FCPS HS Boundary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For a blue county (and it is VERY blue) you people sure are pretty intolerant of diversity. Keep those immigrant children away!

FCPS leadership has been held in low regard for a long time; however, people do tend in many cases to like their existing schools and school-based administrators and teachers.

Now the School Board is poised to do away with the one aspect of the system that people still like.

The point is that the county votes blue - overwhelmingly supporting very relaxed (if any) enforcement of border security. Some county schools (Herndon, Justice, Lewis, Mt. Vernon, Annandale) have absorbed the brunt of this policy. So other schools and neighborhoods don't see the impact. It is time they shared in the difficult situation in which this puts schools. Essentially like Governors Abbott and DeSantis sending migrants to the big cities and Martha's Vineyard - these places need to understand the impact.

As long as the residents in Langley, McLean, Oakton, West Springfield, Robinson, Madison don't see the true impact they will continue voting blue.

Adjusting school boundaries is a very crude way to try and send a message about federal immigration policy. The various schools you mention stand to be affected quite differently, yet still in some cases in ways that will further erode support for FCPS.

“Sending a message” would certainly not be the purpose, considering the all Dem board.
“Equity” would be the point and if middle class and wealthier parents act like their counterparts in Baltimore and NYC, it is what it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Using 2022- 2023 school profile data from FCPS, Irving had 367 level 4 AAP students.

In the 2 years preceding 22/23:

Sangster had approximately 40 to 50 AAP level 4 kids per grade who were zoned for Irving/WSHS not LB. This translates into approximately 100 level 4 kids in the two 6th grade years preceeding 2022/23 who were zoned for Irving/WSHS.

Keene Mill had approximately 300 level 4 AAP kids total, grades 3rd - 6th, in their AAP program, majority of whom are zoned for Irving/WSHS. This averages to roughly 75 to 80 Keene Mill L4 kids per grade, which translates to roughly 150-160 per grade or 300 to 320 or so level 4 kids in the two 6th grade years preceeding 2022/23 who are zoned for Irving/WSHS.

Rough 400-450 Level IV AAP kids in the two years prior to 2022/23 from Keene Mill and Sangster who are zoned for Irving/WSHS.

367 level 4 AAP kids are listed as enrolled at Irving for 7th and 8th grade in 2022-23 based on the Irving dashboard.

The dashboard numbers of the 3 schools above definitely supports the annecdotal evidnce that the majority of Irving/WSHS zoned level 4 kids are now choosing Irving/WSHS over Lak Braddock.

Even rounding the numbers of AAP level 4 kids zoned for Irving/WSHS to 500 elementary kids over the 2 prior years grades, the dashboard numbers strongly suggest that the majority of level 4 AAP kids zoned for Irving are now cgoosing Irving over LB.

Kaaaay- one more time- how does that pertain to this discussion when those kids will choose lake Braddock over key? None of those aap kids would go to key over Braddock. If they are slated to go to Irving and Lewis or Braddock they will ALL go to Braddock. It just doesn’t help get kids to key.

This discussion isn't about Key. It is about Lewis.

The other person said most of the AAP kids out of Keene go to LB and stay at LB for high school.

The data does not support her.

Most of the WS zoned AAP kids are going to Irving now, and following on to WSHS, not LBSS. FCPS dashboard numbers clearly show this.

If Keene was zoned for Lewis, those kids would end up back at Lewis.

Keene is the closest elementary to Lewis and makes the most send based on location to be rezoned to alewis out of all of the WSHS zoned schools.

However, I think that rezoning kids for an agenda that is not in their best interests is a terrible thing and should never happen. If they must rezone, it should be the least disruptive plan that moves forward, and only happen if absolutely necessary.

Unfortunately, the school board does not agree with me.

Some neighborhood is going to get rezoned from WSHS if enrollment trends continue to go up. Let's hope the school board goes with the least disruptive choice, such as eliminating the Sangster split feeder to Lake Braddock, and not moving one of the fringe neighborhoods like Daventry or a Keene Mill neighborhood to Lewis.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Using 2022- 2023 school profile data from FCPS, Irving had 367 level 4 AAP students.

In the 2 years preceding 22/23:

Sangster had approximately 40 to 50 AAP level 4 kids per grade who were zoned for Irving/WSHS not LB. This translates into approximately 100 level 4 kids in the two 6th grade years preceeding 2022/23 who were zoned for Irving/WSHS.

Keene Mill had approximately 300 level 4 AAP kids total, grades 3rd - 6th, in their AAP program, majority of whom are zoned for Irving/WSHS. This averages to roughly 75 to 80 Keene Mill L4 kids per grade, which translates to roughly 150-160 per grade or 300 to 320 or so level 4 kids in the two 6th grade years preceeding 2022/23 who are zoned for Irving/WSHS.

Rough 400-450 Level IV AAP kids in the two years prior to 2022/23 from Keene Mill and Sangster who are zoned for Irving/WSHS.

367 level 4 AAP kids are listed as enrolled at Irving for 7th and 8th grade in 2022-23 based on the Irving dashboard.

The dashboard numbers of the 3 schools above definitely supports the annecdotal evidnce that the majority of Irving/WSHS zoned level 4 kids are now choosing Irving/WSHS over Lak Braddock.

Even rounding the numbers of AAP level 4 kids zoned for Irving/WSHS to 500 elementary kids over the 2 prior years grades, the dashboard numbers strongly suggest that the majority of level 4 AAP kids zoned for Irving are now cgoosing Irving over LB.
[/quote]

Kaaaay- one more time- how does that pertain to this discussion when those kids will choose lake Braddock over key? None of those aap kids would go to key over Braddock. If they are slated to go to Irving and Lewis or Braddock they will ALL go to Braddock. It just doesn’t help get kids to key. [/quote]

This discussion isn't about Key. It is about Lewis.

The other person said most of the AAP kids out of Keene go to LB and stay at LB for high school.

The data does not support her.

Most of the WS zoned AAP kids are going to Irving now, and following on to WSHS, not LBSS. FCPS dashboard numbers clearly show this.

If Keene was zoned for Lewis, those kids would end up back at Lewis.

Keene is the closest elementary to Lewis and makes the most send based on location to be rezoned to alewis out of all of the WSHS zoned schools.

However, I think that rezoning kids for an agenda that is not in their best interests is a terrible thing and should never happen. If they must rezone, it should be the least disruptive plan that moves forward, and only happen if absolutely necessary.

Unfortunately, the school board does not agree with me.

Some neighborhood is going to get rezoned from WSHS if enrollment trends continue to go up. Let's hope the school board goes with the least disruptive choice, such as eliminating the Sangster split feeder to Lake Braddock, and not moving one of the fringe neighborhoods like Daventry or a Keene Mill neighborhood to Lewis.[/quote]

Sweetie the kids who go to lake Braddock for aap over Irving can stay at Braddock for high school with a transfer because they went there for middle school.
Some of Keene mill aap kids come from base schools that lead to Braddock anyway (kings glen/ park and ravens worth es aap go to Keene milk). So it is already split to Braddock and not all kids would be send to Lewis from aap.
ALSO it is not the only school that is 3.1 miles away from Lewis.

On top of that Keene mill kids walk to Irving and you would ruin a middle school walk zone.
Or make kids go k-8 with one group of kids and then 9-12 with another you will have a tough sell.

[Anonymous]

Don't the Keene Mill AAP students come from all over the West Springfield pyramid? Only some of them would have Keene Mill as their base school. So only a portion would end up at Lewis if it were rezoned.

And the old Daventry and HV kids probably make more sense. The distance from HV is not significant. Especially when you consider how far some of the Langley kids go to get to school. Or for that matter, some of the more remote Robinson kids in Clifton or Mason Neck kids (Hayfield?).

[Anonymous]

Also, the Springfield district folks were fools in the past school board election when they voted Schultz out of office over national issues.

Schultz was the one who helped and supported the Daventry parents with their split feeder elimination. She worked diligently with them, even though they were mostly not from her political party, because she treated them as her constituents even though they were from opposing political groups. She worked for her constituents on school issues, and would have been counted on to fight like a bobcat if the school board started pushing to rezone her neighborhoods out of the pyramid to use the kids as political pawns. She was awfully trumpy, but on school issues, particularly rezoning issues, Schultz put constituency over party. Fighting political rezoning was one of her issues.

Now they lost that kind of representation on the school board, followed by redistricting thanks to McKay and the board of supervisors, that split their representation from Springfield district to Providence, where the primary school board representation is on Lewis and not their zoned high school, West Springfield.

I think many in that part of West Springfield are going to end up regretting the day they voted on local offices because of national politics. They basically voted against their own interests, particularly with regards to school rezoning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't the Keene Mill AAP students come from all over the West Springfield pyramid? Only some of them would have Keene Mill as their base school. So only a portion would end up at Lewis if it were rezoned.

And the old Daventry and HV kids probably make more sense. The distance from HV is not significant. Especially when you consider how far some of the Langley kids go to get to school. Or for that matter, some of the more remote Robinson kids in Clifton or Mason Neck kids (Hayfield?).

HV , Sangster and OH are Sangster feeders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't the Keene Mill AAP students come from all over the West Springfield pyramid? Only some of them would have Keene Mill as their base school. So only a portion would end up at Lewis if it were rezoned.

And the old Daventry and HV kids probably make more sense. The distance from HV is not significant. Especially when you consider how far some of the Langley kids go to get to school. Or for that matter, some of the more remote Robinson kids in Clifton or Mason Neck kids (Hayfield?).

Hunt Valley to Lewis makes the least sense.

Look at geography.

Daventry or Keene Mill are the onky areas that make sense geographically.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also, the Springfield district folks were fools in the past school board election when they voted Schultz out of office over national issues.

Schultz was the one who helped and supported the Daventry parents with their split feeder elimination. She worked diligently with them, even though they were mostly not from her political party, because she treated them as her constituents even though they were from opposing political groups. She worked for her constituents on school issues, and would have been counted on to fight like a bobcat if the school board started pushing to rezone her neighborhoods out of the pyramid to use the kids as political pawns. She was awfully trumpy, but on school issues, particularly rezoning issues, Schultz put constituency over party. Fighting political rezoning was one of her issues.

Now they lost that kind of representation on the school board, followed by redistricting thanks to McKay and the board of supervisors, that split their representation from Springfield district to Providence, where the primary school board representation is on Lewis and not their zoned high school, West Springfield.

I think many in that part of West Springfield are going to end up regretting the day they voted on local offices because of national politics. They basically voted against their own interests, particularly with regards to school rezoning.

Fair enough, but, just to reiterate:

Not a single school board candidate ran on a redistricting platform. That they feel they somehow have a mandate to do this is very misplaced.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the Keene Mill AAP students come from all over the West Springfield pyramid? Only some of them would have Keene Mill as their base school. So only a portion would end up at Lewis if it were rezoned.

And the old Daventry and HV kids probably make more sense. The distance from HV is not significant. Especially when you consider how far some of the Langley kids go to get to school. Or for that matter, some of the more remote Robinson kids in Clifton or Mason Neck kids (Hayfield?).

Hunt Valley to Lewis makes the least sense.

Look at geography.

Daventry or Keene Mill are the onky areas that make sense geographically.

Dave try is west Springfield elementary. Keene mill aap pulls from Braddock (ravensworth and kings park/kings glen) and WSHS (cardinal
Forest and keen mill). Again if you take keenemill you will get zero aap kids (they will still be offered Braddock because half their classmates are zoned to Braddock as a home school) and so you are left with the community kids at Keene mill going to Lewis and the app kids going to Braddock which isn’t a good look.

The real reason why these two don’t make sense is that they are both walk zones to Irving. And it isn’t going to fly to go to Irving and then key.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't the Keene Mill AAP students come from all over the West Springfield pyramid? Only some of them would have Keene Mill as their base school. So only a portion would end up at Lewis if it were rezoned.

And the old Daventry and HV kids probably make more sense. The distance from HV is not significant. Especially when you consider how far some of the Langley kids go to get to school. Or for that matter, some of the more remote Robinson kids in Clifton or Mason Neck kids (Hayfield?).

Hunt Valley to Lewis makes the least sense.

Look at geography.

Daventry or Keene Mill are the only areas that make sense geographically.

Keene Mill is only 1.5 miles from WS. Hunt Valley is close to 3 miles. No part of HV can walk to WS. So they will already be on a bus. That bus can go to Lewis very easily.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For a blue county (and it is VERY blue) you people sure are pretty intolerant of diversity. Keep those immigrant children away!

FCPS leadership has been held in low regard for a long time; however, people do tend in many cases to like their existing schools and school-based administrators and teachers.

Now the School Board is poised to do away with the one aspect of the system that people still like.

The point is that the county votes blue - overwhelmingly supporting very relaxed (if any) enforcement of border security. Some county schools (Herndon, Justice, Lewis, Mt. Vernon, Annandale) have absorbed the brunt of this policy. So other schools and neighborhoods don't see the impact. It is time they shared in the difficult situation in which this puts schools. Essentially like Governors Abbott and DeSantis sending migrants to the big cities and Martha's Vineyard - these places need to understand the impact.

As long as the residents in Langley, McLean, Oakton, West Springfield, Robinson, Madison don't see the true impact they will continue voting blue.

DP. I’m a resident in one of those areas and I definitely don’t vote blue. For exactly the reasons you listed. And many others in these areas feel the same way. We are largely NOT the people voting for the disastrous border policies of the current administration.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:When I lived elsewhere, there were
Minor boundary adjustments every year. This meant there was no need for a huge boundary jump in a single year. It was a system which worked very well. I would love to see that adopted here.

That would stink to have to make all new friends potentially out of nowhere. Probably opt for private if we had a boundary change that had us all of the sudden going to Lewis.

Good luck paying for private schools when your property value is going to drop by 25%, potentially putting you underwater on your mortgage, plus they will have to raise property tax rates to compensate for the massive loss in real estate assessments.

I am far more worried about the drop in property values that will come with another trump presidency since his cronies are determined to get rid of federal employees. Our housing market will collapse.

Red herring. The school redistricting situation is much more relevant to Fairfax housing values than the upcoming election.

It is not a red herring! Have you read about the project 2025 - “Project 2025 is a collection of policy proposals to reshape the executive branch of the U.S. federal government at an unprecedented scale in the event of a Republican victory in the 2024 U.S. presidential election”? This will happen in less than a year if trump wins. Given how much our property values depend on federal jobs and contracting, our area values will collapse while the school board is still I. The “community engagement” portion of any boundary change process.

DP. Can you take this to the Politics forum? This thread is about the School Board’s plan to change school boundaries.

+1

+2
Report the PPP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In the policy, “Equal Access to Programming” I assume means boundaries that allow for convenient and guaranteed transfers to neighboring schools with a unique ancient or foreign language (like Latin/sign language/Italian/etc), or a bespoke program that the base school doesn’t offer (like a Leadership Academy, etc).

Uh, no high school in FCPS offers Italian.

If you're going to come on here and shill for Democrats on the School Board looking to upend some of FCPS's best pyramids, at least try to familiarize yourself with the district.

+1
Also, the idea that anyone would transfer to access “a bespoke program” like the ridiculous “Leadership Academy” is laughable.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Very interesting about Daventry, PP. My sister lives there and as you said, that neighborhood is PACKED full of kids.

We’re in the Hunt Valley neighborhood, and I’ve heard that some of those families would’ve been zoned for Lee/Lewis in the past. Do you know which neighborhoods that would’ve been? I think we’re squarely in the WS zone as we live near Hunt Valley pool. In any case, I have 8th and 10th graders so I’m guessing my kids will be gone before any boundary change happened.

The Gambrill neighborhoods outside the parkway.

That rezoning happened long ago, before any current Lewis or WS pyramid students were in school and before most of them were even born, back when south county was built. The current eeniors were either not yeat born oe newborn infants when that HV neighborhood was rezoned to WS (2005) to give you some perspective of how long ago that was.

The story as I understand it was that when that rezoning happened to accomodate the new high school, Saratoga families fought tooth and nail to remain at Lee (Lewis) instead of transferring to nearby South County only a few minutes from their houses. They were successful, but it did not turn out the way they had hoped in the long term as they were the only neighborhood successful at staying at Lee/Lewis.

There was a very unhappy Saratoga mom who posted about it for years here. That is where I got this background story, so there might be some holes in it. That Saratoga person posted regularly in any rezoning thread very angrily about West Springfield, and specifically that Hunt Valley (the farthest out WS elementary school from Lewis and the farthest out school rezoned to the much closer WS) needs to be rezoned to Lewis. The only justification to their arguments is that part of HV outside the parkway used to be zoned for Lee 20 years ago.

It is a weird story that you would not know if you moved here in the past 2 decades, or if you don't often visit these message boards. That person's kids must have long graduated fcps by now, but suspect that they still posts in threads advocating to rezone WS based on the tone and arguments of some of those posts.

Really, except for the Sangster neighborhoods, HV is the farthest away from Lewis and makes the least sense to rezone to Lewis out of all the WS neighborhoods. The one that makes the most sense out of all the elementary schools geographically is Keene Mill, which would also bring an AAP center to the Lewis pyramid.

But really, if the school board wants to rezone WSHS without a headache, Sangster split feeder to Lake Braddock makes the most sense. At most, they will get a few resigned sighs from families that are generational West Springfield families, but the complaints, appeals and push back would be minimal.

I don’t know much about the rest of the schools, but can say that all the Keene Mill kids are walk-zone to Irving, so that would be an issue. Why add a bunch of buses to lee and eliminate a walk zone or why make kids go k-8 together and then mix for high school. Also, that is where a good chunk of the diversity for WSHS is as the housing stock is less expensive than the surrounding areas. (With the exception of Cardinal Forest Condos). I thought Springfield Estates fed to Lewis, or does it not have an AAP school? Most of the Keene mill AAP kids go to Lake Braddock and all the AAP kids can choose between Braddock and Irving so the argument that it would add AAP to Lewis isn’t really true. Those kids already go somewhere else.

Geographically, Keene Mill is the closest zone to Lewis.

Like I said most of the kids go to lake braddock. This will get you 60 kids a year tops. Not much for all the disruption it will cause. I’m betting the board will go for a school that brings in higher numbers and doesn’t disturb a middle school walk zone.

Most of the Keene Mill kids do NOT go to Lake Braddock.

You clearly don't know what you are talking about.

Oh sorry my kid was went through aap and yes most of his classmates in those 3 classes went to Braddock. The community kids go to Irving which are 2-3 classes of kids. All 3 classes of aap can choose if they want to go to Braddock or Irving if they are keene mill area kids or come from a different school. Not one of those aap kids will choose key/ Lewis over Braddock. So that leaves you with maybe 60 kids or so.

Maybe you didn’t know that.

DP. The clearest example of INequity is allowing certain kids (AAP) to choose which school they’d like to attend, while the rest of the kids are given no such choice. AAP centers need to be a thing of the past.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very interesting about Daventry, PP. My sister lives there and as you said, that neighborhood is PACKED full of kids.

We’re in the Hunt Valley neighborhood, and I’ve heard that some of those families would’ve been zoned for Lee/Lewis in the past. Do you know which neighborhoods that would’ve been? I think we’re squarely in the WS zone as we live near Hunt Valley pool. In any case, I have 8th and 10th graders so I’m guessing my kids will be gone before any boundary change happened.

The Gambrill neighborhoods outside the parkway.

That rezoning happened long ago, before any current Lewis or WS pyramid students were in school and before most of them were even born, back when south county was built. The current eeniors were either not yeat born oe newborn infants when that HV neighborhood was rezoned to WS (2005) to give you some perspective of how long ago that was.

The story as I understand it was that when that rezoning happened to accomodate the new high school, Saratoga families fought tooth and nail to remain at Lee (Lewis) instead of transferring to nearby South County only a few minutes from their houses. They were successful, but it did not turn out the way they had hoped in the long term as they were the only neighborhood successful at staying at Lee/Lewis.

There was a very unhappy Saratoga mom who posted about it for years here. That is where I got this background story, so there might be some holes in it. That Saratoga person posted regularly in any rezoning thread very angrily about West Springfield, and specifically that Hunt Valley (the farthest out WS elementary school from Lewis and the farthest out school rezoned to the much closer WS) needs to be rezoned to Lewis. The only justification to their arguments is that part of HV outside the parkway used to be zoned for Lee 20 years ago.

It is a weird story that you would not know if you moved here in the past 2 decades, or if you don't often visit these message boards. That person's kids must have long graduated fcps by now, but suspect that they still posts in threads advocating to rezone WS based on the tone and arguments of some of those posts.

Really, except for the Sangster neighborhoods, HV is the farthest away from Lewis and makes the least sense to rezone to Lewis out of all the WS neighborhoods. The one that makes the most sense out of all the elementary schools geographically is Keene Mill, which would also bring an AAP center to the Lewis pyramid.

But really, if the school board wants to rezone WSHS without a headache, Sangster split feeder to Lake Braddock makes the most sense. At most, they will get a few resigned sighs from families that are generational West Springfield families, but the complaints, appeals and push back would be minimal.

I don’t know much about the rest of the schools, but can say that all the Keene Mill kids are walk-zone to Irving, so that would be an issue. Why add a bunch of buses to lee and eliminate a walk zone or why make kids go k-8 together and then mix for high school. Also, that is where a good chunk of the diversity for WSHS is as the housing stock is less expensive than the surrounding areas. (With the exception of Cardinal Forest Condos). I thought Springfield Estates fed to Lewis, or does it not have an AAP school? Most of the Keene mill AAP kids go to Lake Braddock and all the AAP kids can choose between Braddock and Irving so the argument that it would add AAP to Lewis isn’t really true. Those kids already go somewhere else.

Geographically, Keene Mill is the closest zone to Lewis.

Like I said most of the kids go to lake braddock. This will get you 60 kids a year tops. Not much for all the disruption it will cause. I’m betting the board will go for a school that brings in higher numbers and doesn’t disturb a middle school walk zone.

Most of the Keene Mill kids do NOT go to Lake Braddock.

You clearly don't know what you are talking about.

Oh sorry my kid was went through aap and yes most of his classmates in those 3 classes went to Braddock. The community kids go to Irving which are 2-3 classes of kids. All 3 classes of aap can choose if they want to go to Braddock or Irving if they are keene mill area kids or come from a different school. Not one of those aap kids will choose key/ Lewis over Braddock. So that leaves you with maybe 60 kids or so.

Maybe you didn’t know that.

DP. The clearest example of INequity is allowing certain kids (AAP) to choose which school they’d like to attend, while the rest of the kids are given no such choice. AAP centers need to be a thing of the past.

If they change the boundaries of some of the overcrowded AAP centers like Glasgow or Carson without eliminating AAP centers that draw from multiple pyramids, they are basically reaffirming the AAP center model.

They can't really decouple boundary decisions from decisions about programs (do they retain AAP centers, IB, etc.) and disparities about facilities (do they just continue to neglect some schools because they could send kids elsewhere), even if they pretend otherwise.

But they've given no indication they'll take a serious look at programs or facilities needs, which is what a real "holistic" review - as opposed to the farce they now appear to have in mind - would entail.