FCPS comprehensive boundary review

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Get rid of IB and put AP at every school or these boundary changes are pointless

This was brought up during our breakout group session of the virtual boundary review meeting. When the groups read their top responses to the boundary changes, not a single group was pro-boundary change.

They asked for what benefits could come out of the boundary review process. We responded with “ or changing the boundaries”. Only negatives were brought up.

These review meetings are a sham, if they were taking parents input into consideration they wouldn’t be doing a county wide boundary adjustment.

I pointed out that many of the under enrolled high schools are because of students leaving IB schools for AP schools. They need to look at why schools are overcrowded. Some middle schools are very overcrowded due to being AAP center schools. FCPS could solve 99% of their boundary “problems” by looking at the programs offered at schools that are over/under populated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no one is moving in to Woodson without significant numbers moving out first. FCPS’s own projections show only Woodson and WSHS significantly over capacity in the 5 year projections (which obviously are sus but that’s what they’re going by). Isn’t Mantua ES basically right across the street from Woodson HS though? I can’t see that change happening.

The 5 year projections include modulars. Without modulars, McLean is still at 118%, Marshall at 109%, Chantilly at 112%, and Robinson at 105%. Also, Annandale also goes from 89% to 102% when you take the modular away.

They spent decades telling people that modulars, while not permanent seats, were a suitable learning environment and counted towards capacity when determining whether schools were overcrowded.

It's only when they want to move kids around like widgets for demographic reasons that they do an about-face and assert that getting kids out of modulars - which cost several million to install per modular - is critical. Ask the families at schools with modulars if they want to be redistricted. The answer generally will be no.

The hypocrisy in FCPS never stops.

Is the goal to get rid of modulars? It sounded like they wanted to get rid of them as much as possible because of school safety/security reasons. Is it just going to be used as a tool to let them do whatever they want? They’re good when they get us to the right result and bad otherwise.

That’s Mateo Dunne pretext, not an actual reason.

Very true, it’s sometimes hard to parse what is actually important and will be considered and what it one board member’s “pet issue.” Although I don’t know what in Mount Vernon District is over capacity with modulars. It certainly isn’t anything in the South County pyramid.

[Anonymous]

Also a big point that was brought up last night is the millions of dollars being spent on this boundary review process that could be going towards hiring additional teachers and specialists at schools that need those resources the most.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no one is moving in to Woodson without significant numbers moving out first. FCPS’s own projections show only Woodson and WSHS significantly over capacity in the 5 year projections (which obviously are sus but that’s what they’re going by). Isn’t Mantua ES basically right across the street from Woodson HS though? I can’t see that change happening.

The 5 year projections include modulars. Without modulars, McLean is still at 118%, Marshall at 109%, Chantilly at 112%, and Robinson at 105%. Also, Annandale also goes from 89% to 102% when you take the modular away.

They spent decades telling people that modulars, while not permanent seats, were a suitable learning environment and counted towards capacity when determining whether schools were overcrowded.

It's only when they want to move kids around like widgets for demographic reasons that they do an about-face and assert that getting kids out of modulars - which cost several million to install per modular - is critical. Ask the families at schools with modulars if they want to be redistricted. The answer generally will be no.

The hypocrisy in FCPS never stops.

Sure, but can we agree that schools like Robinson and Annandale which are close to no longer depending on modulars shouldn’t be marketed as having excess capacity?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a parent of school aged kids and support boundary changes. Because I have looked at a map and seen all the ridiculous lines that create inefficiencies and waste money.

Your kids must be early on in their school career. No parent of a high schooler or 8th grader wants their kid moved in the middle of high school. Kids don’t do as well academically their first year after a move.

“ Prior work indicates that children do worse in the year of a school move, but has been largely unsuccessful in isolating the causal effects of mobility. ”

https://direct.mit.edu/edfp/article/12/4/419/10279/Moving-Matters-The-Causal-Effect-of-Moving-Schools

There is enough data about this that the school board should know. This is from MIT, not the UAE like their students are.

[Anonymous]

studies, not students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

They spent decades telling people that modulars, while not permanent seats, were a suitable learning environment and counted towards capacity when determining whether schools were overcrowded.

It's only when they want to move kids around like widgets for demographic reasons that they do an about-face and assert that getting kids out of modulars - which cost several million to install per modular - is critical. Ask the families at schools with modulars if they want to be redistricted. The answer generally will be no.

The hypocrisy in FCPS never stops.

This!

In 2008, the South Lakes boundary study was "based" on the fact that all FCPS high schools should have 2000 students (or no more). They had JUST completed expanding capacity at Westfield to 3000 and had to find a way to justify moving them out to South Lakes. That boundary study was run by South Lakes PTSA which wanted more affluent demographics. They got it at Westfield's expense.

And, of course, this "2000-student ideal" was then promptly ignored at too many high schools to count (when FCPS subsequently expanded them), including South Lakes itself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a parent of school aged kids and support boundary changes. Because I have looked at a map and seen all the ridiculous lines that create inefficiencies and waste money.

Your kids must be early on in their school career. No parent of a high schooler or 8th grader wants their kid moved in the middle of high school. Kids don’t do as well academically their first year after a move.

“ Prior work indicates that children do worse in the year of a school move, but has been largely unsuccessful in isolating the causal effects of mobility. ”

https://direct.mit.edu/edfp/article/12/4/419/10279/Moving-Matters-The-Causal-Effect-of-Moving-Schools

There is enough data about this that the school board should know. This is from MIT, not the UAE like their students are.

I’m sure she’s also hoping for a better school for her kids. Or that higher SES kids will be brought to her school district to save it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a parent of school aged kids and support boundary changes. Because I have looked at a map and seen all the ridiculous lines that create inefficiencies and waste money.

Your kids must be early on in their school career. No parent of a high schooler or 8th grader wants their kid moved in the middle of high school. Kids don’t do as well academically their first year after a move.

“ Prior work indicates that children do worse in the year of a school move, but has been largely unsuccessful in isolating the causal effects of mobility. ”

https://direct.mit.edu/edfp/article/12/4/419/10279/Moving-Matters-The-Causal-Effect-of-Moving-Schools

There is enough data about this that the school board should know. This is from MIT, not the UAE like their students are.

And, while I haven't looked at the study, I assume the kids are moving to "settled" schools--not schools that will necessarily have large changes in staffing like will be required in the Fcps shift.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Get rid of IB and put AP at every school or these boundary changes are pointless

This was brought up during our breakout group session of the virtual boundary review meeting. When the groups read their top responses to the boundary changes, not a single group was pro-boundary change.

They asked for what benefits could come out of the boundary review process. We responded with “ or changing the boundaries”. Only negatives were brought up.

These review meetings are a sham, if they were taking parents input into consideration they wouldn’t be doing a county wide boundary adjustment.

I pointed out that many of the under enrolled high schools are because of students leaving IB schools for AP schools. They need to look at why schools are overcrowded. Some middle schools are very overcrowded due to being AAP center schools. FCPS could solve 99% of their boundary “problems” by looking at the programs offered at schools that are over/under populated.

+1000. This work should have occurred before they even broached the idea of a county-wide review. People like Rachna Sizemore-Heizer, Ilryong Moon, and Kyle McDaniel who pushed ahead with revisions to Policy 8130 so this study could commence had their priorities completely wrong and are laying the foundation for chaos and considerable unrest down the road. Just because they were too lazy to do the hard work doesn't mean it shouldn't have taken place first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no one is moving in to Woodson without significant numbers moving out first. FCPS’s own projections show only Woodson and WSHS significantly over capacity in the 5 year projections (which obviously are sus but that’s what they’re going by). Isn’t Mantua ES basically right across the street from Woodson HS though? I can’t see that change happening.

The 5 year projections include modulars. Without modulars, McLean is still at 118%, Marshall at 109%, Chantilly at 112%, and Robinson at 105%. Also, Annandale also goes from 89% to 102% when you take the modular away.

They spent decades telling people that modulars, while not permanent seats, were a suitable learning environment and counted towards capacity when determining whether schools were overcrowded.

It's only when they want to move kids around like widgets for demographic reasons that they do an about-face and assert that getting kids out of modulars - which cost several million to install per modular - is critical. Ask the families at schools with modulars if they want to be redistricted. The answer generally will be no.

The hypocrisy in FCPS never stops.

Sure, but can we agree that schools like Robinson and Annandale which are close to no longer depending on modulars shouldn’t be marketed as having excess capacity?

Marketed by whom? It would be odd to redistrict kids into schools that already have modulars now, but citing the modulars as a basis to move kids out of schools when the families are perfectly satisfied is pretty damn opportunistic on the part of our two-faced School Board.

But I gather we'll hear more of this from the likes of Mateo Dunne. Not his problem, since we all paid to expand West Potomac to 3000 full-time seats.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no one is moving in to Woodson without significant numbers moving out first. FCPS’s own projections show only Woodson and WSHS significantly over capacity in the 5 year projections (which obviously are sus but that’s what they’re going by). Isn’t Mantua ES basically right across the street from Woodson HS though? I can’t see that change happening.

You could be within four blocks of Oakton HS and zoned for Madison HS.

But isn't that bc all of the City of Vienna needs to be zoned for Madison HS? Just like all of the City of Fairfax is zoned for Fairfax HS? So much like Langley is next door to McLean, Oakton is next door to Madison.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah no one is moving in to Woodson without significant numbers moving out first. FCPS’s own projections show only Woodson and WSHS significantly over capacity in the 5 year projections (which obviously are sus but that’s what they’re going by). Isn’t Mantua ES basically right across the street from Woodson HS though? I can’t see that change happening.

You could be within four blocks of Oakton HS and zoned for Madison HS.

But isn't that bc all of the City of Vienna needs to be zoned for Madison HS? Just like all of the City of Fairfax is zoned for Fairfax HS? So much like Langley is next door to McLean, Oakton is next door to Madison.

Vienna is a town and the entire town is zoned to Madison as a courtesy, not because it has to be. The Vienna Metro station is outside the Town of Vienna and a stones throw to Oakton, but zoned to Madison.

[Anonymous]

The Town of Herndon is zoned for Herndon, yet the school itself is not within the town limits. Neither are all the ES feeders.

[Anonymous]

But isn't that bc all of the City of Vienna needs to be zoned for Madison HS? Just like all of the City of Fairfax is zoned for Fairfax HS? So much like Langley is next door to McLean, Oakton is next door to Madison.

I don't think the same rule applies to Vienna/Madison as Fairfax City/Fairfax High. Fairfax City actually has a school board. I do think all of the Town of Herndon goes to Herndon High, but i don't think it is a rule. Herndon also has Reston kids.