FCPS HS Boundary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

I don't think there's anything wrong with their saying they are looking at the 6-8 MS model because there is research that suggests it is better than the model at all the FCPS MS except Holmes, Poe, and Glasgow, which are 6-8.

But they ought to be able to nail down relatively quickly that moving to a 6-8 MS model conflicts with some of their other goals, such as aligning MS and HS feeder patterns. For example, Cooper simply won't have the capacity to accommodate the 6-8 grade kids in the Langley pyramid, so if you made it a 6-8 grade school you are shrinking Langley and making it under-enrolled at a time when they are claiming they are prioritizing using available capacity across the system.

Agree 100% about APS being far more transparent about how they approach boundary changes. FCPS isn't really approaching this from the perspective of efficiency or good planning. They are bandying about the prospect of county-wide boundary changes because the School Board wants to shove accountability for boundary changes to staff and there are a handful of changes they want to make for equity reasons that they want to claim are being made as part of wider changes in the name of efficiency.

There's a very good chance that what will happen is that they dump this all on staff to make recommendations, staff will propose changes, and then when there's an outcry the School Board members will tell staff they did a lousy job and send them back to the drawing board. Repeat and rinse until the changes are far more incremental and less bold.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

APS is a lot smaller then FCPS and there are far fewer permutations to the move options in Arlington then there are in FCPS. APS also has a ton of option schools that parents who are not happy with their neighborhood school can apply for so there is more school choice making boundary adjustments more palatable for families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

APS is a lot smaller then FCPS and there are far fewer permutations to the move options in Arlington then there are in FCPS. APS also has a ton of option schools that parents who are not happy with their neighborhood school can apply for so there is more school choice making boundary adjustments more palatable for families.

FCPS, like APS, uses the concept of "planning units" when considering boundary adjustments. The difference is that APS has been more transparent in providing parents with tools that allow them to see on their own what the impact of different adjustments would be. FCPS doesn't want to put parents in that position. It's much more top-down, take-it-or-leave-it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

I don't think that anyone wants their 6th graders with the 8th graders.

8th graders are dating, drinking, and in many cases, sesxually active.

Half of the 6th graders are still playing with Legos and pying tag on the playground.

The 6th graders will lose recess if they are moved into middle school, and will be in a teen culture that is nt apprppriate for many of them.

What a terrible idea

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

I don't think there's anything wrong with their saying they are looking at the 6-8 MS model because there is research that suggests it is better than the model at all the FCPS MS except Holmes, Poe, and Glasgow, which are 6-8.

But they ought to be able to nail down relatively quickly that moving to a 6-8 MS model conflicts with some of their other goals, such as aligning MS and HS feeder patterns. For example, Cooper simply won't have the capacity to accommodate the 6-8 grade kids in the Langley pyramid, so if you made it a 6-8 grade school you are shrinking Langley and making it under-enrolled at a time when they are claiming they are prioritizing using available capacity across the system.

Agree 100% about APS being far more transparent about how they approach boundary changes. FCPS isn't really approaching this from the perspective of efficiency or good planning. They are bandying about the prospect of county-wide boundary changes because the School Board wants to shove accountability for boundary changes to staff and there are a handful of changes they want to make for equity reasons that they want to claim are being made as part of wider changes in the name of efficiency.

There's a very good chance that what will happen is that they dump this all on staff to make recommendations, staff will propose changes, and then when there's an outcry the School Board members will tell staff they did a lousy job and send them back to the drawing board. Repeat and rinse until the changes are far more incremental and less bold.

Aren't Poe, Holmes and Glasgow 3 of the worst performing middle schools in the county?

And all of the highest performing middle schools are 7th/8th.

By using those schools as examples, you are making a very strong case against moving 6th graders to middle schools.

7th/8th is a far superior middle school breakdown than 6th-7th-8th.

Using FCPS own middle schools,

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

I don't think that anyone wants their 6th graders with the 8th graders.

8th graders are dating, drinking, and in many cases, sesxually active.

Half of the 6th graders are still playing with Legos and pying tag on the playground.

The 6th graders will lose recess if they are moved into middle school, and will be in a teen culture that is nt apprppriate for many of them.

What a terrible idea

Loundoun County as MS 6-8. I know plenty of school districts with 6-8 in California and across the Mid-West. Some schools have a separate wing for the 6th graders so that interaction with the 7-8th graders is limited. It is not a new concept and none of my friends in LCPS have complained.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

I don't think there's anything wrong with their saying they are looking at the 6-8 MS model because there is research that suggests it is better than the model at all the FCPS MS except Holmes, Poe, and Glasgow, which are 6-8.

But they ought to be able to nail down relatively quickly that moving to a 6-8 MS model conflicts with some of their other goals, such as aligning MS and HS feeder patterns. For example, Cooper simply won't have the capacity to accommodate the 6-8 grade kids in the Langley pyramid, so if you made it a 6-8 grade school you are shrinking Langley and making it under-enrolled at a time when they are claiming they are prioritizing using available capacity across the system.

Agree 100% about APS being far more transparent about how they approach boundary changes. FCPS isn't really approaching this from the perspective of efficiency or good planning. They are bandying about the prospect of county-wide boundary changes because the School Board wants to shove accountability for boundary changes to staff and there are a handful of changes they want to make for equity reasons that they want to claim are being made as part of wider changes in the name of efficiency.

There's a very good chance that what will happen is that they dump this all on staff to make recommendations, staff will propose changes, and then when there's an outcry the School Board members will tell staff they did a lousy job and send them back to the drawing board. Repeat and rinse until the changes are far more incremental and less bold.

Aren't Poe, Holmes and Glasgow 3 of the worst performing middle schools in the county?

And all of the highest performing middle schools are 7th/8th.

By using those schools as examples, you are making a very strong case against moving 6th graders to middle schools.

7th/8th is a far superior middle school breakdown than 6th-7th-8th.

Using FCPS own middle schools,

Those schools have a high percentage of lower SES families, which is why they have poor academic performance. Their scores would look the same if they were 7/8 grade. Carson would have similar outcomes if it was 6-8th grade. There might be a higher number of kids in Algebra 1 as 6th graders if they were at Carson because it would be easier to move kids into or out of the class based on performance.

[Anonymous]

Arlington, City of Falls Church, and Loudon County all use the 6-8 model. Most of the country uses the 6-8 model. Fairfax is the outlier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

I don't think there's anything wrong with their saying they are looking at the 6-8 MS model because there is research that suggests it is better than the model at all the FCPS MS except Holmes, Poe, and Glasgow, which are 6-8.

But they ought to be able to nail down relatively quickly that moving to a 6-8 MS model conflicts with some of their other goals, such as aligning MS and HS feeder patterns. For example, Cooper simply won't have the capacity to accommodate the 6-8 grade kids in the Langley pyramid, so if you made it a 6-8 grade school you are shrinking Langley and making it under-enrolled at a time when they are claiming they are prioritizing using available capacity across the system.

Agree 100% about APS being far more transparent about how they approach boundary changes. FCPS isn't really approaching this from the perspective of efficiency or good planning. They are bandying about the prospect of county-wide boundary changes because the School Board wants to shove accountability for boundary changes to staff and there are a handful of changes they want to make for equity reasons that they want to claim are being made as part of wider changes in the name of efficiency.

There's a very good chance that what will happen is that they dump this all on staff to make recommendations, staff will propose changes, and then when there's an outcry the School Board members will tell staff they did a lousy job and send them back to the drawing board. Repeat and rinse until the changes are far more incremental and less bold.

Aren't Poe, Holmes and Glasgow 3 of the worst performing middle schools in the county?

And all of the highest performing middle schools are 7th/8th.

By using those schools as examples, you are making a very strong case against moving 6th graders to middle schools.

7th/8th is a far superior middle school breakdown than 6th-7th-8th.

Using FCPS own middle schools,

I dug around a bit more. Nationwide, there was a major shift from 7-8 middle schools to 6-8 middle schools starting in the 70s. The academic research seems to be mixed, though, with a number of recent studies finding that the current FCPS model is preferable.

The main reason why Poe, Holmes, and Glasgow are 6-8 middle schools seems to be that they had extra capacity. Holmes MS was the main feeder to Jefferson HS, and there was excess capacity at the HS level in the mid-80s (FCPS had decided it was going to close one of Annandale, Jefferson, or Stuart before deciding to convert Jefferson to a magnet). They didn't close Holmes, however; rather, it later got converted to a 6-8 middle school. If they were to close one of Poe, Holmes, and Glasgow, they could have two 7-8 middle schools that would each be around the size of Johnson or Kilmer (slightly under 1200 students), but then they would have to find ES seats for the 1200 or so 6th grade kids now at those three schools.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

I don't think there's anything wrong with their saying they are looking at the 6-8 MS model because there is research that suggests it is better than the model at all the FCPS MS except Holmes, Poe, and Glasgow, which are 6-8.

But they ought to be able to nail down relatively quickly that moving to a 6-8 MS model conflicts with some of their other goals, such as aligning MS and HS feeder patterns. For example, Cooper simply won't have the capacity to accommodate the 6-8 grade kids in the Langley pyramid, so if you made it a 6-8 grade school you are shrinking Langley and making it under-enrolled at a time when they are claiming they are prioritizing using available capacity across the system.

Agree 100% about APS being far more transparent about how they approach boundary changes. FCPS isn't really approaching this from the perspective of efficiency or good planning. They are bandying about the prospect of county-wide boundary changes because the School Board wants to shove accountability for boundary changes to staff and there are a handful of changes they want to make for equity reasons that they want to claim are being made as part of wider changes in the name of efficiency.

There's a very good chance that what will happen is that they dump this all on staff to make recommendations, staff will propose changes, and then when there's an outcry the School Board members will tell staff they did a lousy job and send them back to the drawing board. Repeat and rinse until the changes are far more incremental and less bold.

Aren't Poe, Holmes and Glasgow 3 of the worst performing middle schools in the county?

And all of the highest performing middle schools are 7th/8th.

By using those schools as examples, you are making a very strong case against moving 6th graders to middle schools.

7th/8th is a far superior middle school breakdown than 6th-7th-8th.

Using FCPS own middle schools,

Those schools have a high percentage of lower SES families, which is why they have poor academic performance. Their scores would look the same if they were 7/8 grade. Carson would have similar outcomes if it was 6-8th grade. There might be a higher number of kids in Algebra 1 as 6th graders if they were at Carson because it would be easier to move kids into or out of the class based on performance.

The more interesting question is whether the schools in that area would be stronger had they kept open Jefferson HS rather than send all the Jefferson HS kids to Annandale HS when Jefferson was converted to a magnet. The Jefferson community lost its neighborhood school and poverty at two ends of Route 236 that previously had been split between Jefferson and Annandale got consolidated at Annandale, with subsequent overcrowding at AHS leading to boundary changes that stripped Annandale of many of its single-family neighborhoods.

[Anonymous]

better to just have 7-8. then they only have to get up early for two years.

i strongly would have preferred keeping my 6th graders in ES.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:better to just have 7-8. then they only have to get up early for two years.

i strongly would have preferred keeping my 6th graders in ES.

I agree, but Dr Reid said, “parents like it, but….’ And sort of shrugged.
Just so you are aware of the amount of weight we are given in this discussion.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:People keep asserting FCPS already has prepared new boundary maps that they'll unveil at some point, but that would be easy enough to FOIA if it were true. Seems like a conspiracy theory.

Oh yeah, they always produce documents under FOIA. They never ever try to bury the requester with costs.

Absurd post.

It would be a specific request so any claims by FCPS of exorbitant production costs could be readily challenged. But thanks for confirming you prefer to wallow in conspiracy theories.

I can’t tell if you are joking.

No. I just find it weird when people claim they’ve already decided what they are going to do and have already drawn up the new maps. If that were the case we’d have seen them already.

To your FOIA point claiming that is a simple low cost request, the county lawyers who will bill you several hundreds of dollars an hour to review any responsive documents would like a word. The staff time spent searching how many custodians’ in boxes would like a word too. These things are expensive by design.

To your broader point, you may want to participate in some conversations with the school board members and FPAC members.

In both instances you are just absolutely wrong, and just trying to carry the water for the school board. You call us conspiracy theorists as we fight against the school boards plans, but I’m guessing you are well aware of their plans too.

If these maps already exist, and you haven’t found a way to obtain and publicize and them yet, these advocacy groups like FairFACTS Matters must be all bluster and far less competent than they’d like people to believe.

But I don’t think they exist yet. Some School Board members may already have specific changes in mind, but I really doubt anything has been memorialized or agreed upon yet.

Prove me wrong.

I’m pretty sure in the governance meeting dr Reid said she had models already that included middle schools going 6-8.
Yiu can rewatch is you are so inclined and let us know if I’m right.

She indicated that she had a few schools in mind for 6-8 middle schools. It didn’t seem related to a holistic boundary adjustment. Even without an update to 8130, it’s Dr Reid’s job to look into these things.

Right. So the superintendent should make the decisions independently of public opinion. I can’t even tell you how glad I am that I turned down a job in FCPS this spring.
APS kept parents informed every step of the way. To bolster their claims for need for more capacity, they immediately had a website where parents could play swap a housing unit to recreate boundaries so they could see the difficulty involved.

FCPS, crickets. “It is her job to look into these things.” Nice. Pat on the head and off to bed.

The school board is dealing with their bad timing (trust in government is low across the board right now) and their poor planning. I really think at this point, they want the drama from parents as the one SB rep said something along the lines of, “it is nice that it is getting attention”

They are really miss handling this.

APS is a lot smaller then FCPS and there are far fewer permutations to the move options in Arlington then there are in FCPS. APS also has a ton of option schools that parents who are not happy with their neighborhood school can apply for so there is more school choice making boundary adjustments more palatable for families.

I thought one of the points of holistically looking at boundaries was to get rid of the transfer options, meaning kids can transfer out so clearly there are options. My kids are in an immersion program, so this definitely happens.

FCPS could do this, but my thought is that the computer model would be too expensive for them to run so they aren’t even trying. Or they didnt’ even think of it because they are handling this old school, military top down style instead of seeing them as partners with the community. In part because the board is so inexperienced in dealing with people

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:better to just have 7-8. then they only have to get up early for two years.

i strongly would have preferred keeping my 6th graders in ES.

+1

I grew up in a place where MS was generally 6-8. Some districts had “Jr. High” which was 7-9 and had the 6th graders at the ES. It seemed weird to me that MS here was just 7th and 8th. But now I like it a lot better. Keeps the 6th graders “young” for another year and then they only have 2 school years on the awful MS bell schedule.