Where will new Sligo Creek ES be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Apparently, only PBES kids are special enough to warrant a close-in holding school and requiring the closing of a neighborhood school to accommodate that.

I’m pretty frustrated with the favoritism for PBES displayed by the superintendent and board thus far. The petition sent around by PBES families in support of converting SSIMS/ SCES to holding schools has made me even more disgruntled.

Can we petition MCPS to move PBES to coveted green space in TP (not unlike the plan to move SCES to Nolte) and then use their old PBES building as a holding school for SCES while they renovate? Only half kidding.

Wow! A petition supporting the closure of someone else's schools? That's a new low. Is that what the PBES community is about? How do we see this petition? I would be very eager to get a copy to verify that it's true.
The odds are so stacked against SSIMS right now. It's so unfair.

It's gross, and an indication of what Takoma Park is becoming (has become). There is absolutely no sense of solidarity, even within the PBES community. If most of the (white, UMC) newcomers had the ability to cleanse "their" schools of the pesky working class/immigrant community, they absolutely would.

[Anonymous]

As a neighbor to Nolte Park and a parent who had a child attend both Sligo Creek and SSIMS I am opposed to to any plan repurposing Nolte Park for an elementary school and repurposing the existing schools for a holding school. A large number of students attending both Sligo and SSIMS are walkers. The current community needs to maintain both a middle school and an elementary school. Our kids should not have to be bussed to oversized middle schools. Our community should not lose a park and gain school bus congestion. A 100% bus holding school and an elementary school a few blocks away separated by the purple line rail is too much congestion without infrastructure to support it. I fear eminent domain to scoop up houses for the purpose of building roads.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Apparently, only PBES kids are special enough to warrant a close-in holding school and requiring the closing of a neighborhood school to accommodate that.

I’m pretty frustrated with the favoritism for PBES displayed by the superintendent and board thus far. The petition sent around by PBES families in support of converting SSIMS/ SCES to holding schools has made me even more disgruntled.

Can we petition MCPS to move PBES to coveted green space in TP (not unlike the plan to move SCES to Nolte) and then use their old PBES building as a holding school for SCES while they renovate? Only half kidding.

Wow! A petition supporting the closure of someone else's schools? That's a new low. Is that what the PBES community is about? How do we see this petition? I would be very eager to get a copy to verify that it's true.
The odds are so stacked against SSIMS right now. It's so unfair.

It's gross, and an indication of what Takoma Park is becoming (has become). There is absolutely no sense of solidarity, even within the PBES community. If most of the (white, UMC) newcomers had the ability to cleanse "their" schools of the pesky working class/immigrant community, they absolutely would.

Similarly, TPES's allocation for ELD teachers was cut a few years back because the need shrunk significantly due to gentrification.

[Anonymous]

The TP fix is in. It's no coincidence that Kate Stewart and Marc Elrich both live in Takoma Park and this proposal directly benefits Piney Branch.

To recap, PBES gets a brand new pool and gets to travel about a mile up the road while it's renovated while 1) SCES is moved (without a feasibility study, possibly to a beloved neighborhood park) 2) SSIMS is closed forever, 3) two middle schools (though of course not TPMS) become significantly bigger, 4) buses from all over the county will clog DTSS and the list goes on.

There's no way Taylor would have proposed this if he didn't think he had the votes. The fix is in. He must have gone to Stewart and Elrich in advance to secure their votes in exchange for PBES getting a sweet deal. The worst part about it is that Stewart is also supposed to represent the SCES and SSIMS communities. It's disgusting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have heard the two leading candidates are Nolte Park and Parkside Elementary School. Losing Nolte would be a huge blow to the entire downtown Silver Spring area.

I very much maintain that the current SCES is fixable and not as bad as they say it is. I would much prefer they renovate and not turn it into a holding school. There's no reason one of the densest (if not the densest) neighborhoods in Montgomery County should have to be the host of the county's holding schools. It makes no sense.

The current SCES is the back end of a 100-year old school that has not been maintained. The school runs lunch from 10 am to 2 pm, because of its small cafeteria. It has poor indoor air quality and is overcapacity. The roof is old. The HVAC is breaks down regularly. The playground is small and because of that, has a dirt surface. Students need to walk through a parking lot with poor sight lines to get to the bathroom if they are at recess. I could go on...

I'm guessing you like the school because your child walks to school and that is the most important thing to you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The TP fix is in. It's no coincidence that Kate Stewart and Marc Elrich both live in Takoma Park and this proposal directly benefits Piney Branch.

To recap, PBES gets a brand new pool and gets to travel about a mile up the road while it's renovated while 1) SCES is moved (without a feasibility study, possibly to a beloved neighborhood park) 2) SSIMS is closed forever, 3) two middle schools (though of course not TPMS) become significantly bigger, 4) buses from all over the county will clog DTSS and the list goes on.

There's no way Taylor would have proposed this if he didn't think he had the votes. The fix is in. He must have gone to Stewart and Elrich in advance to secure their votes in exchange for PBES getting a sweet deal. The worst part about it is that Stewart is also supposed to represent the SCES and SSIMS communities. It's disgusting.

Don't write to DCUM. Write to the BOE and the entire county council about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The TP fix is in. It's no coincidence that Kate Stewart and Marc Elrich both live in Takoma Park and this proposal directly benefits Piney Branch.

To recap, PBES gets a brand new pool and gets to travel about a mile up the road while it's renovated while 1) SCES is moved (without a feasibility study, possibly to a beloved neighborhood park) 2) SSIMS is closed forever, 3) two middle schools (though of course not TPMS) become significantly bigger, 4) buses from all over the county will clog DTSS and the list goes on.

There's no way Taylor would have proposed this if he didn't think he had the votes. The fix is in. He must have gone to Stewart and Elrich in advance to secure their votes in exchange for PBES getting a sweet deal. The worst part about it is that Stewart is also supposed to represent the SCES and SSIMS communities. It's disgusting.

I also think it's particularly disgusting to increase the population of Eastern because it (currently) has a rather high FARMS population. On what planet is that a best practice? Maybe that percentage will change once they divvy up the SSIMS kids, but even so, it's really a big eff you to the community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That could work in the long term but it does seem pretty devastating for the current SCES kids to get split up from their friends midway through elementary school. And then what happens in middle school and high school? Do they send all of ESS with its new boundaries to eastern and then Northwood?

Currently SSIMS articulates to Northwood and Blair. Who knows who is going anywhere in the upper grades, or even grade school, with this superintendent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The current SCES is the back end of a 100-year old school that has not been maintained. The school runs lunch from 10 am to 2 pm, because of its small cafeteria. It has poor indoor air quality and is overcapacity. The roof is old. The HVAC is breaks down regularly. The playground is small and because of that, has a dirt surface. Students need to walk through a parking lot with poor sight lines to get to the bathroom if they are at recess. I could go on...

I'm guessing you like the school because your child walks to school and that is the most important thing to you.

As an SCES parent, I believe that some of these issues like the playground and “walking through a parking lot” are overblown, whereas others (like the small cafeteria) are legit. I want to see data on costs to make the school safe and functional before throwing in the towel.

But to your second point, walkability matters here for good reasons! Many of our neighbors bought in DTSS because we can walk to the metro and the schools, and that is essential because we have zero or one car. If the school moves to Parkside ES, it is going to complicate drop off and pick up. For pick up, we will have to metro back to silver spring after work, take some form of public transit (bus?) up to park side to get the kids from after care, and then bus back to our DTSS home with the kids (whereas now we hop off the a metro, walk to the school, and then we all walk the few blocks home). Metro accessibility and school accessibility were the main reason we moved here. And we aren’t the only ones with these circumstances. So yes, walking is important to many of us but for pretty valid reasons.

[Anonymous]

Is it feasible to site a elementary school at Nolte Park but also maintain a park and playground that's still accessible to the rest of the community (at least on weekends and during the summer)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The TP fix is in. It's no coincidence that Kate Stewart and Marc Elrich both live in Takoma Park and this proposal directly benefits Piney Branch.

To recap, PBES gets a brand new pool and gets to travel about a mile up the road while it's renovated while 1) SCES is moved (without a feasibility study, possibly to a beloved neighborhood park) 2) SSIMS is closed forever, 3) two middle schools (though of course not TPMS) become significantly bigger, 4) buses from all over the county will clog DTSS and the list goes on.

There's no way Taylor would have proposed this if he didn't think he had the votes. The fix is in. He must have gone to Stewart and Elrich in advance to secure their votes in exchange for PBES getting a sweet deal. The worst part about it is that Stewart is also supposed to represent the SCES and SSIMS communities. It's disgusting.

TPMS is already the largest middle school in the DCC, with a capacity of 1257.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is very complex. And based on the way things have been going, I’m not sure they are going to adequately engage the communities that will be affected by changes. But hopefully I am wrong.

If they do add part of SCES to the ESS catchment area and try to keep kids together for MS/HS, it seems like adding everybody to Eastern (which is slated for rebuild) and Northwood (which is brand new) would make more sense from a utilization perspective than adding more kids to TPMS and Blair, which are already at or near capacity. I don’t necessarily agree that it’s right, but I could see MCPS trying to make that point.

But ESS is so walkable to TPMS! That would be a major loss to this community.

Related, ESS is one of the schools untouched by the first 4 options that is now in play for the second set.

ESS is 1 mile from TPMS, along busy Piney Branch Ave. I wouldn't call that walkable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have heard the two leading candidates are Nolte Park and Parkside Elementary School. Losing Nolte would be a huge blow to the entire downtown Silver Spring area.

I very much maintain that the current SCES is fixable and not as bad as they say it is. I would much prefer they renovate and not turn it into a holding school. There's no reason one of the densest (if not the densest) neighborhoods in Montgomery County should have to be the host of the county's holding schools. It makes no sense.

The current SCES is the back end of a 100-year old school that has not been maintained. The school runs lunch from 10 am to 2 pm, because of its small cafeteria. It has poor indoor air quality and is overcapacity. The roof is old. The HVAC is breaks down regularly. The playground is small and because of that, has a dirt surface. Students need to walk through a parking lot with poor sight lines to get to the bathroom if they are at recess. I could go on...

I'm guessing you like the school because your child walks to school and that is the most important thing to you.

SCES is not bad; the HVAC needs improvement but that could be done with split systems. Cars don't need to be parked between the playground and the school; lunch could be addressed differently. The playground is much better than it was in the past and there were not so many complaints back then. The energy has changed at the school in the past year. The school could be fixed and that would be better for the community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They are proposing buidling a new Eastern on the current campus and keeping the current Eastern in use while it's being built. Why not use that as a holding school for SSIMS students after the new Eastern is built and renovate SSIMS?

Or convert just SCES to a holding elementary school and let SSIMS students use it, plus parts of their current building while renovating SSIMS? Then it could be used for Piney Branch and other elementary communities after SSIMS is renovated.

The point is, there are creative solutions here that do not involve putting the entire burden of needing a holding school on one neighborhood/community. This plan is a complete slap in the face to the SSIMS community.

They can't have two whole middle schools operating on one middle school site simultaneously.

Why not? We have an ES and a MS that have been operating on the same site for 25+ years.

They are operating on a larger site that was formerly a high school. Eastern's site is not large enough to support double the number of cars and buses, plus neither school would have fields to use during that time.

According to Taylor, people in holding schools can tolerate temporary inconveniences, so…

Temporary inconveniences like mold and open exposure to asbestos? Sure.

[Anonymous]

I mean, ESS students are in the tpms walk zone (it's about 3/4 of a mile between the two). You don't have to walk on piney Branch, you can take Ritchie and then gist or ray. Plenty of kids who live between Sligo and piney Branch are closer to TPMS then to ESS but zoned to ESS. Definitely way more walkable than Eastern or Sligo would be.