Reply to Making sense of MCPS regional program transportation

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Talked to Adnan Mamoon, Chief Operations Officer (oversees transportation among other things), about this at Blair tonight.

He said that the final plan for how buses will work has not been decided, but that the budget presented to the Board is based on students having to get to their local high school to catch a bus to the program school.

Did the "that's a very good point for us to think about" when the equity issues around that were mentioned, although it was [b]unclear whether he hadn't thought of it or if that is just his standard line when people provide feedback/criticism.[/b][/quote]
It's probably the latter which looks really bad for him, though the former would be even worse.
[/quote]

Either one is bad.  I have had an open mind to the creation of these regional programs, but telling parents of kids who would be entitled to a school bus at their host schools that they need to figure out how to pick up and drop off kids 2x a day at their host high school if they want their kids to attend a regional program is incredibly inequitable.[/quote]

Jeannie Franklin was asked a question about transportation too and said she didn't know/it would be figured out later, and when someone pointed out that the "get yourself to your local high school" model would be deeply inequitable and MCPS should commit to making sure there will be bus stops within reasonable walking distance for all students, she responded with "well, either way, it will be much better than we have now!"

Completely ignoring that: 
1) "It will be better than it is now but still very inequitable" is not an acceptable response to a proposal that is turning the system on its head for the purpose of creating more equity 
2) It will potentially actually be worse than it is now in many cases-- not just for DCC and NEC families who have neighborhood buses to consortium schools, but also most of the existing magnets at least have stops at local elementary or middle schools rather than parents having to drive their kids to the local high school.  While the total travel time may be decreased for some of those kids, telling kids they need to walk to a nearby ES/MS and then take a long bus ride is much more equitable than telling kids they need to find someone to drive them to a faraway HS and then take a shorter bus ride.

She did not seem to have thought any deeper about the equity implications of busing besides "I was told that the regional model will make bus rides shorter and more equitable so it must be true!' [/quote]

UGH. The lack of critical thinking here is mind-boggling. Which is more feasible for a student with 2 working parents who is highly motivated to attend an advanced STEM program:
1. A 35-minute bus ride, with a stop 0.75 mi from his house?
2. A 15-minute bus ride, with a stop 2 miles from their house?[/quote]

And that even understates it, because a 2 mile walk to a bus is at least theoretically walkable for a highly motivated student (but will deter many of them.). But there are a lot of kids WAY further away than that where it's just flat-out impossible to walk to the HS and if you don't have a parent to drive you you're screwed.[/quote]

+1  I thought much of the regional program was histrionics by families who were benefitting from the status quo but if MCPS literally has not thought through busing for the 5 minutes required to realize that there's a major problem in requiring kids who are entitled to buses to their home high school to walk to that high school to get another bus to a regional program, well, then this thing is truly half cooked and the Central Office should be ashamed.[/quote]

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