FCPS Boundary Review Updates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So, your point is for Carson to take Herndon kids? Which ones? If anyone goes to Herndon from Carson, I would think it would be McNair or Coates.

See what FCPS/SB loads into "Mclearen Rd" HS and Carson. After that do it from Herndon MS feeds. Carson capacity matches Herndon but Herndon MS is more in line with the new HS. Unless we are surprised... The point is to have capacity at Herndon MS for minimum 100 plus AAP currently feeding to Hughes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone post the Great Falls parents statement on this? I am not part of their Facebook group.

Community Group Comments on School Board Plan to Acquire a New Western High School

Today, Citizens For Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba responded to action taken last night by the Fairfax County School Board to authorize the $150 million purchase of the now-shuttered King Abdullah Academy in Herndon.

With nine members voting to support the motion and three abstaining, the Fairfax County School Board authorized the acquisition of the King Abdullah Academy. Located in Herndon, the 40-acre site previously housed high school and middle school students for an enrollment of about 800 students. Currently assessed at $117,665,760 by Fairfax County, it is described on the former school’s website as a fully equipped high school complete with state-of-the-art classrooms, labs, indoor and outdoor athletic facilities, as well as an eight-lane Olympic-style, 25-yard competition pool.

According to Halacy and Dacoba, “The timing of this announcement is incredible for several reasons. While the need for more high school capacity in the western area of the county has been under discussion for at least 20 years, due to increased residential development, the school board and administrators have been heavily engaged in the debate surrounding the method and policies involving a revision of school boundaries to address capacity issues, given the differences in enrollments throughout the county. The vote by the school board to acquire a new facility will have a sweeping effect on current planning efforts that have involved a contentious relationship between the administration and the community. This tends to overshadow months of work and meetings by residents who have been participating in the county’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC).”

They added: “Based on the comments at last night’s meeting of the board, some board members consider the purchase price a rare bargain and characterize this as a windfall, given the current cost of land acquisition and construction. It could present opportunities to ease capacity issues and reduce time and effort in the process of addressing needs for the western part of the county. But the decision to proceed with this by the Superintendent and her staff without engagement with the ongoing planning process is a disappointing factor. Even with the cost that has been reported, we agree with the school board members who did not vote for this because of numerous unanswered questions and the lack of transparency surrounding this initiative.

The county recently struggled to achieve a balanced budget, proposing severe cuts to avoid negatively affecting the school system’s budget and other essential county services. So, initiatives like buying a new school are likely to have a significant budget impact going forward. Though we are not surprised that the school administrators undertook this significant financial commitment without full public disclosure and debate, particularly without including such plans in the current discussions with the Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC) community members.

Purchasing a high school by a county public school authority without adequate public disclosure and input from the community that has been involved in this effort for decades is an example of an administratively unsound choice. Just as the School Board’s negotiated its labor agreements that granted a 7% salary increase for their employees without involving the Board of Supervisors (which is the county’s budget authority), taking this action behind closed doors is another striking example of the lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation typical of this school and its administrators.

School board officials and Superintendent Reid should be reminded that they don’t operate in a policy and decision-making vacuum. Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors. We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.

Citizens For Great Falls looks forward to engaging with the community organizations like FairFACTS Matters Foundation and the other organizations across Fairfax County involved in the efforts to
support high-quality education in our community.

It sounds like these people don't understand the difference between the annual budget and the capital budget. And that they don't want teachers to earn a living wage. Really on brand for the type of people I imagine live in Great Falls.

Citizens For Great Falls has been fighting the needed Western high school since the beginning. They are deathly afraid of being rezoned to Herndon and want to fill Herndon with kids from south of the school so that the Forestville ES and Great Falls ES kids don't end up there one day. They are going ballistic now because they didn't get time to organize and tank the whole thing, and now FCPS is getting basically a ready-made school for a price they can't even argue with.

Citizens for Great Falls did not exist until a few months ago, so they clearly weren't fighting a western HS "since the beginning."

New name, same people. Call them Citizens of Great Falls if you choose. We all know. They aren't being sly or subtle, trying to make other arguments like fiscal responsibility or whatever else to not say the quiet part out loud. They are scared to death of ending up at Herndon and will support or obstruct anything necessary to keep it from happening.

Are you sure you want to make that argument?

Part of the reason the Westfield/South Lakes/Chantilly folks are so keen on a school near Carson MS is that it only stands to get poor kids from Coates ES and McNair ES. A "Hutchison HS" near Hutchison ES would have fed from both Hutchison and Coates and that was too many poor kids for y'all.

This is nonsense. A beautiful school property nearly perfectly sited fell into FCPS lap. They would be crazy not to buy it. You are acting like there are dozens of similar properties to choose from. This is a one of a kind property.

And the school is likely going to have the demographics you want. So stop pretending Great Falls parents are the only ones who care about that, you hypocrite.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

A Western high school is any school that largely serves kids living in Western Fairfax. Oakton does, and will continue to, serve many kids in Western Fairfax. The proximity of Madison, Oakton, Woodson, and Fairfax does not allow for any other result.

And, just recently, Oakton was expanded to have a program capacity of 2642 seats. It's below capacity now and projected to be even more under capacity by 2029.

Well , I guess we can ship Fair Lakes kids to Lewis and call that a Western High School.

Look at a map. Oakton is not a Western High school. Just because Great Falls wants their kids to ride a bus for thirty minutes does not mean that everyone wants to do that. And, if you kept up with the local news, you would have read that BOS just approved a huge new residential development just up the street from Oakton.

LADY - read the posts before these. Oakton isn't in Western Fairfax County OBVIOUSLY, but it serves Western Fairfax County families. I'm the person who originally noted that Oakton was recently renovated and has a large capacity, I said that we live in Western Fairfax County and are thrilled that we're zoned to a great school, but the commute to Oakton is a beast. We live much closer to this new location than to Oakton.

Our home to King Abdullah: 3.4 Miles - 5-10 minutes during rush hour
Our home to Oakton: 9.5 Miles - 20-30 minutes during rush hour

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone post the Great Falls parents statement on this? I am not part of their Facebook group.

Community Group Comments on School Board Plan to Acquire a New Western High School

Today, Citizens For Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba responded to action taken last night by the Fairfax County School Board to authorize the $150 million purchase of the now-shuttered King Abdullah Academy in Herndon.

With nine members voting to support the motion and three abstaining, the Fairfax County School Board authorized the acquisition of the King Abdullah Academy. Located in Herndon, the 40-acre site previously housed high school and middle school students for an enrollment of about 800 students. Currently assessed at $117,665,760 by Fairfax County, it is described on the former school’s website as a fully equipped high school complete with state-of-the-art classrooms, labs, indoor and outdoor athletic facilities, as well as an eight-lane Olympic-style, 25-yard competition pool.

According to Halacy and Dacoba, “The timing of this announcement is incredible for several reasons. While the need for more high school capacity in the western area of the county has been under discussion for at least 20 years, due to increased residential development, the school board and administrators have been heavily engaged in the debate surrounding the method and policies involving a revision of school boundaries to address capacity issues, given the differences in enrollments throughout the county. The vote by the school board to acquire a new facility will have a sweeping effect on current planning efforts that have involved a contentious relationship between the administration and the community. This tends to overshadow months of work and meetings by residents who have been participating in the county’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC).”

They added: “Based on the comments at last night’s meeting of the board, some board members consider the purchase price a rare bargain and characterize this as a windfall, given the current cost of land acquisition and construction. It could present opportunities to ease capacity issues and reduce time and effort in the process of addressing needs for the western part of the county. But the decision to proceed with this by the Superintendent and her staff without engagement with the ongoing planning process is a disappointing factor. Even with the cost that has been reported, we agree with the school board members who did not vote for this because of numerous unanswered questions and the lack of transparency surrounding this initiative.

The county recently struggled to achieve a balanced budget, proposing severe cuts to avoid negatively affecting the school system’s budget and other essential county services. So, initiatives like buying a new school are likely to have a significant budget impact going forward. Though we are not surprised that the school administrators undertook this significant financial commitment without full public disclosure and debate, particularly without including such plans in the current discussions with the Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC) community members.

Purchasing a high school by a county public school authority without adequate public disclosure and input from the community that has been involved in this effort for decades is an example of an administratively unsound choice. Just as the School Board’s negotiated its labor agreements that granted a 7% salary increase for their employees without involving the Board of Supervisors (which is the county’s budget authority), taking this action behind closed doors is another striking example of the lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation typical of this school and its administrators.

School board officials and Superintendent Reid should be reminded that they don’t operate in a policy and decision-making vacuum. Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors. We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.

Citizens For Great Falls looks forward to engaging with the community organizations like FairFACTS Matters Foundation and the other organizations across Fairfax County involved in the efforts to
support high-quality education in our community.

It sounds like these people don't understand the difference between the annual budget and the capital budget. And that they don't want teachers to earn a living wage. Really on brand for the type of people I imagine live in Great Falls.

Citizens For Great Falls has been fighting the needed Western high school since the beginning. They are deathly afraid of being rezoned to Herndon and want to fill Herndon with kids from south of the school so that the Forestville ES and Great Falls ES kids don't end up there one day. They are going ballistic now because they didn't get time to organize and tank the whole thing, and now FCPS is getting basically a ready-made school for a price they can't even argue with.

Citizens for Great Falls did not exist until a few months ago, so they clearly weren't fighting a western HS "since the beginning."

New name, same people. Call them Citizens of Great Falls if you choose. We all know. They aren't being sly or subtle, trying to make other arguments like fiscal responsibility or whatever else to not say the quiet part out loud. They are scared to death of ending up at Herndon and will support or obstruct anything necessary to keep it from happening.

I just can't respect an organization that chose to bring in the teacher raises into this argument. Totally unrelated and overall a GOOD thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone post the Great Falls parents statement on this? I am not part of their Facebook group.

Community Group Comments on School Board Plan to Acquire a New Western High School

Today, Citizens For Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba responded to action taken last night by the Fairfax County School Board to authorize the $150 million purchase of the now-shuttered King Abdullah Academy in Herndon.

With nine members voting to support the motion and three abstaining, the Fairfax County School Board authorized the acquisition of the King Abdullah Academy. Located in Herndon, the 40-acre site previously housed high school and middle school students for an enrollment of about 800 students. Currently assessed at $117,665,760 by Fairfax County, it is described on the former school’s website as a fully equipped high school complete with state-of-the-art classrooms, labs, indoor and outdoor athletic facilities, as well as an eight-lane Olympic-style, 25-yard competition pool.

According to Halacy and Dacoba, “The timing of this announcement is incredible for several reasons. While the need for more high school capacity in the western area of the county has been under discussion for at least 20 years, due to increased residential development, the school board and administrators have been heavily engaged in the debate surrounding the method and policies involving a revision of school boundaries to address capacity issues, given the differences in enrollments throughout the county. The vote by the school board to acquire a new facility will have a sweeping effect on current planning efforts that have involved a contentious relationship between the administration and the community. This tends to overshadow months of work and meetings by residents who have been participating in the county’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC).”

They added: “Based on the comments at last night’s meeting of the board, some board members consider the purchase price a rare bargain and characterize this as a windfall, given the current cost of land acquisition and construction. It could present opportunities to ease capacity issues and reduce time and effort in the process of addressing needs for the western part of the county. But the decision to proceed with this by the Superintendent and her staff without engagement with the ongoing planning process is a disappointing factor. Even with the cost that has been reported, we agree with the school board members who did not vote for this because of numerous unanswered questions and the lack of transparency surrounding this initiative.

The county recently struggled to achieve a balanced budget, proposing severe cuts to avoid negatively affecting the school system’s budget and other essential county services. So, initiatives like buying a new school are likely to have a significant budget impact going forward. Though we are not surprised that the school administrators undertook this significant financial commitment without full public disclosure and debate, particularly without including such plans in the current discussions with the Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC) community members.

Purchasing a high school by a county public school authority without adequate public disclosure and input from the community that has been involved in this effort for decades is an example of an administratively unsound choice. Just as the School Board’s negotiated its labor agreements that granted a 7% salary increase for their employees without involving the Board of Supervisors (which is the county’s budget authority), taking this action behind closed doors is another striking example of the lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation typical of this school and its administrators.

School board officials and Superintendent Reid should be reminded that they don’t operate in a policy and decision-making vacuum. Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors. We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.

Citizens For Great Falls looks forward to engaging with the community organizations like FairFACTS Matters Foundation and the other organizations across Fairfax County involved in the efforts to
support high-quality education in our community.

It sounds like these people don't understand the difference between the annual budget and the capital budget. And that they don't want teachers to earn a living wage. Really on brand for the type of people I imagine live in Great Falls.

Citizens For Great Falls has been fighting the needed Western high school since the beginning. They are deathly afraid of being rezoned to Herndon and want to fill Herndon with kids from south of the school so that the Forestville ES and Great Falls ES kids don't end up there one day. They are going ballistic now because they didn't get time to organize and tank the whole thing, and now FCPS is getting basically a ready-made school for a price they can't even argue with.

Citizens for Great Falls did not exist until a few months ago, so they clearly weren't fighting a western HS "since the beginning."

New name, same people. Call them Citizens of Great Falls if you choose. We all know. They aren't being sly or subtle, trying to make other arguments like fiscal responsibility or whatever else to not say the quiet part out loud. They are scared to death of ending up at Herndon and will support or obstruct anything necessary to keep it from happening.

I just can't respect an organization that chose to bring in the teacher raises into this argument. Totally unrelated and overall a GOOD thing.

I'll play devil's advocate and disagree that it's unrelated.

The issue they are raising with respect to the teacher raises isn't that the raises weren't deserved. It's that FCPS/School Board negotiated raises for FCPS employees without coordinating with the Board of Supervisors. The negotiated raises (7%) were unrealistic from the inception because there was no scenario where the BOS was going to provide FCPS with a large enough transfer to fund them. So people had to go back and renegotiate the raises. It was a bad process that created confusion among FCPS staff and acrimony between FCPS and the Board of Supervisors.

The KAA acquisition is somewhat similar in that it came out of the blue and it's unclear whether FCPS coordinated with anyone in advance. Will the BOS look favorably on FCPS adding surplus HS capacity in a part of the county that isn't even expected to see the most growth? Has FCPS come up with any reasonable estimate of what incremental costs it will incur to make KAA a suitable school for FCPS students, or the annual operating costs thereafter? And, as noted before, what are the implications for the ongoing boundary review and other capital projects?

FCPS hasn't shared that information, so it's possible that it doesn't know yet, or it's possible that it has some idea but chooses not to share that information yet. Either way, it's going to be another messy process (and the boundary review was already messy enough). Several School Board members were concerned enough about the lack of clarity that they abstained from the vote to acquire the property, and they are members who've tended to care the most about FCPS's governance processes (Meren, Moon, and Sizemore Heizer).

You can care about how FCPS goes about doing business, and object to the continued lack of transparency and blatant inconsistencies in their decision-making without being against either teachers or raises for teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone post the Great Falls parents statement on this? I am not part of their Facebook group.

Community Group Comments on School Board Plan to Acquire a New Western High School

Today, Citizens For Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba responded to action taken last night by the Fairfax County School Board to authorize the $150 million purchase of the now-shuttered King Abdullah Academy in Herndon.

With nine members voting to support the motion and three abstaining, the Fairfax County School Board authorized the acquisition of the King Abdullah Academy. Located in Herndon, the 40-acre site previously housed high school and middle school students for an enrollment of about 800 students. Currently assessed at $117,665,760 by Fairfax County, it is described on the former school’s website as a fully equipped high school complete with state-of-the-art classrooms, labs, indoor and outdoor athletic facilities, as well as an eight-lane Olympic-style, 25-yard competition pool.

According to Halacy and Dacoba, “The timing of this announcement is incredible for several reasons. While the need for more high school capacity in the western area of the county has been under discussion for at least 20 years, due to increased residential development, the school board and administrators have been heavily engaged in the debate surrounding the method and policies involving a revision of school boundaries to address capacity issues, given the differences in enrollments throughout the county. The vote by the school board to acquire a new facility will have a sweeping effect on current planning efforts that have involved a contentious relationship between the administration and the community. This tends to overshadow months of work and meetings by residents who have been participating in the county’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC).”

They added: “Based on the comments at last night’s meeting of the board, some board members consider the purchase price a rare bargain and characterize this as a windfall, given the current cost of land acquisition and construction. It could present opportunities to ease capacity issues and reduce time and effort in the process of addressing needs for the western part of the county. But the decision to proceed with this by the Superintendent and her staff without engagement with the ongoing planning process is a disappointing factor. Even with the cost that has been reported, we agree with the school board members who did not vote for this because of numerous unanswered questions and the lack of transparency surrounding this initiative.

The county recently struggled to achieve a balanced budget, proposing severe cuts to avoid negatively affecting the school system’s budget and other essential county services. So, initiatives like buying a new school are likely to have a significant budget impact going forward. Though we are not surprised that the school administrators undertook this significant financial commitment without full public disclosure and debate, particularly without including such plans in the current discussions with the Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC) community members.

Purchasing a high school by a county public school authority without adequate public disclosure and input from the community that has been involved in this effort for decades is an example of an administratively unsound choice. Just as the School Board’s negotiated its labor agreements that granted a 7% salary increase for their employees without involving the Board of Supervisors (which is the county’s budget authority), taking this action behind closed doors is another striking example of the lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation typical of this school and its administrators.

School board officials and Superintendent Reid should be reminded that they don’t operate in a policy and decision-making vacuum. Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors. We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.

Citizens For Great Falls looks forward to engaging with the community organizations like FairFACTS Matters Foundation and the other organizations across Fairfax County involved in the efforts to
support high-quality education in our community.

It sounds like these people don't understand the difference between the annual budget and the capital budget. And that they don't want teachers to earn a living wage. Really on brand for the type of people I imagine live in Great Falls.

Citizens For Great Falls has been fighting the needed Western high school since the beginning. They are deathly afraid of being rezoned to Herndon and want to fill Herndon with kids from south of the school so that the Forestville ES and Great Falls ES kids don't end up there one day. They are going ballistic now because they didn't get time to organize and tank the whole thing, and now FCPS is getting basically a ready-made school for a price they can't even argue with.

Citizens for Great Falls did not exist until a few months ago, so they clearly weren't fighting a western HS "since the beginning."

New name, same people. Call them Citizens of Great Falls if you choose. We all know. They aren't being sly or subtle, trying to make other arguments like fiscal responsibility or whatever else to not say the quiet part out loud. They are scared to death of ending up at Herndon and will support or obstruct anything necessary to keep it from happening.

I just can't respect an organization that chose to bring in the teacher raises into this argument. Totally unrelated and overall a GOOD thing.

I get you dislike great falls with a passion, but the post clearly brought in teacher raises to highlight another example where the school board believes it can operate with impunity. It’s a fair point to highlight it here whether or not you think those raises are appropriate.

You pretending that they said something that they didn’t, destroys what little credibility you have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To me, 6 high schools at 90% capacity is preferable to 5 high schools at 100-105% capacity. Especially if it provides stability to those in the area. I also wouldn't want my kid to go to a HS 30 min away, nor would I want random streets in my neighborhood moved around to fine tune capacity issues at every boundary study. I think it's worth it even if it increases operating costs.

They want the schools to be around 85-95% capacity ideally. Having a few empty classrooms helps when you have a particularly large class - you can use your empty rooms for a few years vs. having to get some trailers. The hallways and cafeteria aren’t as crowded, and neither are the parking lots at the HS where you also have to factor in student parking.

We have a middle-high school imbalance in that area. Carson currently sends its neighborhood students to, I think, 3 HS? Plus the AAP center kids as well. If you could assign each MS in the region to a HS I think families would be a lot happier and feel more stable. or at least get the middle schools down to a roughly even two way split if “one middle, one HS” wasn’t feasible.

They should be looking at western Fairfax high schols - Chantilly, Westfield, South Lakes, Oakton, Centreville, and Herndon - collectively.

Currently these schools have a program capacity of 15,148. That excludes the modular at Chantilly and the planned expansion of Centreville. Current enrollment is 15,186. FCPS projects that enrollment will decline to 14,213 students by 2029-30.

Add a new school with a program capacity of 2200 seats and you end up with 17,348 seats and overall capacity utilization under 82%. If you include the Chantilly modular or any expansion of Centreville that number goes down further.

County residents deserve a clear explanation as to why, given these facts, FCPS is going ahead with the purchase of a building for an additional high school in the area. And if this is their plan for western Fairfax, what does it mean for others? Will they use the purported savings to accelerate additions at other schools? Will they just shift kids to schools to schools further west?

You can argue that FCPS's enrollment forecasts are flawed because they don't adequately take into account potential development until a developer has broken ground. But if that's the case, they should be refining their forecasting methodology, not shooting blind and selectively expanding capacity in an area that currently is projected to have a capacity surplus in anticipation of future development they've made no real effort to analyze.

Just take a look at the Wesfield pyramid new development potential student yield. I don’t think that number is included in FCPS CAP
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/08eca5b417f94ca09dc6c384db28c764

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone post the Great Falls parents statement on this? I am not part of their Facebook group.

Community Group Comments on School Board Plan to Acquire a New Western High School

Today, Citizens For Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba responded to action taken last night by the Fairfax County School Board to authorize the $150 million purchase of the now-shuttered King Abdullah Academy in Herndon.

With nine members voting to support the motion and three abstaining, the Fairfax County School Board authorized the acquisition of the King Abdullah Academy. Located in Herndon, the 40-acre site previously housed high school and middle school students for an enrollment of about 800 students. Currently assessed at $117,665,760 by Fairfax County, it is described on the former school’s website as a fully equipped high school complete with state-of-the-art classrooms, labs, indoor and outdoor athletic facilities, as well as an eight-lane Olympic-style, 25-yard competition pool.

According to Halacy and Dacoba, “The timing of this announcement is incredible for several reasons. While the need for more high school capacity in the western area of the county has been under discussion for at least 20 years, due to increased residential development, the school board and administrators have been heavily engaged in the debate surrounding the method and policies involving a revision of school boundaries to address capacity issues, given the differences in enrollments throughout the county. The vote by the school board to acquire a new facility will have a sweeping effect on current planning efforts that have involved a contentious relationship between the administration and the community. This tends to overshadow months of work and meetings by residents who have been participating in the county’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC).”

They added: “Based on the comments at last night’s meeting of the board, some board members consider the purchase price a rare bargain and characterize this as a windfall, given the current cost of land acquisition and construction. It could present opportunities to ease capacity issues and reduce time and effort in the process of addressing needs for the western part of the county. But the decision to proceed with this by the Superintendent and her staff without engagement with the ongoing planning process is a disappointing factor. Even with the cost that has been reported, we agree with the school board members who did not vote for this because of numerous unanswered questions and the lack of transparency surrounding this initiative.

The county recently struggled to achieve a balanced budget, proposing severe cuts to avoid negatively affecting the school system’s budget and other essential county services. So, initiatives like buying a new school are likely to have a significant budget impact going forward. Though we are not surprised that the school administrators undertook this significant financial commitment without full public disclosure and debate, particularly without including such plans in the current discussions with the Boundary Review Advisory Committee (BRAC) community members.

Purchasing a high school by a county public school authority without adequate public disclosure and input from the community that has been involved in this effort for decades is an example of an administratively unsound choice. Just as the School Board’s negotiated its labor agreements that granted a 7% salary increase for their employees without involving the Board of Supervisors (which is the county’s budget authority), taking this action behind closed doors is another striking example of the lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation typical of this school and its administrators.

School board officials and Superintendent Reid should be reminded that they don’t operate in a policy and decision-making vacuum. Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors. We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.

Citizens For Great Falls looks forward to engaging with the community organizations like FairFACTS Matters Foundation and the other organizations across Fairfax County involved in the efforts to
support high-quality education in our community.

It sounds like these people don't understand the difference between the annual budget and the capital budget. And that they don't want teachers to earn a living wage. Really on brand for the type of people I imagine live in Great Falls.

Citizens For Great Falls has been fighting the needed Western high school since the beginning. They are deathly afraid of being rezoned to Herndon and want to fill Herndon with kids from south of the school so that the Forestville ES and Great Falls ES kids don't end up there one day. They are going ballistic now because they didn't get time to organize and tank the whole thing, and now FCPS is getting basically a ready-made school for a price they can't even argue with.

Citizens for Great Falls did not exist until a few months ago, so they clearly weren't fighting a western HS "since the beginning."

New name, same people. Call them Citizens of Great Falls if you choose. We all know. They aren't being sly or subtle, trying to make other arguments like fiscal responsibility or whatever else to not say the quiet part out loud. They are scared to death of ending up at Herndon and will support or obstruct anything necessary to keep it from happening.

Are you sure you want to make that argument?

Part of the reason the Westfield/South Lakes/Chantilly folks are so keen on a school near Carson MS is that it only stands to get poor kids from Coates ES and McNair ES. A "Hutchison HS" near Hutchison ES would have fed from both Hutchison and Coates and that was too many poor kids for y'all.

This is nonsense. A beautiful school property nearly perfectly sited fell into FCPS lap. They would be crazy not to buy it. You are acting like there are dozens of similar properties to choose from. This is a one of a kind property.

And the school is likely going to have the demographics you want. So stop pretending Great Falls parents are the only ones who care about that, you hypocrite.

You have a bizarre attitude problem. We are zone to Westfield--not exactly lily white and wealthy---and are unlikely to be rezoned but i would happily send my kids to a
Smaller, brand new school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To me, 6 high schools at 90% capacity is preferable to 5 high schools at 100-105% capacity. Especially if it provides stability to those in the area. I also wouldn't want my kid to go to a HS 30 min away, nor would I want random streets in my neighborhood moved around to fine tune capacity issues at every boundary study. I think it's worth it even if it increases operating costs.

They want the schools to be around 85-95% capacity ideally. Having a few empty classrooms helps when you have a particularly large class - you can use your empty rooms for a few years vs. having to get some trailers. The hallways and cafeteria aren’t as crowded, and neither are the parking lots at the HS where you also have to factor in student parking.

We have a middle-high school imbalance in that area. Carson currently sends its neighborhood students to, I think, 3 HS? Plus the AAP center kids as well. If you could assign each MS in the region to a HS I think families would be a lot happier and feel more stable. or at least get the middle schools down to a roughly even two way split if “one middle, one HS” wasn’t feasible.

They should be looking at western Fairfax high schols - Chantilly, Westfield, South Lakes, Oakton, Centreville, and Herndon - collectively.

Currently these schools have a program capacity of 15,148. That excludes the modular at Chantilly and the planned expansion of Centreville. Current enrollment is 15,186. FCPS projects that enrollment will decline to 14,213 students by 2029-30.

Add a new school with a program capacity of 2200 seats and you end up with 17,348 seats and overall capacity utilization under 82%. If you include the Chantilly modular or any expansion of Centreville that number goes down further.

County residents deserve a clear explanation as to why, given these facts, FCPS is going ahead with the purchase of a building for an additional high school in the area. And if this is their plan for western Fairfax, what does it mean for others? Will they use the purported savings to accelerate additions at other schools? Will they just shift kids to schools to schools further west?

You can argue that FCPS's enrollment forecasts are flawed because they don't adequately take into account potential development until a developer has broken ground. But if that's the case, they should be refining their forecasting methodology, not shooting blind and selectively expanding capacity in an area that currently is projected to have a capacity surplus in anticipation of future development they've made no real effort to analyze.

Just take a look at the Wesfield pyramid new development potential student yield. I don’t think that number is included in FCPS CAP
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/08eca5b417f94ca09dc6c384db28c764

If you’re going to add capacity based on the potential student yields shown in that tool, expanding Marshall and McLean should be the top priorities.

In any event, even if that growth at Westfield did materialize it shares a border with a school with hundreds of vacant seats that we’ve already paid for.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To me, 6 high schools at 90% capacity is preferable to 5 high schools at 100-105% capacity. Especially if it provides stability to those in the area. I also wouldn't want my kid to go to a HS 30 min away, nor would I want random streets in my neighborhood moved around to fine tune capacity issues at every boundary study. I think it's worth it even if it increases operating costs.

They want the schools to be around 85-95% capacity ideally. Having a few empty classrooms helps when you have a particularly large class - you can use your empty rooms for a few years vs. having to get some trailers. The hallways and cafeteria aren’t as crowded, and neither are the parking lots at the HS where you also have to factor in student parking.

We have a middle-high school imbalance in that area. Carson currently sends its neighborhood students to, I think, 3 HS? Plus the AAP center kids as well. If you could assign each MS in the region to a HS I think families would be a lot happier and feel more stable. or at least get the middle schools down to a roughly even two way split if “one middle, one HS” wasn’t feasible.

They should be looking at western Fairfax high schols - Chantilly, Westfield, South Lakes, Oakton, Centreville, and Herndon - collectively.

Currently these schools have a program capacity of 15,148. That excludes the modular at Chantilly and the planned expansion of Centreville. Current enrollment is 15,186. FCPS projects that enrollment will decline to 14,213 students by 2029-30.

Add a new school with a program capacity of 2200 seats and you end up with 17,348 seats and overall capacity utilization under 82%. If you include the Chantilly modular or any expansion of Centreville that number goes down further.

County residents deserve a clear explanation as to why, given these facts, FCPS is going ahead with the purchase of a building for an additional high school in the area. And if this is their plan for western Fairfax, what does it mean for others? Will they use the purported savings to accelerate additions at other schools? Will they just shift kids to schools to schools further west?

You can argue that FCPS's enrollment forecasts are flawed because they don't adequately take into account potential development until a developer has broken ground. But if that's the case, they should be refining their forecasting methodology, not shooting blind and selectively expanding capacity in an area that currently is projected to have a capacity surplus in anticipation of future development they've made no real effort to analyze.

Just take a look at the Wesfield pyramid new development potential student yield. I don’t think that number is included in FCPS CAP
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/08eca5b417f94ca09dc6c384db28c764

If you’re going to add capacity based on the potential student yields shown in that tool, expanding Marshall and McLean should be the top priorities.

In any event, even if that growth at Westfield did materialize it shares a border with a school with hundreds of vacant seats that we’ve already paid for.

Careful what you wish for. We could make a lot of space available to McLean right now by filling those Herndon seats with Forestville and Great Falls and shifting more of McLean to Langley.

[Anonymous]

New to this thread but finally finished catching up. Kids will possibly be affected by KAA purchase. We are new to FCPS coming from a Yankee state.

It’s obvious on first glance the fcps districts are gerrymandered to hell. It’s flagrant. And after a bit of Google mapping and Zillow research to understand the last few pages and get a sense of who is where, I can only conclude the Great Falls families are shameless and will do and say anything to avoid their kids going to Herndon even if it means sabotaging other communities and the district itself! Extremely antisocial behavior.

Especially Forestville ES, some of these houses are literally walking/biking distance to Herndon HS. It’s egregious.

The idea that those south of 267 and up to double the distance away from Herndon as compared to Forestville families, should have to go to Herndon, and the county shouldn’t buy KAA, so their precious little urchins don’t have to go to a school with what I can only conclude the GF families consider the have-nots, is a complete farce.

Why should you 2.2 miles away from your nearest high school be going to one that is what, 8-9+ miles away and thinking those families 4-5 miles away go to a school essentially next to your house across insane traffic?

Nonsensical ideas about creating high schools that don’t make sense in Hutchison (per the other poster, that would be a traffic nightmare - though RCMS is too) when KAA is a best case solution for those between Herndon and Westfield are so transparent it is painful to read.

I’m surprised precincts that went so (D) this last election wouldn’t be jumping at the chance to embrace diversity and have their kids attend a school with so many immigrant families, lord knows how many of these wackos were out yesterday with their very clever No Kings No ICE signs.

[Anonymous]

All I have to say at this point is that scenarios like the KAA school are why the previous boundary policy was better than the current one. We should look at boundaries when you NEED to and when the communities call for it, not just cause the calendar says so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New to this thread but finally finished catching up. Kids will possibly be affected by KAA purchase. We are new to FCPS coming from a Yankee state.

It’s obvious on first glance the fcps districts are gerrymandered to hell. It’s flagrant. And after a bit of Google mapping and Zillow research to understand the last few pages and get a sense of who is where, I can only conclude the Great Falls families are shameless and will do and say anything to avoid their kids going to Herndon even if it means sabotaging other communities and the district itself! Extremely antisocial behavior.

Especially Forestville ES, some of these houses are literally walking/biking distance to Herndon HS. It’s egregious.

The idea that those south of 267 and up to double the distance away from Herndon as compared to Forestville families, should have to go to Herndon, and the county shouldn’t buy KAA, so their precious little urchins don’t have to go to a school with what I can only conclude the GF families consider the have-nots, is a complete farce.

Why should you 2.2 miles away from your nearest high school be going to one that is what, 8-9+ miles away and thinking those families 4-5 miles away go to a school essentially next to your house across insane traffic?

Nonsensical ideas about creating high schools that don’t make sense in Hutchison (per the other poster, that would be a traffic nightmare - though RCMS is too) when KAA is a best case solution for those between Herndon and Westfield are so transparent it is painful to read.

I’m surprised precincts that went so (D) this last election wouldn’t be jumping at the chance to embrace diversity and have their kids attend a school with so many immigrant families, lord knows how many of these wackos were out yesterday with their very clever No Kings No ICE signs.

Did you look at schools and buy your house accordingly when you moved from your yankee state? So did the great falls family. Welcome to FCPS no one wants to move to move except one guy who lives in falls church and wants his kid in Oakton. Now that you’ve read this thread read all community comments from phases 1 and 2. No one wants changes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New to this thread but finally finished catching up. Kids will possibly be affected by KAA purchase. We are new to FCPS coming from a Yankee state.

It’s obvious on first glance the fcps districts are gerrymandered to hell. It’s flagrant. And after a bit of Google mapping and Zillow research to understand the last few pages and get a sense of who is where, I can only conclude the Great Falls families are shameless and will do and say anything to avoid their kids going to Herndon even if it means sabotaging other communities and the district itself! Extremely antisocial behavior.

Especially Forestville ES, some of these houses are literally walking/biking distance to Herndon HS. It’s egregious.

The idea that those south of 267 and up to double the distance away from Herndon as compared to Forestville families, should have to go to Herndon, and the county shouldn’t buy KAA, so their precious little urchins don’t have to go to a school with what I can only conclude the GF families consider the have-nots, is a complete farce.

Why should you 2.2 miles away from your nearest high school be going to one that is what, 8-9+ miles away and thinking those families 4-5 miles away go to a school essentially next to your house across insane traffic?

Nonsensical ideas about creating high schools that don’t make sense in Hutchison (per the other poster, that would be a traffic nightmare - though RCMS is too) when KAA is a best case solution for those between Herndon and Westfield are so transparent it is painful to read.

I’m surprised precincts that went so (D) this last election wouldn’t be jumping at the chance to embrace diversity and have their kids attend a school with so many immigrant families, lord knows how many of these wackos were out yesterday with their very clever No Kings No ICE signs.

Listen to the sanctimonious mooch pretending she cares about anything but a bump in her property value off the backs of her neighbors. Welcome, there is another one of you here (if it isn’t you pretending to be new here).

We’ve heard all your tripe before. 🤡

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:New to this thread but finally finished catching up. Kids will possibly be affected by KAA purchase. We are new to FCPS coming from a Yankee state.

It’s obvious on first glance the fcps districts are gerrymandered to hell. It’s flagrant. And after a bit of Google mapping and Zillow research to understand the last few pages and get a sense of who is where, I can only conclude the Great Falls families are shameless and will do and say anything to avoid their kids going to Herndon even if it means sabotaging other communities and the district itself! Extremely antisocial behavior.

Especially Forestville ES, some of these houses are literally walking/biking distance to Herndon HS. It’s egregious.

The idea that those south of 267 and up to double the distance away from Herndon as compared to Forestville families, should have to go to Herndon, and the county shouldn’t buy KAA, so their precious little urchins don’t have to go to a school with what I can only conclude the GF families consider the have-nots, is a complete farce.

Why should you 2.2 miles away from your nearest high school be going to one that is what, 8-9+ miles away and thinking those families 4-5 miles away go to a school essentially next to your house across insane traffic?

Nonsensical ideas about creating high schools that don’t make sense in Hutchison (per the other poster, that would be a traffic nightmare - though RCMS is too) when KAA is a best case solution for those between Herndon and Westfield are so transparent it is painful to read.

I’m surprised precincts that went so (D) this last election wouldn’t be jumping at the chance to embrace diversity and have their kids attend a school with so many immigrant families, lord knows how many of these wackos were out yesterday with their very clever No Kings No ICE signs.

Did you look at schools and buy your house accordingly when you moved from your yankee state? So did the great falls family. Welcome to FCPS no one wants to move to move except one guy who lives in falls church and wants his kid in Oakton. Now that you’ve read this thread read all community comments from phases 1 and 2. No one wants changes

+1. She should look at the feedback from the community meetings over the last year. It’s very clear almost no one wants boundary changes.