There will be no school all week - Here is why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

[Anonymous]

People will only get angrier as they see Loudoun attending school all week without issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

THIS! There isnt a single house with the sidewalks not shoveled that also doesnt have a driveway shoveled. Not a single one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

THIS! There isnt a single house with the sidewalks not shoveled that also doesnt have a driveway shoveled. Not a single one.

Probably because those people need their driveway and don’t need their sidewalk. It’s not realistic to rely on residents for this. You can say how it should be all you want but it’s just not realistic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

+100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

Stagger times over how many hours?
So half the kids miss half the day?
and when MANY parents don't follow the instructions and just frop off thier kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

Stagger times over how many hours?
So half the kids miss half the day?
and when MANY parents don't follow the instructions and just frop off thier kids?

Fine. Keep your kids home then. The rest of us can take our kids to school. It will help with the traffic if some people bail.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

THIS! There isnt a single house with the sidewalks not shoveled that also doesnt have a driveway shoveled. Not a single one.

Probably because those people need their driveway and don’t need their sidewalk. It’s not realistic to rely on residents for this. You can say how it should be all you want but it’s just not realistic.

I chose not to shovel my sidewalk and my neighbors did the same. Everyone is just walking on top of the snow without issue. We don't need sidewalks cleared.

What I also chose to do last night was submit a complaint with VDOT about the entrance to my neighborhood because there's no way a school bus could turn right without the merge lane being plowed. Right now the plow tracker shows a VDOT plow at that same spot I complained about.

We need to submit targeted complaints about the issues in our own neighborhoods so VDOT can prioritize it. There are a lot of plows in the southern part of the state right now and not very many in NOVA. Get online and tell them what's preventing the buses from getting into your respective neighborhoods.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

You must not have any concept of common sense. Post a schedule of how 1600 students can be dropped off at a school that can barely even handle the NORMAL drop off rate on a regular day?

I'll give you a probable answer. If it takes just 30 seconds for each car to pull in and drop off their kid and the cars were perfectly lined up with no downtime it would take 13 hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

You must not have any concept of common sense. Post a schedule of how 1600 students can be dropped off at a school that can barely even handle the NORMAL drop off rate on a regular day?

I'll give you a probable answer. If it takes just 30 seconds for each car to pull in and drop off their kid and the cars were perfectly lined up with no downtime it would take 13 hours.

You think each car has to do it one at a time? Ha ha. This area is so clownish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't parents drive kids if they can't walk?? It seems my options are to either take off an entire day of work and stay home with my kids, or drive them to school. I think all working parents will choose #2.

I get that school isn't childcare, but schools need to understand that parents have to work.

Longfellow Middle School has almost 1600 kids. Not possible for 1600 cars to be dropping off kids. Now, imagine ALL the schools doing that... Also, not all parents have cars. Fairfax is 405 square miles.

Sure they could. They could stagger the times. That everyone throws their hands up in the air and refuses to educate kids is awful.

You must not have any concept of common sense. Post a schedule of how 1600 students can be dropped off at a school that can barely even handle the NORMAL drop off rate on a regular day?

I'll give you a probable answer. If it takes just 30 seconds for each car to pull in and drop off their kid and the cars were perfectly lined up with no downtime it would take 13 hours.

+1

Longfellow can hardly manage the volume of our K+R as is…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Report from a real live principal:
I sent an email to facilities about remaining ice in our parking lot where kids would exit the bus. Within 30 minutes there were contracted crews here working on it.

I’d like to see if I can get them to take care of the sidewalks of the few houses across the street from the school whose owners chose to do nothing. The sidewalks are untouched sheets of ice. That probably won’t happen which means students won’t be able to safely get to the crossing guard at the crosswalk.

Transportation supervisors are going around and looking at stops. They are working with VDOT to clear them.

We really do want the kids back in school.

But do you understand that you cannot clear all the bus stops in the county in a reasonable amount of time, and that while you do that, kids are missing out on critical instruction? In particular, high schoolers with AP exams in May, who need to work on the entire curriculum before their exam date?

As a Principal, can you push to have virtual learning approved for high schoolers in the future, if we ever get another event that closes schools for more than a week?

Thank you.

LOL my son took five AP classes all but one class was independent reading and learning. Have him read and study. There is not much critical instruction going on in FCPS high schools these days.

This just isn't true for STEM APs. It just isn't. I will grant that it's easier to do for stuff like APUSH, but even then, if kids want a 5 on the exam, they need instruction and practice on formatting their answers to fit the specific College Board requirements.

Just because they need it does not mean they are getting it in FCPS schools. Kids need a lot that they are not getting in FCPS.

[Anonymous]

Why isn’t virtual learning an option. Lots of districts went that route. FCPS collects data at the beginning of every school year regarding WiFi access and laptop availability for each student. Every school should have planned accordingly and encouraged students and staff to take laptops home (like during Covid era). They also could have planned to provide internet as they did during COVID. FCPS does not know how to organize and execute anything at any level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe a neighbor is out of town, or is sick, dealing with cancer, doesn't have a shovel to chop the ice, or elderly (Principal admits it's a sheet of ice), etc. The comment "chose" heavily implies that the neighbors had a choice to clear but didn't because they don't feel like it.

Our neighbor chose to shovel his driveway but not the sidewalk that houses the bus stop. It was a choice. It’s ok to acknowledge that some people are a%*holes.

THIS! There isnt a single house with the sidewalks not shoveled that also doesnt have a driveway shoveled. Not a single one.

Probably because those people need their driveway and don’t need their sidewalk. It’s not realistic to rely on residents for this. You can say how it should be all you want but it’s just not realistic.

I chose not to shovel my sidewalk and my neighbors did the same. Everyone is just walking on top of the snow without issue. We don't need sidewalks cleared.

What I also chose to do last night was submit a complaint with VDOT about the entrance to my neighborhood because there's no way a school bus could turn right without the merge lane being plowed. Right now the plow tracker shows a VDOT plow at that same spot I complained about.

We need to submit targeted complaints about the issues in our own neighborhoods so VDOT can prioritize it. There are a lot of plows in the southern part of the state right now and not very many in NOVA. Get online and tell them what's preventing the buses from getting into your respective neighborhoods.

So you're one of the POS who are too lazy to shovel the sidewalk. Wow. People don't choose to walk on the ice. They have to. People like you are trash and the reason society is so screwed up. My street on Sunday and Monday...EVERYONE was outside shoveling and people helped others with their sidewalks and driveways. Funny enough, the ONLY HOUSE that still does not have their sidewalk shoveled was the ONLY house with half a dozen Trump signs in their lawn a year ago.