Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the summary. I think it does make sense to do one mammoth study. IMO, they should look at all of those clusters for Woodward and Crown together.

Some of the neighborhoods in the Crown cluster are closer to the clusters impacted by Woodward.

There's not going to be enough room at Woodward for RM students too. There's barely enough room for WJ and DCC students.

The whole process of redistributing kids will be interesting. Which students from RM are closest to Woodward? I think it's the southern pieces of Rustin and Twinbrook ESes. The only schools equally close from DCC are the Western portions of Viers Mill and Rock View ESes.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the summary. I think it does make sense to do one mammoth study. IMO, they should look at all of those clusters for Woodward and Crown together.

Some of the neighborhoods in the Crown cluster are closer to the clusters impacted by Woodward.

There's not going to be enough room at Woodward for RM students too. There's barely enough room for WJ and DCC students.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For current 7th graders in WJ cluster, this sounds like a nightmare. If they choose the Apex program, would they be able to complete it if redistricted to Woodward? I realize no one knows the answer to that.

It is not a nightmare. They will account for these sorts of questions in 2026

They will account for these sorts of questions in 2025 if the school is opening in 2026.

Anonymous wrote:

WJ is scheduled to open in August 26. Won’t that be the school year your seventh grader starts their junior year? Doesn’t MCPS allow juniors to stay at their current school?

No. Only seniors.

Not true. For the Clarksburg/Northwest/Seneca Valley study, rising juniors and seniors stayed at their current schools.

WJ is scheduled to open in August 26. Won’t that be the school year your seventh grader starts their junior year? Doesn’t MCPS allow juniors to stay at their current school?

No. Only seniors.

Whatever they decide to do, some will love it and some will hate it. As much as I cannot stand that office (or most of MCPS Central Office), this is a no-win situation for them.

Anonymous wrote:For current 7th graders in WJ cluster, this sounds like a nightmare. If they choose the Apex program, would they be able to complete it if redistricted to Woodward? I realize no one knows the answer to that.

WJ is scheduled to open in August 26. Won’t that be the school year your seventh grader starts their junior year? Doesn’t MCPS allow juniors to stay at their current school?

Anonymous wrote:For current 7th graders in WJ cluster, this sounds like a nightmare. If they choose the Apex program, would they be able to complete it if redistricted to Woodward? I realize no one knows the answer to that.

It is not a nightmare. They will account for these sorts of questions in 2026

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think all Seth can hope for at this point is to establish the scope of the studies. There are a lot of new seats coming online in 2026 and 2027, but all over the County there is a lot of new residential development that could change the numbers significantly in 3 years. It seems too far out to actually do a study.

If the projects are already approved, they're factored in to the projections.

Sort of - they´re factored in in whatever BS numbers the developers have given to avoid paying more to the County vs. being open and populated with students. A development opening is different than being on the drawing board and can generate a significantly higher number of students than projected.

Anonymous wrote:I think all Seth can hope for at this point is to establish the scope of the studies. There are a lot of new seats coming online in 2026 and 2027, but all over the County there is a lot of new residential development that could change the numbers significantly in 3 years. It seems too far out to actually do a study.

If the projects are already approved, they're factored in to the projections.

Anonymous wrote:I think all Seth can hope for at this point is to establish the scope of the studies. There are a lot of new seats coming online in 2026 and 2027, but all over the County there is a lot of new residential development that could change the numbers significantly in 3 years. It seems too far out to actually do a study.

good point, which is why, IMO, doing a massive study across the clusters makes sense.

For current 7th graders in WJ cluster, this sounds like a nightmare. If they choose the Apex program, would they be able to complete it if redistricted to Woodward? I realize no one knows the answer to that.

I think all Seth can hope for at this point is to establish the scope of the studies. There are a lot of new seats coming online in 2026 and 2027, but all over the County there is a lot of new residential development that could change the numbers significantly in 3 years. It seems too far out to actually do a study.

Thanks for the summary. I think it does make sense to do one mammoth study. IMO, they should look at all of those clusters for Woodward and Crown together.

Some of the neighborhoods in the Crown cluster are closer to the clusters impacted by Woodward.

There was a preliminary discussion at the BOE meeting today about planning for the upcoming boundary studies relating to the opening of new Woodward and Crown high schools, and the significant expansions at Northwood and Damascus. They presented two possible timelines for when all three studies could happen.

The scope for the Woodward study could be determined soon, in February/March 2023, with the board's final boundary decisions coming in March 2025. Or, the scope could be determined later, in February/March 2024, with the final decision in November 2025. The school is set to open in August 2026. (The scope would include things like which schools/clusters would be looked at, whether only high schools or also middle schools, etc.)

The Crown study would be one year later in both scenarios, so Feb/Mar 2024 through March 2026, or Feb/Mar 2025 through November 2026, with an August 2027 opening.

The Damascus study would be February/March 2024 through November 2025, with an August 2026 opening.


They also showed a color-coded map of all the clusters currently connected to these projects, consistent with the CIP:
The Damascus project: the Damascus and Clarksburg clusters.
The Crown project: the Northwest, Quince Orchard, Wootton, Richard Montgomery, and Gaithersburg clusters.
The Woodward and Northwood projects: the Walter Johnson, Wheaton, Einstein, Northwood, Kennedy, and Blair clusters.

But they did make the point that in the process of determining the study scopes, they could end up different than the above. And board members also asked about the feasibility of combining all 13 clusters into one mammoth study. No real discussion of if or how that would work. They said they did not know yet how either of the new schools would be populated, with one, two, or three grades starting there the first year.