense, has measurable metrics, prioritizes the families who purchased homes in zone over families pupil placing into schools or lying about residency, and prioritizes stability, with a transparent and accessible feedback process for affected families are the only changes FCPS should have made to policy 8130.

They aren’t going to revise Policy 8130 along the lines you’ve suggested but you can propose whatever you want. You’ll get a few likes here from folks who’d like to limit the school board’s discretion and that’s all.

+1, the SB is creating a problem, then trying to solve it. Using a convoluted process to justify their bloated paychecks and staff. They also demand hours of time, expertise, and research by FCPS staff to support their boondoggles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

So they are against split feeders, but creating them? Is Edison in really bad shape currently? Are there other options for Edison?

Edison is full because the auto academy there is popular and it's getting kids pupil placing in to go there, which is something you'd expect and is actually really great. I don't know it's exactly full now, but there are some new housing developments planned nearby, especially on the old Top Golf property and around the former county government center, so it has the potential to be very full in the next five years.

Lewis should have the auto academy

That would help Lewis. They should install some other desirable programs there as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They could have avoided all this controversy if they revised 8130 to say:

A) A review will occur when a school building grows beyond 110% capacity.

B) The first step of the review process requires a full residency check of all students attending this school. Students shown to reside out of the school zone will be returned to their home school the following school year and the school population will be recounted with the accurate student enrollment.

C) All schools slated for rezoning must return student transfers to their base school before starting the rezoning process, so that the incoming transfer number is zero students. No incoming transfer students may be counted in the numbers used for rezoning. Only students residing in the base school zone may be counted for rezoning purposes.

D) All students enrolling in the transition years of kindergarten, 7th grade and 9th grade will be required to submit proof of residency to enroll in school.

E) All rezoning will allow grandfathering for any residency confirmed students currently enrolled at the school, with rezoning occuring when the student transitions to a new MS (7th) or HS (9th) school level.

F) FCPS is required to hold the rezoning information meetings at the schools directly impacted by rezoning.

Can we push these out as a group? Seriously. These are good parameters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

Slide 12 of the 4/11 presentation addresses a Bull Run ES attendance island. I think you are referring to Slide 20 of the 4/25 presentation, which appears to show part of Holmes moving to Justice.

I doubt this was their intent, but Thru Consulting probably should be renamed Sloppy Consulting. I think they used the wrong map, and treated an area that they separately proposed to move from Parklawn ES to Columbia ES (see Slide 36 of the 4/11 presentation) as if that area was zoned for Justice rather than Annandale. That area currently attends Annandale and there would be no reason to move it to Justice, especially if they were moving it from Parklawn (currently a split feeder to Annandale and Justice) to Columbia (a 100% feeder to Annandale).

The whole Edison-to-Annandale move to eliminate the split feeder at Holmes looks like an exercise in rearranging deck chairs. In 2010-11 Annandale HS had an enrollment of slighly over 2500 and this was considered unacceptable. In response, the School Board moved the part of Wakefield Forest that had attended Poe/Annandale to Frost/Woodson and reassigned Bren Mar Park from Annandale to Edison while leaving it at Holmes. Now, because split feeders are being targeted, they are proposing to move Bren Mar Park back to Annandale, which would leave Annandale just shy of 2500 again.

I feel for that community. Some now in the Edsall Park area have to cross both 495 and 395 to get to Edison, but Annandale with 2500 kids is not going to be a great environment. It's an old building that, along with Lewis and McLean, got the cheapest "renovations" of any high schools in the early 2000s, and it currently has a 14-classroom modular. It also has a large ESOL/FARMS population, and 2500 kids at Annandale is a bigger challenge than, say, 2400 kids at McLean. On the other hand, Edison is currently at 107% capacity with no modular, so they thought they were dealing with two issues (split feeder at Holmes, overcrowding at Edison) by reassigning BMP back to Annandale. If you can install a modular at Annandale (28 acres), I'm not sure why they can't install a modular at Edison (43.5 acres).

We are newer to the area and live in that part of Wakefield Forest that was re-districted to Frost and Woodson back when you mentioned. I have heard from neighbors that the community was split on it and it was ugly. Lots of people wanted to stay at Annandale and were able to due to generous grandfathering policies.

My spouse and I went to one of the earlier boundary meetings at Annandale HS to see the school and hopefully talk to some families there, in the event that our neighborhood was sent back there. We chose the Frost and Woodson pyramid due to AP, marching band, and a few extracurricular clubs our kids are particularly interested in. We were/are not eager to have our kids move in high school but we took the opportunity to go and see the school during that presentation.

We met countless parents who loved the school and didn’t want to be zoned OUT of it. They had kids who loved the IB program and have a stellar Arabic teacher, apparently. They described what happened when our particular area was routed out of Annandale and to Woodson and it was really interesting to hear. They said the parent and community involvement plummeted at the middle and high schools there and never really recovered - at least not to the original level. Again, we are new to the area and totally unfamiliar with what has happened in the past here. That’s just what we were told. It was good perspective to help us better appreciate what can happen when school boundaries are changed and communities are moved to other areas. It sounds like it was a net negative for Annandale, and while I’d prefer my kids to stay at Woodson and continue to have stability there, I really feel for our neighboring school and community and hope they don’t continue to have such unrest.

Annandale is a good school with a great faculty. But the Wakefield Forest area move was part of a white flight that was very contentious. Annandale was one of the better schools but neighborhood demographics were changing and many wanted to move to Woodson which was very white.

Yet, they took neighborhoods like Camelot (very white) and didn't send them to Woodson or Annandale - but bussed them across 495 to Falls Church HS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

Slide 12 of the 4/11 presentation addresses a Bull Run ES attendance island. I think you are referring to Slide 20 of the 4/25 presentation, which appears to show part of Holmes moving to Justice.

I doubt this was their intent, but Thru Consulting probably should be renamed Sloppy Consulting. I think they used the wrong map, and treated an area that they separately proposed to move from Parklawn ES to Columbia ES (see Slide 36 of the 4/11 presentation) as if that area was zoned for Justice rather than Annandale. That area currently attends Annandale and there would be no reason to move it to Justice, especially if they were moving it from Parklawn (currently a split feeder to Annandale and Justice) to Columbia (a 100% feeder to Annandale).

The whole Edison-to-Annandale move to eliminate the split feeder at Holmes looks like an exercise in rearranging deck chairs. In 2010-11 Annandale HS had an enrollment of slighly over 2500 and this was considered unacceptable. In response, the School Board moved the part of Wakefield Forest that had attended Poe/Annandale to Frost/Woodson and reassigned Bren Mar Park from Annandale to Edison while leaving it at Holmes. Now, because split feeders are being targeted, they are proposing to move Bren Mar Park back to Annandale, which would leave Annandale just shy of 2500 again.

I feel for that community. Some now in the Edsall Park area have to cross both 495 and 395 to get to Edison, but Annandale with 2500 kids is not going to be a great environment. It's an old building that, along with Lewis and McLean, got the cheapest "renovations" of any high schools in the early 2000s, and it currently has a 14-classroom modular. It also has a large ESOL/FARMS population, and 2500 kids at Annandale is a bigger challenge than, say, 2400 kids at McLean. On the other hand, Edison is currently at 107% capacity with no modular, so they thought they were dealing with two issues (split feeder at Holmes, overcrowding at Edison) by reassigning BMP back to Annandale. If you can install a modular at Annandale (28 acres), I'm not sure why they can't install a modular at Edison (43.5 acres).

We are newer to the area and live in that part of Wakefield Forest that was re-districted to Frost and Woodson back when you mentioned. I have heard from neighbors that the community was split on it and it was ugly. Lots of people wanted to stay at Annandale and were able to due to generous grandfathering policies.

My spouse and I went to one of the earlier boundary meetings at Annandale HS to see the school and hopefully talk to some families there, in the event that our neighborhood was sent back there. We chose the Frost and Woodson pyramid due to AP, marching band, and a few extracurricular clubs our kids are particularly interested in. We were/are not eager to have our kids move in high school but we took the opportunity to go and see the school during that presentation.

We met countless parents who loved the school and didn’t want to be zoned OUT of it. They had kids who loved the IB program and have a stellar Arabic teacher, apparently. They described what happened when our particular area was routed out of Annandale and to Woodson and it was really interesting to hear. They said the parent and community involvement plummeted at the middle and high schools there and never really recovered - at least not to the original level. Again, we are new to the area and totally unfamiliar with what has happened in the past here. That’s just what we were told. It was good perspective to help us better appreciate what can happen when school boundaries are changed and communities are moved to other areas. It sounds like it was a net negative for Annandale, and while I’d prefer my kids to stay at Woodson and continue to have stability there, I really feel for our neighboring school and community and hope they don’t continue to have such unrest.

Annandale is a good school with a great faculty. But the Wakefield Forest area move was part of a white flight that was very contentious. Annandale was one of the better schools but neighborhood demographics were changing and many wanted to move to Woodson which was very white.

Yet, they took neighborhoods like Camelot (very white) and didn't send them to Woodson or Annandale - but bussed them across 495 to Falls Church HS.

Camelot has been at Falls Church a lot longer than all of Wakefield Forest has been at Woodson. At one point in the 1980s they were going to split Camelot ES between Falls Church and Woodson and the community told the School Board it would prefer to move entirely to Falls Church rather than be split in two.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

Slide 12 of the 4/11 presentation addresses a Bull Run ES attendance island. I think you are referring to Slide 20 of the 4/25 presentation, which appears to show part of Holmes moving to Justice.

I doubt this was their intent, but Thru Consulting probably should be renamed Sloppy Consulting. I think they used the wrong map, and treated an area that they separately proposed to move from Parklawn ES to Columbia ES (see Slide 36 of the 4/11 presentation) as if that area was zoned for Justice rather than Annandale. That area currently attends Annandale and there would be no reason to move it to Justice, especially if they were moving it from Parklawn (currently a split feeder to Annandale and Justice) to Columbia (a 100% feeder to Annandale).

The whole Edison-to-Annandale move to eliminate the split feeder at Holmes looks like an exercise in rearranging deck chairs. In 2010-11 Annandale HS had an enrollment of slighly over 2500 and this was considered unacceptable. In response, the School Board moved the part of Wakefield Forest that had attended Poe/Annandale to Frost/Woodson and reassigned Bren Mar Park from Annandale to Edison while leaving it at Holmes. Now, because split feeders are being targeted, they are proposing to move Bren Mar Park back to Annandale, which would leave Annandale just shy of 2500 again.

I feel for that community. Some now in the Edsall Park area have to cross both 495 and 395 to get to Edison, but Annandale with 2500 kids is not going to be a great environment. It's an old building that, along with Lewis and McLean, got the cheapest "renovations" of any high schools in the early 2000s, and it currently has a 14-classroom modular. It also has a large ESOL/FARMS population, and 2500 kids at Annandale is a bigger challenge than, say, 2400 kids at McLean. On the other hand, Edison is currently at 107% capacity with no modular, so they thought they were dealing with two issues (split feeder at Holmes, overcrowding at Edison) by reassigning BMP back to Annandale. If you can install a modular at Annandale (28 acres), I'm not sure why they can't install a modular at Edison (43.5 acres).

We are newer to the area and live in that part of Wakefield Forest that was re-districted to Frost and Woodson back when you mentioned. I have heard from neighbors that the community was split on it and it was ugly. Lots of people wanted to stay at Annandale and were able to due to generous grandfathering policies.

My spouse and I went to one of the earlier boundary meetings at Annandale HS to see the school and hopefully talk to some families there, in the event that our neighborhood was sent back there. We chose the Frost and Woodson pyramid due to AP, marching band, and a few extracurricular clubs our kids are particularly interested in. We were/are not eager to have our kids move in high school but we took the opportunity to go and see the school during that presentation.

We met countless parents who loved the school and didn’t want to be zoned OUT of it. They had kids who loved the IB program and have a stellar Arabic teacher, apparently. They described what happened when our particular area was routed out of Annandale and to Woodson and it was really interesting to hear. They said the parent and community involvement plummeted at the middle and high schools there and never really recovered - at least not to the original level. Again, we are new to the area and totally unfamiliar with what has happened in the past here. That’s just what we were told. It was good perspective to help us better appreciate what can happen when school boundaries are changed and communities are moved to other areas. It sounds like it was a net negative for Annandale, and while I’d prefer my kids to stay at Woodson and continue to have stability there, I really feel for our neighboring school and community and hope they don’t continue to have such unrest.

Annandale is a good school with a great faculty. But the Wakefield Forest area move was part of a white flight that was very contentious. Annandale was one of the better schools but neighborhood demographics were changing and many wanted to move to Woodson which was very white.

Yet, they took neighborhoods like Camelot (very white) and didn't send them to Woodson or Annandale - but bussed them across 495 to Falls Church HS.

Camelot has been at Falls Church a lot longer than all of Wakefield Forest has been at Woodson. At one point in the 1980s they were going to split Camelot ES between Falls Church and Woodson and the community told the School Board it would prefer to move entirely to Falls Church rather than be split in two.

I remember this. Splitting the neighborhood would have been disastrous and it was a choice of no choice. The Board needed Camelot to move to Falls Church. It was one of the lowest performing HS and the neighborhood would boost the school.

[Anonymous]

So I guess they’re not going to publish the full drafts if the maps before the community engagement events. These meetings are going to be wasted pointing out errors that were likely already addressed or questioned by BRAC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone tell me what’s up with Armstrong elementary? It seems like they are getting a renovation and expansion that will bring them from 74% capacity to 41% capacity. At a cost of over $116 million.

Good news, I think I found a line item that would go a long way toward solving the budget shortfall.

Why in the world are they expanding a school at 74% capacity?

Got to get below 60% so they can trigger moving in all those Forestville homes south of Rt. 7

Even setting aside the potential equity play for the moment, these are the people saying they have a huge budget shortfall.

I’ve always been a fan of paying teachers well and I generally have supported public schools, but man, expanding a school for $59 million so that it can be 2/5 full, that’s enough to turn even me into a rabid libertarian.

No board member should keep their job after that horrendous decision.

Money is money, but they typically differentiate between the capital budget and the operating budget. School renovations are covered by the capital budget funded through bonds. When they talk about the budget shortfall they are usually referring to the operating budget that depends heavily on annual transfers from the Board of Supervisors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone tell me what’s up with Armstrong elementary? It seems like they are getting a renovation and expansion that will bring them from 74% capacity to 41% capacity. At a cost of over $116 million.

Good news, I think I found a line item that would go a long way toward solving the budget shortfall.

Why in the world are they expanding a school at 74% capacity?

Got to get below 60% so they can trigger moving in all those Forestville homes south of Rt. 7

Even setting aside the potential equity play for the moment, these are the people saying they have a huge budget shortfall.

I’ve always been a fan of paying teachers well and I generally have supported public schools, but man, expanding a school for $59 million so that it can be 2/5 full, that’s enough to turn even me into a rabid libertarian.

No board member should keep their job after that horrendous decision.

Money is money, but they typically differentiate between the capital budget and the operating budget. School renovations are covered by the capital budget funded through bonds. When they talk about the budget shortfall they are usually referring to the operating budget that depends heavily on annual transfers from the Board of Supervisors.

Money is fungible. And when they throw tens of millions away on unnecessary capital projects, it’s a symptom of much bigger waste.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So I guess they’re not going to publish the full drafts if the maps before the community engagement events. These meetings are going to be wasted pointing out errors that were likely already addressed or questioned by BRAC.

Agreed. And the approach to the meetings encourages a free for all where the people from Chantilly will be competing for time with people from West Springfield, Marshall, Edison, etc.

They could have a much more focused discussion if there was a separate meeting in each affected pyramid or at least region. But they don’t want that. They want to create the illusion of public participation but that’s all. These people suck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone tell me what’s up with Armstrong elementary? It seems like they are getting a renovation and expansion that will bring them from 74% capacity to 41% capacity. At a cost of over $116 million.

Good news, I think I found a line item that would go a long way toward solving the budget shortfall.

Why in the world are they expanding a school at 74% capacity?

Got to get below 60% so they can trigger moving in all those Forestville homes south of Rt. 7

Even setting aside the potential equity play for the moment, these are the people saying they have a huge budget shortfall.

I’ve always been a fan of paying teachers well and I generally have supported public schools, but man, expanding a school for $59 million so that it can be 2/5 full, that’s enough to turn even me into a rabid libertarian.

No board member should keep their job after that horrendous decision.

Money is money, but they typically differentiate between the capital budget and the operating budget. School renovations are covered by the capital budget funded through bonds. When they talk about the budget shortfall they are usually referring to the operating budget that depends heavily on annual transfers from the Board of Supervisors.

Money is fungible. And when they throw tens of millions away on unnecessary capital projects, it’s a symptom of much bigger waste.

Tell Robyn Lady and it will go in one ear and out the other. All she wants is the most money possible spent on schools in the pyramid where she lives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

Slide 12 of the 4/11 presentation addresses a Bull Run ES attendance island. I think you are referring to Slide 20 of the 4/25 presentation, which appears to show part of Holmes moving to Justice.

I doubt this was their intent, but Thru Consulting probably should be renamed Sloppy Consulting. I think they used the wrong map, and treated an area that they separately proposed to move from Parklawn ES to Columbia ES (see Slide 36 of the 4/11 presentation) as if that area was zoned for Justice rather than Annandale. That area currently attends Annandale and there would be no reason to move it to Justice, especially if they were moving it from Parklawn (currently a split feeder to Annandale and Justice) to Columbia (a 100% feeder to Annandale).

The whole Edison-to-Annandale move to eliminate the split feeder at Holmes looks like an exercise in rearranging deck chairs. In 2010-11 Annandale HS had an enrollment of slighly over 2500 and this was considered unacceptable. In response, the School Board moved the part of Wakefield Forest that had attended Poe/Annandale to Frost/Woodson and reassigned Bren Mar Park from Annandale to Edison while leaving it at Holmes. Now, because split feeders are being targeted, they are proposing to move Bren Mar Park back to Annandale, which would leave Annandale just shy of 2500 again.

I feel for that community. Some now in the Edsall Park area have to cross both 495 and 395 to get to Edison, but Annandale with 2500 kids is not going to be a great environment. It's an old building that, along with Lewis and McLean, got the cheapest "renovations" of any high schools in the early 2000s, and it currently has a 14-classroom modular. It also has a large ESOL/FARMS population, and 2500 kids at Annandale is a bigger challenge than, say, 2400 kids at McLean. On the other hand, Edison is currently at 107% capacity with no modular, so they thought they were dealing with two issues (split feeder at Holmes, overcrowding at Edison) by reassigning BMP back to Annandale. If you can install a modular at Annandale (28 acres), I'm not sure why they can't install a modular at Edison (43.5 acres).

We are newer to the area and live in that part of Wakefield Forest that was re-districted to Frost and Woodson back when you mentioned. I have heard from neighbors that the community was split on it and it was ugly. Lots of people wanted to stay at Annandale and were able to due to generous grandfathering policies.

My spouse and I went to one of the earlier boundary meetings at Annandale HS to see the school and hopefully talk to some families there, in the event that our neighborhood was sent back there. We chose the Frost and Woodson pyramid due to AP, marching band, and a few extracurricular clubs our kids are particularly interested in. We were/are not eager to have our kids move in high school but we took the opportunity to go and see the school during that presentation.

We met countless parents who loved the school and didn’t want to be zoned OUT of it. They had kids who loved the IB program and have a stellar Arabic teacher, apparently. They described what happened when our particular area was routed out of Annandale and to Woodson and it was really interesting to hear. They said the parent and community involvement plummeted at the middle and high schools there and never really recovered - at least not to the original level. Again, we are new to the area and totally unfamiliar with what has happened in the past here. That’s just what we were told. It was good perspective to help us better appreciate what can happen when school boundaries are changed and communities are moved to other areas. It sounds like it was a net negative for Annandale, and while I’d prefer my kids to stay at Woodson and continue to have stability there, I really feel for our neighboring school and community and hope they don’t continue to have such unrest.

Annandale is a good school with a great faculty. But the Wakefield Forest area move was part of a white flight that was very contentious. Annandale was one of the better schools but neighborhood demographics were changing and many wanted to move to Woodson which was very white.

Yet, they took neighborhoods like Camelot (very white) and didn't send them to Woodson or Annandale - but bussed them across 495 to Falls Church HS.

Camelot has been at Falls Church a lot longer than all of Wakefield Forest has been at Woodson. At one point in the 1980s they were going to split Camelot ES between Falls Church and Woodson and the community told the School Board it would prefer to move entirely to Falls Church rather than be split in two.

I remember this. Splitting the neighborhood would have been disastrous and it was a choice of no choice. The Board needed Camelot to move to Falls Church. It was one of the lowest performing HS and the neighborhood would boost the school.

In the 1980s weren’t Falls Church and Woodson pretty much the same demographically and in terms of academic outcomes? (Woodson was probably a little wealthier but that’s it.)

Only JEB Stuart (old Justice HS) had a high ESOL population back then. Mostly Vietnamese, Hmong, and Cambodian I believe. All the other schools like Lee, Annandale, Woodson, Lake Braddock, Fairfax, etc., were pretty much the same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cooper will get overcrowded before Langley with the Spring Hill move that is already proposed but they will work the system in a few years to get modulars installed at Cooper and Langley to add more capacity.

Or they'll just deal with temporary overcrowding, knowing that student numbers will decline in the coming years. You poor thing.

DP, but moving that big chunk of Tysons to Cooper/Langley may be a game changer. That’s a growing area, unlike the aging single-family neighborhoods that have been losing school-age kids.

No idea why you’re so confrontational. Are you the scarecrow poster?

It will be interesting see how long it takes older neighborhoods to flip.

A nearby street used to have about ten high school kids getting off the bus a few years ago, now I see one or two. On the other hand, my street had only my school-aged kids for years and then suddenly 30% of the houses flipped to families with children, all of whom are sending them to FCPS.

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Anonymous wrote:Can someone on here talk about Annandale High school. The school is close to capacity and projected to hit higher (with modulars) yet they are moving Lewis students and putting it above capacity.

Why would they do that? This seems to go against the whole point of this review and sets the school for failure when it is finally turning itself around.

1. They are only looking at September enrollments for capacity, not projections.
2. They are considering capacity with the modulars, not without.

So while there’s projected growth in Annandale, and the current capacity is perfect for phasing out the modulars, they’re going to fill them back up.

And, look at that, in the efforts to fix the Holmes to Annandale and Edison split feeder, they’ve created a Holmes to Annandale/Justice split feeder in the 4-11 presentation, slide 12 that’s never addressed!

Slide 12 of the 4/11 presentation addresses a Bull Run ES attendance island. I think you are referring to Slide 20 of the 4/25 presentation, which appears to show part of Holmes moving to Justice.

I doubt this was their intent, but Thru Consulting probably should be renamed Sloppy Consulting. I think they used the wrong map, and treated an area that they separately proposed to move from Parklawn ES to Columbia ES (see Slide 36 of the 4/11 presentation) as if that area was zoned for Justice rather than Annandale. That area currently attends Annandale and there would be no reason to move it to Justice, especially if they were moving it from Parklawn (currently a split feeder to Annandale and Justice) to Columbia (a 100% feeder to Annandale).

The whole Edison-to-Annandale move to eliminate the split feeder at Holmes looks like an exercise in rearranging deck chairs. In 2010-11 Annandale HS had an enrollment of slighly over 2500 and this was considered unacceptable. In response, the School Board moved the part of Wakefield Forest that had attended Poe/Annandale to Frost/Woodson and reassigned Bren Mar Park from Annandale to Edison while leaving it at Holmes. Now, because split feeders are being targeted, they are proposing to move Bren Mar Park back to Annandale, which would leave Annandale just shy of 2500 again.

I feel for that community. Some now in the Edsall Park area have to cross both 495 and 395 to get to Edison, but Annandale with 2500 kids is not going to be a great environment. It's an old building that, along with Lewis and McLean, got the cheapest "renovations" of any high schools in the early 2000s, and it currently has a 14-classroom modular. It also has a large ESOL/FARMS population, and 2500 kids at Annandale is a bigger challenge than, say, 2400 kids at McLean. On the other hand, Edison is currently at 107% capacity with no modular, so they thought they were dealing with two issues (split feeder at Holmes, overcrowding at Edison) by reassigning BMP back to Annandale. If you can install a modular at Annandale (28 acres), I'm not sure why they can't install a modular at Edison (43.5 acres).

We are newer to the area and live in that part of Wakefield Forest that was re-districted to Frost and Woodson back when you mentioned. I have heard from neighbors that the community was split on it and it was ugly. Lots of people wanted to stay at Annandale and were able to due to generous grandfathering policies.

My spouse and I went to one of the earlier boundary meetings at Annandale HS to see the school and hopefully talk to some families there, in the event that our neighborhood was sent back there. We chose the Frost and Woodson pyramid due to AP, marching band, and a few extracurricular clubs our kids are particularly interested in. We were/are not eager to have our kids move in high school but we took the opportunity to go and see the school during that presentation.

We met countless parents who loved the school and didn’t want to be zoned OUT of it. They had kids who loved the IB program and have a stellar Arabic teacher, apparently. They described what happened when our particular area was routed out of Annandale and to Woodson and it was really interesting to hear. They said the parent and community involvement plummeted at the middle and high schools there and never really recovered - at least not to the original level. Again, we are new to the area and totally unfamiliar with what has happened in the past here. That’s just what we were told. It was good perspective to help us better appreciate what can happen when school boundaries are changed and communities are moved to other areas. It sounds like it was a net negative for Annandale, and while I’d prefer my kids to stay at Woodson and continue to have stability there, I really feel for our neighboring school and community and hope they don’t continue to have such unrest.

Annandale is a good school with a great faculty. But the Wakefield Forest area move was part of a white flight that was very contentious. Annandale was one of the better schools but neighborhood demographics were changing and many wanted to move to Woodson which was very white.

Yet, they took neighborhoods like Camelot (very white) and didn't send them to Woodson or Annandale - but bussed them across 495 to Falls Church HS.

Camelot has been at Falls Church a lot longer than all of Wakefield Forest has been at Woodson. At one point in the 1980s they were going to split Camelot ES between Falls Church and Woodson and the community told the School Board it would prefer to move entirely to Falls Church rather than be split in two.

I remember this. Splitting the neighborhood would have been disastrous and it was a choice of no choice. The Board needed Camelot to move to Falls Church. It was one of the lowest performing HS and the neighborhood would boost the school.

In the 1980s weren’t Falls Church and Woodson pretty much the same demographically and in terms of academic outcomes? (Woodson was probably a little wealthier but that’s it.)

Only JEB Stuart (old Justice HS) had a high ESOL population back then. Mostly Vietnamese, Hmong, and Cambodian I believe. All the other schools like Lee, Annandale, Woodson, Lake Braddock, Fairfax, etc., were pretty much the same.

DP. Falls Church had a reputation for working class whites through the 80s. The kids at other schools used to call Falls Church kids “grits.”

Stuart had a tony reputation for decades because of the Lake Barcroft and Sleepy Hollow neighborhoods but then the garden apartments that mostly had housed single office workers started filling up with poorer immigrants with kids from all over the world. By the late 80s Stuart was high ESOL.