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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I totally agree with what you are saying and have said the same thing myself “Good is defined by the socioeconomic status of the students.” That said my son does attend a school with a high FARMS rate and while  I think it is a good school in terms of the education and quality of teachers he has, I also see the drawbacks. Some things I do not like about his school and the high FARMS rates- lack of parental involvement- seems to be the same small group of higher SES parents who do everything, it is impossible to communicate with parents in the class and organize things like gifts for teachers, lack of relationships with kids outside of the classroom (good luck getting any of his school friends to do things like attend a b-day party). Overall I know my son will succeed no matter where he goes because he comes from a home with 2 well educated parents who will supplement his education and push him to succeed, but the social aspect of a high FARMS school does make me a little sad and makes me think more about moving. [/quote]

This gets repeated at the middle and high school level.  Have been in both types of schools. At higher SES schools there will be more activities, more trips, and more parents who will chaperone and lend their time and efforts to things like fundraisers and teacher appreciation days.  All around just a more positive environment than at schools where the teachers and administrators have to do everything and then some.  Don't get me wrong, some of the people at the high FARMS schools are DEDICATED and PHENOMENAL, but they are expected to do so much.   [/quote]

So why not change the boundaries around within a school district, so that every school has a more evenly mixed group? Many of the schools here are either very high FARMS rate or very low. [/quote]

Are you talking about FCPS?  Easier said than done, since there's a concentration of low FARMS schools in the northern and central part of the county and high FARMS schools in the southeastern part of the county.  Unless, of course, you get rid of contiguous school boundaries and just start busing kids around a county where traffic congestion is a major issue.  It might be easier in APS, which also has big differences in FARMS rates among schools, but is also a much smaller jurisdiction.

[/quote]

They already do this to some degree. For example, my neighborhood which is probably considered “middle class” for the DC area (our Gross HHI is $200k) and made up of similar families is split into 4 different elementary schools. Geographically it makes absolutely no sense.  With ¾ of the kids going to the elementary school that is not the closest to home.  All 4 elementary school have about a 40-50% FARMS rate. If they were not to split up our neighborhood I suspect that some of the school could have closer to a 75% FARMS rate. So I assume they split our neighborhood to even things out amongst the schools. [/quote]

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