Who said there isn't a North-South divide?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

Meh, can't have it all I guess. It's not ideal, but as long as VPI still got guaranteed spots, I could live with it better than moving Immersion or something there. Right now the majority of students at ATS are from North Arlington, and there are more kids from the PUs closest to the current location. And if I remember correctly, those PUs had similar or higher densities of students than the ones around Nottingham, so I don't think it would be that drastic a change. Again, I don't think Nottingham should become an option school per se, but I understand why it was included as a possibility and I think it is neither the best, nor worst, idea presented.

Again, the only reason Nottingham or Tuckahoe were ever in this mix is because of the overlapping walk zones with Reed, and the boundaries that will have to be drawn if they don't move an option school to that quadrant. I guess we'll see what these boundaries look like and whether or not they are preferable to moving option schools around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

Meh, can't have it all I guess. It's not ideal, but as long as VPI still got guaranteed spots, I could live with it better than moving Immersion or something there. Right now the majority of students at ATS are from North Arlington, and there are more kids from the PUs closest to the current location. And if I remember correctly, those PUs had similar or higher densities of students than the ones around Nottingham, so I don't think it would be that drastic a change. Again, I don't think Nottingham should become an option school per se, but I understand why it was included as a possibility and I think it is neither the best, nor worst, idea presented.

Again, the only reason Nottingham or Tuckahoe were ever in this mix is because of the overlapping walk zones with Reed, and the boundaries that will have to be drawn if they don't move an option school to that quadrant. I guess we'll see what these boundaries look like and whether or not they are preferable to moving option schools around.

And again, what I’m saying is that we could address the excess seats while also potentially helping South Arlington if we went with the staff’s second scenario from round two, put immersion at Barcroft and Carlin Springs, keep ATS where it is, and use up the excess NW seats by sending the Ashlawn boundaries across 50. The only goal achieved by making Nottingham an option site would be making the staff’s job of drawing boundaries easier. It does nothing else to APS, and would create new challenges to replace the old ones (e.g., where are you going to put excess students in the region, which NW would have after Reed if you made one of the other schools option, when Tuckahoe can only take four trailers and McKinley has to load up on six to manage the rest even though it’ll put them at something like 150% of their cafeteria capacity and they’ll have no playground because no one else can take trailers?).

That anyone in the community thought that was a good idea continues to baffle me. The entire NW would get flucked, and no one but the staff would benefit from it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

Meh, can't have it all I guess. It's not ideal, but as long as VPI still got guaranteed spots, I could live with it better than moving Immersion or something there. Right now the majority of students at ATS are from North Arlington, and there are more kids from the PUs closest to the current location. And if I remember correctly, those PUs had similar or higher densities of students than the ones around Nottingham, so I don't think it would be that drastic a change. Again, I don't think Nottingham should become an option school per se, but I understand why it was included as a possibility and I think it is neither the best, nor worst, idea presented.

Again, the only reason Nottingham or Tuckahoe were ever in this mix is because of the overlapping walk zones with Reed, and the boundaries that will have to be drawn if they don't move an option school to that quadrant. I guess we'll see what these boundaries look like and whether or not they are preferable to moving option schools around.

Speaking of Nottingham I recently noticed that it is easily able to accommodate 6+ buses at one time for Summer School. So what is the next excuse?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Yep, 3rd grade is where underperforming schools start to show the problems. Performing schools start to shine.

And, those who send their kids to underperforming schools often do not know any better. I am the PP with the long post on Barcroft. Every single family I know (and there are 8) that have moved from Barcroft or moved schools has said the differences between the new school and Barcroft was light and day. In the classroom, on the playground, everything.

It's quite simple. UMC have had enrichment since the day they were born and continue to get it from peer exposure, summer enrichment, after school activities and PTA funded extras. Poor kids get none of these things; they get winter coats and SOL drilling instead of chess club. Of course there is a difference.

These differences could be mitigated by in school tracking, which would help to keep UMC families and their resources at elementaries with significant share of ED students. After school enrichment would actually be available to poor kids since a critical mass of UMC could sustain it at a place like Randolph or Barcroft.. But for some reason, the admin has decided that tracking is evil, when it fact it is a way to teach children of different abilities under the same roof. So instead we track by income and geography such that poor kids are poorly served in NA schools where they have no peers, and UMC are poorly served by SA schools, where they have no peers and yes, are being held back by the slower pace of instruction. The decision not to track is a major factor in why our schools are so segregated. This is undeniable. UMC parents move to where their kids will have peers to ensure that instruction is aimed at their level. In school tracking would help convince them that can happen at any Arlington elementary, not just the ones north of 50. I'm sick and tired of hearing my kid will be fine. I want my kid to do well and enjoy school, not be "fine".

A personal note:
was tracked into the "dumb" math classes all my life. I have a graduate degree and make a comfortable income. I'm still not great at math but that's what was good for me, and it what was good for my peers, who did have high ability in math. And it didn't seem to adversely affect my life.

Tracking is the answer. Not this bs individualized learning mumbo jumbo.

One problem with tracking as you propose it is what do you do with children who have the academic ability to learn at the pace of the higher track, but have language barriers that mean some classroom time with have to be spent working through that before moving on to the next concept? Or are you proposing segregation by first language so that kids have to be tracked into lower level classes, regardless of academic potential, because English isn’t their first language?

DP. I took the tour at Barcroft and the new principal mentioned tracking. She also said they evaluate children frequently and move them between groups or adjust what their group is learning as needed. Several parents also mentioned tracking. It was made clear that the school was not lumping all English learners together. They recognized that some kids would have more access to English that others.

What does that "tracking" consist of? Just whatever group of kids you work in small groups with, covering the same material other groups of more less able students are covering? Or is it tracking as particles at the classroom level, where the material being taught and the pace of instruction differs? The latter seems like a meaningful difference to me, the former does not.

Tracking already happens to a certain extent in all APS elementary schools from third grade onward. Because policy is to try to give all kids academic peers in their classes, children identified for gifted services will tend to be clustered with other such students to provide those academic peers.

I'm not talking about gifted and not. Most kids aren't, and there is a huge range of ability within that not gifted group. How are the not gifted differentiated?

It was something like 17 groups varying skill levels, with kids moving in between frequently. Not an education expert, but when we took the tour, we did see kids in different groups working on the same topic, presumably with enough of a challenge for each. The principal also talked up her plan to have the kids take 10 books home a night for reading by themselves or with someone else, available in English and Spanish.

After taking the tour, did you decide to enroll your kid at Barcroft?

...we're still going to try for an option school, but it made me feel better if we don't get into one. We can't afford private, so there's that... Don't really understand how the new option lottery works - if you get a seat in one school, you can't wait to see what else you've gotten? And the chances of getting option seat are pretty slim, it seems...

Thanks for being honest. What would you need to see or hear for Barcroft to be equal or preferable to option schools generally? I assume a more integrated school whose focus is not by default and necessity the needs of a poor, ELL supermajority, but tell me if it is something else, I'm honestly curious.

Similar test scores. More balanced student body of SES lines. Engaged parents. I've read about how Hoffman-Boston was turned around and how active the parents at all income levels are. I don't hear about that with Barcroft. I do hear good things, but the test scores don't paint a great picture. If there are successes, there should be a better way to demonstrate them.

Ultimately, we would apply to all the option schools because they are better on paper and we wouldn't pass up the chance to go to a better school.

[Anonymous]

PP is wise to take option if it comes. All the things they tell you at the tour are the same at every other Arlington elementary. Fluid groupings, differentiated instruction, etc. etc. That is all true. But at Barcroft and schools like it there are too many kids in the lower groupings and they require a great deal of attention to even come close to SOL benchmarks. So they WILL proide differentiated work to your non-remedial kids but not with the intensity and same level of attention they would get elsewhere. Look at the high pass rates on SOLs (kids scoring over 500) and compare that across schools. Or ask what percentage of the kids get into the higher math classes in 6th grade and compare.

[Anonymous]

They could have done that without moving ATS to Nottingham. ATS and Campbell stay where they are, in locations that are more accessible to SA families and don't encourage even more 22207 families to apply. Immersion programs go to Carlin Springs and Barcroft. Ashlawn reaches across 50 to pull a bunch of the displaced Carlin Springs and Barcroft units north, helping to improve SES balance while also resolving the issue of excess seats in NW.

How does ATS -> Nottingham improve on that?

I would support Claremont immersion moving to Carlin Springs and Claremont becoming a neighborhood school - that makes perfect sense from every direction. But making both Carlin Springs and Barcroft option schools is a bad idea. CS, Campbell, and Barcroft all being option schools leaves only Randolph as an accessible, walkable neighborhood school in the entire west end of Columbia Pike. That's really not fair. Despite what recent exchanges on this forum have espoused, Barcroft is not the most desperate school in need of a demographic re-balance. Its FRL% has been heading downward - and hopefully will continue to do so with some consistent and strong leadership leading MC families to attend rather than opt out. But breaking up the low-income and very high ELL % community at Carlin Springs would be a very significant step in de-segregating schools.

ATS could move to an allotment-per-school or a seat set-aside admissions policy and relocate to the future Reed site - promises to Westover about a neighborhood school or not. Then Key could move to ATS. That makes the two immersion schools close enough to each other for whatever purported cooperation and collaboration they say would be of use and also locate both programs geographically to draw more Spanish-dominant applicants as well as English-dominant, without crowding out all possibilities for a neighborhood school on the Pike's west end.

Minor quibble - Barcroft farms rate has not meaningfully changed in at least 20 years. It has hovered between 55 and 65 since 2002 and usually is about 59 percent. Same goes for carlin springs (about 80) and Randolph (75). Zero progress at those schools in two decades. You can look up the historical rates using the internet archive. Massive change at Oakridge and Henry (both about 60 percent in 2002, now at 25 and 31 percent respectively. The answer is simple; the county board intervened to prevent gentrification in some districts and not in others, then built additional AH in a limited geographic area. And now we're saying that we're limited in our ability to intervene by drawing boundaries that ameliorate segregation? That's a choice.

Barcroft's FRL rates may not have permanently changed in a meaningful way; but I consider 59% a significant improvement from 65%. And if new, strong, consistent leadership can lure more MC families to come and stay, then that 59% will move further in the right direction. But I agree with you that not drawing boundaries that mitigate segregation is a choice - and, IMO, a bad one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

That's blatantly false and easily disproved looking at the transfer report.
Nottingham has 18 transfers to ATS, Tuckahoe 19, and Discovery 23. Drew has 13, Randolph has 13 Patrick Henry has 17

I'm not sure what your proportionality argument is? Nottingham has 525 students, Tuckahoe 526, Discovery 600. Drew has 570, Randolph 417, Patrick Henry 617.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP is wise to take option if it comes. All the things they tell you at the tour are the same at every other Arlington elementary. Fluid groupings, differentiated instruction, etc. etc. That is all true. But at Barcroft and schools like it there are too many kids in the lower groupings and they require a great deal of attention to even come close to SOL benchmarks. So they WILL proide differentiated work to your non-remedial kids but not with the intensity and same level of attention they would get elsewhere. Look at the high pass rates on SOLs (kids scoring over 500) and compare that across schools. Or ask what percentage of the kids get into the higher math classes in 6th grade and compare.

What I worry about when I tour the choice schools is seeing something that we little chance of having.

I know a high number of kids zoned to Barcroft don't go there, so at least I know it's possible to go somewhere else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

They could have done that without moving ATS to Nottingham. ATS and Campbell stay where they are, in locations that are more accessible to SA families and don't encourage even more 22207 families to apply. Immersion programs go to Carlin Springs and Barcroft. Ashlawn reaches across 50 to pull a bunch of the displaced Carlin Springs and Barcroft units north, helping to improve SES balance while also resolving the issue of excess seats in NW.

How does ATS -> Nottingham improve on that?

I would support Claremont immersion moving to Carlin Springs and Claremont becoming a neighborhood school - that makes perfect sense from every direction. But making both Carlin Springs and Barcroft option schools is a bad idea. CS, Campbell, and Barcroft all being option schools leaves only Randolph as an accessible, walkable neighborhood school in the entire west end of Columbia Pike. That's really not fair. Despite what recent exchanges on this forum have espoused, Barcroft is not the most desperate school in need of a demographic re-balance. Its FRL% has been heading downward - and hopefully will continue to do so with some consistent and strong leadership leading MC families to attend rather than opt out. But breaking up the low-income and very high ELL % community at Carlin Springs would be a very significant step in de-segregating schools.

ATS could move to an allotment-per-school or a seat set-aside admissions policy and relocate to the future Reed site - promises to Westover about a neighborhood school or not. Then Key could move to ATS. That makes the two immersion schools close enough to each other for whatever purported cooperation and collaboration they say would be of use and also locate both programs geographically to draw more Spanish-dominant applicants as well as English-dominant, without crowding out all possibilities for a neighborhood school on the Pike's west end.

Minor quibble - Barcroft farms rate has not meaningfully changed in at least 20 years. It has hovered between 55 and 65 since 2002 and usually is about 59 percent. Same goes for carlin springs (about 80) and Randolph (75). Zero progress at those schools in two decades. You can look up the historical rates using the internet archive. Massive change at Oakridge and Henry (both about 60 percent in 2002, now at 25 and 31 percent respectively. The answer is simple; the county board intervened to prevent gentrification in some districts and not in others, then built additional AH in a limited geographic area. And now we're saying that we're limited in our ability to intervene by drawing boundaries that ameliorate segregation? That's a choice.

Barcroft's FRL rates may not have permanently changed in a meaningful way; but I consider 59% a significant improvement from 65%. And if new, strong, consistent leadership can lure more MC families to come and stay, then that 59% will move further in the right direction. But I agree with you that not drawing boundaries that mitigate segregation is a choice - and, IMO, a bad one.

65% was 12 years ago. On what basis do you consider a 5 percentage point shift from 65 to 60 to be significant? It's plainly not. Aside from a single year blip 2014 when it bumped up to 65 percent, but it snapped right back to where it had been for a decade, 59-61, consistently. There has been no momentum, no shift toward middle class buy-in. Something has to change, and that is moving an immersion school there or creating a third.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The neighborhood around Nottingham has an enormous walk zone. A whole lot more people from that neighborhood will apply to ATS than currently do if it’s a choice between walking to ATS or being bused to Tuckahoe or Discovery. More applications from that area means that even with a random lottery, that neighborhood will get a larger percentage of the ATS seats than they do (Nottingham, Tuckahoe and Discovery currently send proportionally fewer students to ATS than most other APS schools), which would leave fewer seats for South Arlington families.

That's blatantly false and easily disproved looking at the transfer report.
Nottingham has 18 transfers to ATS, Tuckahoe 19, and Discovery 23. Drew has 13, Randolph has 13 Patrick Henry has 17

I'm not sure what your proportionality argument is? Nottingham has 525 students, Tuckahoe 526, Discovery 600. Drew has 570, Randolph 417, Patrick Henry 617.

I said most, not all. You found only three schools with fewer transfers, which pretty much proves my point.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

Do you live in S Arlington? I lived in Fairlington, and my DC went to ATS. if ATS was further north, it would not have been a viable option for us. Immersion wasn't something our family was interested, so I'm not sure what that other strong option would have been. ATS is centrally located and should stay centrally located.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but moving key does benefit south Arlington. Not sure why you would think otherwise.
Immersion would give a leg up to the esl kids in south arlington because they would learn math in spanish. That’s the whole point of immersion. It would bring very affluent north Arlington kids to a south Arlington elementary school because a lot of the kids at key aren’t from its immediate area.
You can’t have it both ways— say you do t want segregated schools but then say that hosting option schools is unfair (especially in the case of immersion that would pull traditionally low performing kids out of the neighborhood school)

Moving Key to ATS doesn't move it south, it moves it west. And moves ATS north, making it less accessible for people in the south. Kind of the opposite of what you say the south needs.

Dp- You haven’t listened to South Arlington posters at all. Not at all.

Then explain it, because clearly I haven't grasped it from reading all of these threads. How will it be better for South Arlington families when lots more Nottingham-area families flock to ATS because it's walking distance and edge out more of the SA families?

There's no geographic preference, so I don't think S Arlington families would be "edged out." They may not apply to that program if they lived very far into South Arlington, but there would be a different strong option for families that would be closer. I don't really care where or if ATS were to move. The main issue should be getting immersion closer to Spanish-speakers, and either Carlin Springs or Barcroft or even ATS would do that (it's closer to Buckingham than Key). I only think the Nottingham stuff came up because of the Reed school and too many seats/overlapping walk zones once it's built. I don't think anyone would be talking about an option school anywhere in that quadrant if it weren't for that one issue.

Do you live in S Arlington? I lived in Fairlington, and my DC went to ATS. if ATS was further north, it would not have been a viable option for us. Immersion wasn't something our family was interested, so I'm not sure what that other strong option would have been. ATS is centrally located and should stay centrally located.

Jeez. Maybe you could have sent Jr to Abingdon?

[Anonymous]

Moving immersion to where there are spanish speakers makes sense. There is no way anyone can dispute that. Right now the biggest poverty pockets are in south Arlington, so moving immersion from key to Carlin springs makes sense. Keep reed and Nottingham and ats where they are.
I know Key is staying put because there is no political will to move it, but moving key to Carlin springs made sense and would have been beneficial for the larger community.
I guess we will see what wacko boundaries they come up with. I’m pretty sure that if you start having scenarios where a large numbers of kids north of 50 are getting put into hb or fleet to make room in long branch (and in the process empty out Taylor), I’m pretty sure there will be widespread revolt.

[Anonymous]

I live in South Arlington, zoned for Drew. My family and all of my gentrifying neighbors so far have choiced out, several to ATS. IMO we should all be forced into our neighborhood schools. Otherwise we're just improving the demographics of the choice schools on the backs of the South Arlington neighborhood schools.