FCPS comprehensive boundary review

[Anonymous]

Free and reduced meals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

It’s the same story if you removed Hagel Circle out of Halley and sent it to Lorton Station or perhaps Gunston. You 1) make Halley have probably the lowest FARMS in Fairfax County - apart from Hagel Circle it has only NICE, nice neighborhoods in bounds. And you’d make Lorton Station or Gunston or wherever VERY high FARMS. LS is already Title 1, troubled, and being kept afloat by having the AAP center. Gunston is right on the borderline. And 2) It would kill enrollment at Halley. Dunne estimates that 150 kids come from the attendance island. That’s a whole classroom per grade level. So now I have to ask, if we’re consolidating schools to this degree, is closing buildings on the table? What will Halley ES do with only 2 classes per grade level? There’s nowhere really to “get” students from there, it’s on the border with PWC and in bounds for South County which (according to FCPS facility’s own calculations) is trending toward long term under enrollment.

I think when SC’s boundaries were carved mostly out of Hayfield’s back in the day, there was a degree of negotiation about the troubled neighborhoods and where they would go, and Lorton Station/Hayfield ended up with Woods of Fairfax apartments and Halley/South County ended up with Hagel Circle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

It’s the same story if you removed Hagel Circle out of Halley and sent it to Lorton Station or perhaps Gunston. You 1) make Halley have probably the lowest FARMS in Fairfax County - apart from Hagel Circle it has only NICE, nice neighborhoods in bounds. And you’d make Lorton Station or Gunston or wherever VERY high FARMS. LS is already Title 1, troubled, and being kept afloat by having the AAP center. Gunston is right on the borderline. And 2) It would kill enrollment at Halley. Dunne estimates that 150 kids come from the attendance island. That’s a whole classroom per grade level. So now I have to ask, if we’re consolidating schools to this degree, is closing buildings on the table? What will Halley ES do with only 2 classes per grade level? There’s nowhere really to “get” students from there, it’s on the border with PWC and in bounds for South County which (according to FCPS facility’s own calculations) is trending toward long term under enrollment.

I think when SC’s boundaries were carved mostly out of Hayfield’s back in the day, there was a degree of negotiation about the troubled neighborhoods and where they would go, and Lorton Station/Hayfield ended up with Woods of Fairfax apartments and Halley/South County ended up with Hagel Circle.

While physically closer to Lorton Station, there’s no road or path that connects Hagel Circle to Timarand Drive. Gunston Elementary ends up being the shortest route at 1.2-ish miles, rather than the 5+ mile drive to Halley.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

They’ve acknowledged that it does more harm than good to bus these attendance islands across the county in an attempt to balance FARM rates. They want to discourage chronic absenteeism by creating neighborhood schools you can walk to if you miss the bus, and is close enough to attend community events.

Exactly. While the FCPS is all for pushing DEI including more balanced FARM rates, their top priority is accreditation and a big part of that is minimizing chronic absenteeism. FCPS attendance data shows a high correlation between distance and chronic absenteeism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

They’ve acknowledged that it does more harm than good to bus these attendance islands across the county in an attempt to balance FARM rates. They want to discourage chronic absenteeism by creating neighborhood schools you can walk to if you miss the bus, and is close enough to attend community events.

Exactly. While the FCPS is all for pushing DEI including more balanced FARM rates, their top priority is accreditation and a big part of that is minimizing chronic absenteeism. FCPS attendance data shows a high correlation between distance and chronic absenteeism.

Guarantee you there will be some UMC neighborhoods that are assigned to a farther away elementary school because the SB knows that they are at lower risk of chronic absenteeism. The priority will be rebalancing FARM rates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

They’ve acknowledged that it does more harm than good to bus these attendance islands across the county in an attempt to balance FARM rates. They want to discourage chronic absenteeism by creating neighborhood schools you can walk to if you miss the bus, and is close enough to attend community events.

Exactly. While the FCPS is all for pushing DEI including more balanced FARM rates, their top priority is accreditation and a big part of that is minimizing chronic absenteeism. FCPS attendance data shows a high correlation between distance and chronic absenteeism.

Guarantee you there will be some UMC neighborhoods that are assigned to a farther away elementary school because the SB knows that they are at lower risk of chronic absenteeism. The priority will be rebalancing FARM rates.

That’s going to look extremely transparent and won’t pass the smell test, especially after the election. All of the NoVa counties had a slight but noticeable rightward shift. Biden got 70% of Fairfax and Harris only got 65%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

They’ve acknowledged that it does more harm than good to bus these attendance islands across the county in an attempt to balance FARM rates. They want to discourage chronic absenteeism by creating neighborhood schools you can walk to if you miss the bus, and is close enough to attend community events.

Exactly. While the FCPS is all for pushing DEI including more balanced FARM rates, their top priority is accreditation and a big part of that is minimizing chronic absenteeism. FCPS attendance data shows a high correlation between distance and chronic absenteeism.

Guarantee you there will be some UMC neighborhoods that are assigned to a farther away elementary school because the SB knows that they are at lower risk of chronic absenteeism. The priority will be rebalancing FARM rates.

That’s going to look extremely transparent and won’t pass the smell test, especially after the election. All of the NoVa counties had a slight but noticeable rightward shift. Biden got 70% of Fairfax and Harris only got 65%.

School board is doing its part to get vouchers in the state.

Amen!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

It’s the same story if you removed Hagel Circle out of Halley and sent it to Lorton Station or perhaps Gunston. You 1) make Halley have probably the lowest FARMS in Fairfax County - apart from Hagel Circle it has only NICE, nice neighborhoods in bounds. And you’d make Lorton Station or Gunston or wherever VERY high FARMS. LS is already Title 1, troubled, and being kept afloat by having the AAP center. Gunston is right on the borderline. And 2) It would kill enrollment at Halley. Dunne estimates that 150 kids come from the attendance island. That’s a whole classroom per grade level. So now I have to ask, if we’re consolidating schools to this degree, is closing buildings on the table? What will Halley ES do with only 2 classes per grade level? There’s nowhere really to “get” students from there, it’s on the border with PWC and in bounds for South County which (according to FCPS facility’s own calculations) is trending toward long term under enrollment.

I think when SC’s boundaries were carved mostly out of Hayfield’s back in the day, there was a degree of negotiation about the troubled neighborhoods and where they would go, and Lorton Station/Hayfield ended up with Woods of Fairfax apartments and Halley/South County ended up with Hagel Circle.

While physically closer to Lorton Station, there’s no road or path that connects Hagel Circle to Timarand Drive. Gunston Elementary ends up being the shortest route at 1.2-ish miles, rather than the 5+ mile drive to Halley.

Gunston is on the other side of Route 1. It’s faster to get to Lorton Station. A walking path could also be added. But Gunston nor Lorton Station can absorb another 150 kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

The only way to solve the Whitman/Sandburg issue is to build a new school building within the Mount Vernon boundaries. If you swap the schools, Sandburg will still be 100% bused for all the MVHS pyramid students. The building is too far of a walk for anyone who lives within the MVHS boundaries. When my kids were at Whitman, there was definitely a "disconnect" to the school and I think alot of it has to do with its location.

Whitman is where it is located because of a financial decision when Groveton HS and Fort Hunt HS merged to create West Potomac HS. The corresponding middle schools were merged and you had an empty school building. FCPS decided to move Whitman instead of renovate the building it was in (the original Mount Vernon HS on Rt. 1) and rent out the old building. That building is now owned by Fairfax County Government and NOT FCPS. I think that may have happened when Whitman moved back in the 1980s. Personally, I'd love to see Whitman move back to the original MVHS building but that's not going to happen.
https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/publicworks/capital-projects/original-mount-vernon-high-school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up babe, new Mateo Dunne email just dropped. Not going to copy the whole thing here because it’s quite long, but specific situations are called out by name in the Mount Vernon district including the Whitman/Sandburg situation and the Halley attendance island. https://www.fcps.edu/aggregator/sources/19?utm_campaign+=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery#

This is what I found interesting:

"Over 100 students who live within walking distance of Mount Vernon Woods ES are assigned to attend Fort Hunt ES. They ride the bus every day past multiple elementary schools to arrive at Fort Hunt ES."

Removing those kids from Fort Hunt eliminates all of their FARMS students and sends them to a high FARMS school, so I don't see that happening.

I don't see how Whitman/Sandburg is solvable without creating more problems. If you give Sandburg to MVSH and Whitman to WPHS, the the walkable neighborhoods to Sandburg (in the Stratford Landing Boundary, across the street from Waynewood, both separated from MVHS by Ft Hunt) then you move more kids to MVHS than MVHS has capacity for. Moving Hollin Meadows to MVHS so Whitman is in the boundary Creates another island unless you move Stratford Landing as well, but then Sandburg outside of its boundaries

The only way to solve the Whitman/Sandburg issue is to build a new school building within the Mount Vernon boundaries. If you swap the schools, Sandburg will still be 100% bused for all the MVHS pyramid students. The building is too far of a walk for anyone who lives within the MVHS boundaries. When my kids were at Whitman, there was definitely a "disconnect" to the school and I think alot of it has to do with its location.

Whitman is where it is located because of a financial decision when Groveton HS and Fort Hunt HS merged to create West Potomac HS. The corresponding middle schools were merged and you had an empty school building. FCPS decided to move Whitman instead of renovate the building it was in (the original Mount Vernon HS on Rt. 1) and rent out the old building. That building is now owned by Fairfax County Government and NOT FCPS. I think that may have happened when Whitman moved back in the 1980s. Personally, I'd love to see Whitman move back to the original MVHS building but that's not going to happen.
https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/publicworks/capital-projects/original-mount-vernon-high-school

Should have rented the current Whitman site to the Saudis but what happens there is always what's best for the now West Potomac area. That junk even impacted far western Fairfax County - Saudi school went from Dunn Loring to original Mount Vernon then ended up on land zoned for a school mysteriusly next to Carson MS. See the 6/25/19 Board of Supervisors on the bond referendum. Storck didn't like the 3000 count HS and Mckay called the open capacity at Mount Vernon the elephant in the room. Corbett Sanders was running the school board at the time.

All this mess and through most of it we've had 3 at large elected members on the school board.
.

[Anonymous]

Mount Vernon District deserves no more money for facilities for years after unnecessary expansion of West Potomac to 3000 under sleazy Corbett-Sanders. Change your boundaries to get rid of attendance islands if you want but otherwise it should be at the bottom of the next queue.

[Anonymous]

You gotta wonder if Gatehouse is reconsidering their commitment to the boundary review after their party got trounced on Tuesday.

Especially since Hispanics abandoned the party and voters sent a message that they loathe identity politics.

I wonder if the school board and its party will finally start thinking through the implications of its plans to screw over the kids of many of the only remaining plank in the democratic base - educated voters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You gotta wonder if Gatehouse is reconsidering their commitment to the boundary review after their party got trounced on Tuesday.

Especially since Hispanics abandoned the party and voters sent a message that they loathe identity politics.

I wonder if the school board and its party will finally start thinking through the implications of its plans to screw over the kids of many of the only remaining plank in the democratic base - educated voters.

They didn't get trounced in Fairfax. These educated voters deserve the blue policies they voted for. And that includes boundary changes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You gotta wonder if Gatehouse is reconsidering their commitment to the boundary review after their party got trounced on Tuesday.

Especially since Hispanics abandoned the party and voters sent a message that they loathe identity politics.

I wonder if the school board and its party will finally start thinking through the implications of its plans to screw over the kids of many of the only remaining plank in the democratic base - educated voters.

They didn't get trounced in Fairfax. These educated voters deserve the blue policies they voted for. And that includes boundary changes.

I think it is foolish to continue to hold onto these ideals. If the deportations and firing of federal employees and removal of teacher tenure and addition of merit pay for teachers come to pass, FCPS is in for a world of hurt and should do its best to maintain stability wherever they can.

[Anonymous]

I should say keep the ideals but don’t implement policy on them without significant buy in from parents. Which they don’t have. Fed employees will want to stay in the area if they can keep their kids in their schools, but if change is happening anyway it will be much much easier to leave.