Redistrict Montgomery County

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bring the redistricting on! I live just a few blocks from the divide between WJ and Einstein (and Einstein is MILES closer to the WJ students here). I'm now in the Einstein cluster and perfectly fine with that, but can't imagine that if things actually got redistricted that my home value would go anywhere but up -- but of course the property taxes would go up too.

I also live on the Einstein side. I don't care if they redistrict but I do care a lot that people are willing to spend $200k to keep their kids away from my kid and his friends over here on our side of the line. It's just so stark here with the line a few blocks away. People think it's a safer investment to live in a rich, mostly white cluster. That is very morally troubling to me. What if you could buy tickets to movies where only white people attended, and they cost more? What if you could pay more to join a swim club where only white people attended, and it cost more? That's how this feels to me.

Why did you pay more to live in Einstein boundaries than say rather than Northwood (or fill in the blank)? Did you totally ignore the schools? Did you not want your kids near the Northwood kids? I'm not going to presume that. I assume most of us bought a house we could afford with the best schools possible within that budget. Why cast such aspersions to your neighbors?

I'm the one you're responding to. I see your point. But not everyone buys houses that way, looking for the highest rated schools at their price point. And many, many people like us could afford to live in wealthier areas but don't. When your income goes up, should you move to Whitman? We bought a house in an area we liked with a good commute, ignoring the ratings, figuring it was MCPS and it would all be okay. We also were very aware that "good" scores correlate with income and race, not school quality. It turns out that we really like our school and our neighbors who moved here with a similar attitude. We also regularly encounter disparaging remarks from strangers about our school (example: meet a guy walking his dog who says hey this is a really nice street. It's such a shame it goes to Einstein). Maybe I've gotten a little cynical from all these encounters.

It sounds like you made the right choice for your family. We moved out of the Einstein cluster when our kids were young because we were apprehensive about the school's ratings. I just checked them again after reading this thread and I was reminded of what I discovered back then that although white and asian children at einstein do much better than AA and HI children (I believe this differential is due to socioeconomic status not race), all groups (including white and asian kids) achieve lower SAT scores than the MCPS average. For us this was an important data point. We believed our children would be better off if they went to a school with lots of high performing kids. What we found was that it has been a mixed bag. It is a larger peer group but it is still pretty much the same curriculum. I am for the most part happy with our high school and it sounds like you are happy with Einstein. You don't like people assuming your school is crappy and I don't like people assuming we moved so our kids could go to school with white kids.

My kids aren't in the Einstein cluster so I have no dog in this fight, but according to the 2016 results white and African American kids at Einstein scored higher than the MCPS SAT average.

I am the poster you are responding to. I was not clear in my post for which I apologize. According to the MCPS results for 2015 (which is the most recent report I could find) here are the MCPS scores and the Einstein scores (out of 2400):
MCPS White students 1770 Einstein White students 1724
MCPS Asian students 1789 Einstein Asian students 1589
MCPS AA students 1414 Einstein AA students 1371
MCPS HI students 1476 Einstein HI students 1410
MCPS FARMS students 1386 Einstein FARMS students 1391
MCPS Special Education students 1363 Einstein Special Education students 1204
MCPS LEP students 1291 Einstein LEP students 1056

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bring the redistricting on! I live just a few blocks from the divide between WJ and Einstein (and Einstein is MILES closer to the WJ students here). I'm now in the Einstein cluster and perfectly fine with that, but can't imagine that if things actually got redistricted that my home value would go anywhere but up -- but of course the property taxes would go up too.

I also live on the Einstein side. I don't care if they redistrict but I do care a lot that people are willing to spend $200k to keep their kids away from my kid and his friends over here on our side of the line. It's just so stark here with the line a few blocks away. People think it's a safer investment to live in a rich, mostly white cluster. That is very morally troubling to me. What if you could buy tickets to movies where only white people attended, and they cost more? What if you could pay more to join a swim club where only white people attended, and it cost more? That's how this feels to me.

Why did you pay more to live in Einstein boundaries than say rather than Northwood (or fill in the blank)? Did you totally ignore the schools? Did you not want your kids near the Northwood kids? I'm not going to presume that. I assume most of us bought a house we could afford with the best schools possible within that budget. Why cast such aspersions to your neighbors?

I'm the one you're responding to. I see your point. But not everyone buys houses that way, looking for the highest rated schools at their price point. And many, many people like us could afford to live in wealthier areas but don't. When your income goes up, should you move to Whitman? We bought a house in an area we liked with a good commute, ignoring the ratings, figuring it was MCPS and it would all be okay. We also were very aware that "good" scores correlate with income and race, not school quality. It turns out that we really like our school and our neighbors who moved here with a similar attitude. We also regularly encounter disparaging remarks from strangers about our school (example: meet a guy walking his dog who says hey this is a really nice street. It's such a shame it goes to Einstein). Maybe I've gotten a little cynical from all these encounters.

It sounds like you made the right choice for your family. We moved out of the Einstein cluster when our kids were young because we were apprehensive about the school's ratings. I just checked them again after reading this thread and I was reminded of what I discovered back then that although white and asian children at einstein do much better than AA and HI children (I believe this differential is due to socioeconomic status not race), all groups (including white and asian kids) achieve lower SAT scores than the MCPS average. For us this was an important data point. We believed our children would be better off if they went to a school with lots of high performing kids. What we found was that it has been a mixed bag. It is a larger peer group but it is still pretty much the same curriculum. I am for the most part happy with our high school and it sounds like you are happy with Einstein. You don't like people assuming your school is crappy and I don't like people assuming we moved so our kids could go to school with white kids.

My kids aren't in the Einstein cluster so I have no dog in this fight, but according to the 2016 results white and African American kids at Einstein scored higher than the MCPS SAT average.

I am the poster you are responding to. I was not clear in my post for which I apologize. According to the MCPS results for 2015 (which is the most recent report I could find) here are the MCPS scores and the Einstein scores (out of 2400):
MCPS White students 1770 Einstein White students 1724
MCPS Asian students 1789 Einstein Asian students 1589
MCPS AA students 1414 Einstein AA students 1371
MCPS HI students 1476 Einstein HI students 1410
MCPS FARMS students 1386 Einstein FARMS students 1391
MCPS Special Education students 1363 Einstein Special Education students 1204
MCPS LEP students 1291 Einstein LEP students 1056

Here are the 2016 results released a few weeks ago

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/info/pdf/160929%20SAT%20Exam%20Participation%20Perform.pdf

some of the subgroup scores are concerning, but white scores are just behind the W and magnet schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't disagree with the OP. But wow, it would cause world war III. Could you imagine how long it would take?

This seems like a logical solution. Will never happen due to politics, but logical.

Well, it's going to be proposed sometime soon...betting on next 12 - 18 months.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People pay a premium to live in a neighborhood that has a highly rated school cluster. In Kensington for example, a similar house in the WJ school district would sell for around $150k more than one in the Einstein neighborhood and a house in the BCC zoned part of Kensington would sell for perhaps $200-$250K more than the one in Einstein. For many middle class people, their homes are their main source of wealth and so yes people will be concerned about any redistricting plan that threatens to reduce their home's value. The county should also consider whether a massive redistricting that causes upper middle class people to leave or makes them less likely to move to Mont. County would reduce state income tax revenue and property tax revenue. That would impact school funding.
Also one of the posts in the thread on WJ's situation had some statistics on the SAT performance of FARMS kids in a "W" school and a nearby DCC school and while there is a difference, they are quite similar. Another post on the same thread noted that white students in Einstein and WJ had nearly identical SAT scores (approx. 1800/2400) which is suggestive if you assume that race is correlated with socioeconomic status. In other words, you can physically move the kids around the county in all kinds of ways but unless you address the underlying differences in the socioeconomic status of the kids it is really hard to close the achievement gap. That is not a task that MCPS can tackle on its own.
Here are the stats from the WJ thread:
"Here are the Highest Mean SAT Critical Reading, Mathematics, and Writing Scores for students who qualify for FARMS (Class of 2015):
MCPS: 1386/2400
Einstein 1392/2400
WJ: 1463/2400
BCC: 1330/2400"
[Report Post]

They don't care. I'm starting to lose count of how often I've heard Rice & Floreen say, "Well, Germantown has it worse." Fine, Council. You cater to Germantown and watch as the WESTERN part of the County gets the hell out of Dodge. Have they ever heard of telecommuting? Many of us no longer NEED to stay in MoCo.

[Anonymous]

What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People pay a premium to live in a neighborhood that has a highly rated school cluster. In Kensington for example, a similar house in the WJ school district would sell for around $150k more than one in the Einstein neighborhood and a house in the BCC zoned part of Kensington would sell for perhaps $200-$250K more than the one in Einstein. For many middle class people, their homes are their main source of wealth and so yes people will be concerned about any redistricting plan that threatens to reduce their home's value. The county should also consider whether a massive redistricting that causes upper middle class people to leave or makes them less likely to move to Mont. County would reduce state income tax revenue and property tax revenue. That would impact school funding.
Also one of the posts in the thread on WJ's situation had some statistics on the SAT performance of FARMS kids in a "W" school and a nearby DCC school and while there is a difference, they are quite similar. Another post on the same thread noted that white students in Einstein and WJ had nearly identical SAT scores (approx. 1800/2400) which is suggestive if you assume that race is correlated with socioeconomic status. In other words, you can physically move the kids around the county in all kinds of ways but unless you address the underlying differences in the socioeconomic status of the kids it is really hard to close the achievement gap. That is not a task that MCPS can tackle on its own.
Here are the stats from the WJ thread:
"Here are the Highest Mean SAT Critical Reading, Mathematics, and Writing Scores for students who qualify for FARMS (Class of 2015):
MCPS: 1386/2400
Einstein 1392/2400
WJ: 1463/2400
BCC: 1330/2400"
[Report Post]

They don't care. I'm starting to lose count of how often I've heard Rice & Floreen say, "Well, Germantown has it worse." Fine, Council. You cater to Germantown and watch as the WESTERN part of the County gets the hell out of Dodge. Have they ever heard of telecommuting? Many of us no longer NEED to stay in MoCo.

You really believe the council is catering to Germantown? I live there and I don't see that at all. Germantown is in the "Western part of the county" JFYI

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To me it would depend on what would be the goal of such an effort? If it is to alleviate over crowding, I am all for it. If it is for "diversity" than forget it. I dont want my kid bussed across the county to some gang school. FWIW we are in RM cluster, not W

Which school or schools are gang schools in your opinion?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

+1 In the end, it's a slightly more sophisticated version of racism, maybe more like classism (just so happens, not by accident, that the majority of poor people in urban areas are POC), but that makes it all the more insidious.

I'm not a MD resident any longer, but I'm in Arlington and I think we're moving in this direction (gradually, like an iceberg). If MoCo, Arlington, and Fairfax all undertook efforts at desegregation simultaneously, do we really think everyone would flee to the exurbs? I don't. Traffic and Metro suck. And there aren't enough jobs that are 100% remote for a large enough percentage of the population to be able to leave, thereby destabilizing the regional housing market. Also, I think there are enough of us higher SES (white) parents who won't engage in the "white flight" reaction that our parents did. There's too much evidence that suggests we'll all be better off in desegregated school systems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

Maybe I misunderstood how the desegregation would work---but I was under the impression that X% of students from Y area would attend school in Z area. And then X% of students in Z area would attend school in Y area. So the kids would be being bussed both ways.

I'm not convinced W parents pulling their kids would solely be about racism. The W schools are the area of the county where the parents have the means to make a choice. Asking parents and students to move their sense of community to the other side of town is a lot. I like to cheer my kid and our neighbors on at the school sports events. Maybe someone says they have to run an errand so another parent drives a neighbor child home and feeds them a snack. Maybe the kids work on a project together after school.

At least in this area, bussing is not just about desegregation--it's about impacting peoples sense of community and you have to factor in traffic. If you read the Jobs forum, when someone asks where should I live, the first response is where do you work? Traffic in this area has a way of impacting quality of life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

Maybe I misunderstood how the desegregation would work---but I was under the impression that X% of students from Y area would attend school in Z area. And then X% of students in Z area would attend school in Y area. So the kids would be being bussed both ways.

I'm not convinced W parents pulling their kids would solely be about racism. The W schools are the area of the county where the parents have the means to make a choice. Asking parents and students to move their sense of community to the other side of town is a lot. I like to cheer my kid and our neighbors on at the school sports events. Maybe someone says they have to run an errand so another parent drives a neighbor child home and feeds them a snack. Maybe the kids work on a project together after school.

At least in this area, bussing is not just about desegregation--it's about impacting peoples sense of community and you have to factor in traffic. If you read the Jobs forum, when someone asks where should I live, the first response is where do you work? Traffic in this area has a way of impacting quality of life.

Not necessarily, and school desegregation should be combined with housing desegregation in order to really work. But much of MCPS is compact enough that desegregation would be a fairly easy matter of drawing boundaries that encompass different types of housing, and doing so deliberately.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Its not that the W schools are better. They just test better because the gene pool.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

Maybe I misunderstood how the desegregation would work---but I was under the impression that X% of students from Y area would attend school in Z area. And then X% of students in Z area would attend school in Y area. So the kids would be being bussed both ways.

I'm not convinced W parents pulling their kids would solely be about racism. The W schools are the area of the county where the parents have the means to make a choice. Asking parents and students to move their sense of community to the other side of town is a lot. I like to cheer my kid and our neighbors on at the school sports events. Maybe someone says they have to run an errand so another parent drives a neighbor child home and feeds them a snack. Maybe the kids work on a project together after school.

At least in this area, bussing is not just about desegregation--it's about impacting peoples sense of community and you have to factor in traffic. If you read the Jobs forum, when someone asks where should I live, the first response is where do you work? Traffic in this area has a way of impacting quality of life.

Not necessarily, and school desegregation should be combined with housing desegregation in order to really work. But much of MCPS is compact enough that desegregation would be a fairly easy matter of drawing boundaries that encompass different types of housing, and doing so deliberately.

Seems like a win-win solution is to fund low-income housing near the W's. Would enhance diversity without the expense of busing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens to the allure of the W schools if the current students are no longer there? Are they still perceived as better if the majority are bussed in from other areas and the IB residents choose private instead? What happens when parent involvement declines because the IB parents are no longer involved and the current student body parents can't be involved because of things like work, lack of transportation, or any of the other current reasons that they are are currently not involved in their local school?

Have you listened to the TAL podcast on school segregation? It's called "The Problem We All Live With" and is about how desegregation is the ONLY thing that has ever worked for bridging the achievement gap. The interesting thing is that it works without bringing down the scores or educational experiences of schools that were formerly overwhelmingly white.

Basically, there's scads of evidence that desegregation doesn't hurt white and Asian students, but does help Black and Latinx students, so the only reason that "W parents" would pull their kids would be racism.

Maybe I misunderstood how the desegregation would work---but I was under the impression that X% of students from Y area would attend school in Z area. And then X% of students in Z area would attend school in Y area. So the kids would be being bussed both ways.

I'm not convinced W parents pulling their kids would solely be about racism. The W schools are the area of the county where the parents have the means to make a choice. Asking parents and students to move their sense of community to the other side of town is a lot. I like to cheer my kid and our neighbors on at the school sports events. Maybe someone says they have to run an errand so another parent drives a neighbor child home and feeds them a snack. Maybe the kids work on a project together after school.

At least in this area, bussing is not just about desegregation--it's about impacting peoples sense of community and you have to factor in traffic. If you read the Jobs forum, when someone asks where should I live, the first response is where do you work? Traffic in this area has a way of impacting quality of life.

Not necessarily, and school desegregation should be combined with housing desegregation in order to really work. But much of MCPS is compact enough that desegregation would be a fairly easy matter of drawing boundaries that encompass different types of housing, and doing so deliberately.

Seems like a win-win solution is to fund low-income housing near the W's. Would enhance diversity without the expense of busing.

That's fine but how is that going to happen? Current home owners that are willing to sell want to sell for market value---be that to a new family or to a developer. Developers are interested in maximizing profit. Yes, they are required to have MPDUs but unless it's only a few per hundred. So if there is a 100 unit development being built, the developers only have to set aside maybe 10-15 units for MPDUs.

Does the county own land that it's going to turn over to be developed into low income housing? Or do they have the funds to purchase a large tract of land from a private owner who could sell to a developer at market rate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I really just want my kids to go to the school closest to us. I have no desire to put them on a bus for an extended trip across the county 2x per day. Further, I want my involvement in the school to be easy and I want to be a part of my community. I'd like to see my neighbor at school, the pool, the local library, the grocery store. If I need to run over to school for something, it should be a quick drive, not 20-30 min involving major roads.

For the magnets, I'd want to see an all or nothing proposition. Put a reasonably distanced magnet program in each cluster. The idea that there are 2 MS magnets is nuts. Why should kids have to sit on a bus for 39-45 min to get to school? And the 30-45 min goes both ways---western county kids who would like to attend the TP magnet have to sit in a bus. If you implement SES bussing, you're putting the TP MS kid on a bus to a western school for 39-45 min. That's not fair to any child.

+1 Well said. I would only like to see redistricting to relieve overcrowding, and to keep kids at the closest school to their home. (This also helps with environmental and traffic issues.)

+2. I went to bus-ed schools as a kid, and I arrived at school every day totally exhausted and nauseated after a 45 minute bus ride. (Plus we had to get to school really early, so that the bus could do another run.) I then slept through a lot of school. Also, the schools I attended that were most obviously bus-ed did nothing to increase racial integration or harmony. One school I went to bused kids from a very UMC neighborhood (where we were basically the poorest family) and then kids from the poorest, minority neighborhood. The two groups never spoke, and were basically all in different classes. It was a very bad environment for both, and I think it increased each groups' poor impression of the other group. I went to another bus-ed school that was sort of the random catch-all school, and it was much more successful. Most of the kids weren't coming from that far away, and it was a diverse mix of neighborhoods, so it didn't seem so much like a bad re-make of The Outsiders.

I see a couple problems in the County, but one is that they just don't have enough schools in the areas of the County where the population is most dense. I know there's not a lot of land available to purchase for new schools, but it also doesn't seem like there's any effort to do so. (A big property came on the market in our neighborhood in a location that would have been perfect for a new E.S., but it went to a developer to build a new subdivision.) It does seem like the County is making a lot of progress in diversifying the housing stock in certain areas of the County (there's a lot of apartments and other cheaper options going up in North Bethesda, for instance), but then they are just cramming these kids into schools that are already bursting at the seams. I think that creates a lot of resistance from the current residents -- even the families that are fine with socio-economic diversity are going to be concerned about bringing another 200 kids coming into a school that's already 200 kids over capacity.