Reply to Possible new Alexandria City high school boundaries?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][b]I think the single public high school in the City of Alexandria is a really unique benefit to all of the students -- unlike other municipalities in the region, we don't have the housing costs in different areas driving socio-economic segregation in the high school, and that benefits everyone[/b]. So to the degree there is still time to influence any decision, I plan to advocate with my elected representatives that Minnie Howard be rebuilt to be 9/10 (rather than just grade 9, as it is now) and the current King Street campus -- walking distance from Minnie Howard -- be used for 11/12. I've found that it's fairly easy to have an influence on these processes in the City so long as you're paying attention. Everything gets posted on the website, including meeting agendas and dates and times for the schools capital planning task force currently underway, and most meetings are open to the public.  [/quote]

Thanks PP, and fully agreed that one consolidated TC benefits everyone. [b] If an expansion were necessary (which it's not - TC has more square footage per student than most schools in the area)[/b], a 9/10 - 11/12 structure would certainly be the way to go.  While the school board has expressly and repeatedly rejected that, it's clear that Council is no longer as inclined to completely defer to school board as it used to, and contacting Council as well as the task force would probably be beneficial.  
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Let's talk about this highlighted statement. All I have ever heard by the active and past ACPS School Board and now City Council directly disagrees with this bolded statement. TC Williams High School, built by 2007 and advertised as one of the most expensive of high schools in the nation ever ($110M to $130M) does NOT allow building up vertically in 2017 or ever, based on its original architectural short-sighted design. Amazing yes, tax paying Alexandrians? Given the crowding of the High School and future projections, I do not know what you mean by "has more square footage per student than most in the area" as TC Williams is already at capacity. Maybe it does, but sadly (or fiscally not prudently for taxpayers) TW Williams can't be built up further in the present nor in the future. :([/quote]

Not the case.  The gym could be placed in a stand-alone structure and the gym space in the school could be converted into at least fourteen classrooms (the design allowed for this).  That's if it were really necessary. TC Williams has roughly 20% more square feet per student than the average Fairfax high school.  .  At present, during any one class period, more than one in every seven classrooms sits empty.  The only time there is real crowding is class-change passing periods.  Lengthening them by three minutes each solves that completely.  If TC were insufficiently large by objective measures, the school board could have released valid, verifiable statistics showing actual school by school - they haven't and they won't.  They are wedded to a split of TC, which is what their documents promise.  [/quote]

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