Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So after 73 pages...it still seems like it’s a toss up as to whether the move happens.

I’m imagining Jim Carrey in “Dumb and Dumber” saying “so you’re saying there’s a chance!”

Wow, you must be ancient with that movie reference.

Wow, you must be stupid with that observation.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Option schools are nice to have, but anyone who argues they can’t be moved 2 miles while simultaneously advocating for neighborhood zones that are 3 miles wide is a complete hypocrite.

Yep. That’s this thread summarized in two sentences.

Very well put.

Anonymous wrote:Option schools are nice to have, but anyone who argues they can’t be moved 2 miles while simultaneously advocating for neighborhood zones that are 3 miles wide is a complete hypocrite.

Yep. That’s this thread summarized in two sentences.

Option schools are nice to have, but anyone who argues they can’t be moved 2 miles while simultaneously advocating for neighborhood zones that are 3 miles wide is a complete hypocrite.

Anonymous wrote:SB should hear other schools say

We support options schools, but they should not take priority over neighborhood schools, especially when data shows a neighborhood school was needed where Key sits when the revised the options policy, today and in the future.

Let’s not kid ourselves about diversity at option schools being the magic solution to demographics. While they look balanced, the create the imbalance at neighborhood schools, like Carlin Springs, Barcroft, Drew, Randolph (more?). If the can’t move then maybe they should cease to exist.

If more McKinley students can walk to Reed then to can walk to McKinley, common sense demands Reed is a shifted McKinley.

Housing segregation is what causes Barcroft, Randolph, etc, to be high poverty. Barcroft Apartments was built as housing for single adults, and it was until the 1980s when families started crowding into small apartments. Likewise, we now build family oriented subsidized housing in a small geographic area. South Arlington, and the poorest parts of it.

You can run the numbers yourself. If every single student zoned to Randolph went there, with no opt outs, it’s FRL rate would drop less than 10 points. It’d still be 65 percent FRL. Douglas park is a very large SFH neighborhood. But Barcroft Apts is simply enormous. It can’t be balanced. And neither can developments like the Berkeley, or Columbia Hills, a new one of which opens every year. Each such building will produce over 100 high needs kids every year, forever, with no fluctuation based on generational turnover like in every other housing type.

To be blunt, option schools may not be the ideal method for producing demographic diversity, but given this county’s segregated history, it’s unwillingness to use current housing policy to offset it via geographic distribution, and parents resistance to boundary changes and devotion to “walkability” ... option schools are literally the only method left.

Anonymous wrote:SB should hear other schools say

We support options schools, but they should not take priority over neighborhood schools, especially when data shows a neighborhood school was needed where Key sits when the revised the options policy, today and in the future.

Let’s not kid ourselves about diversity at option schools being the magic solution to demographics. While they look balanced, the create the imbalance at neighborhood schools, like Carlin Springs, Barcroft, Drew, Randolph (more?). If the can’t move then maybe they should cease to exist.

If more McKinley students can walk to Reed then to can walk to McKinley, common sense demands Reed is a shifted McKinley.

Option schools do not create the imbalance at the neighborhood schools you mention above. They are “imbalanced” because there’s just that many impoverished kids live in those zones. Take away option schools, those schools would still have massively high FRL. Poor people exist. Sorry if that inconveniences anyone.

It’s like saying option schools are to blame for the wealthiest North Arlington schools having practically no FRL rate.

SB should hear other schools say

We support options schools, but they should not take priority over neighborhood schools, especially when data shows a neighborhood school was needed where Key sits when the revised the options policy, today and in the future.

Let’s not kid ourselves about diversity at option schools being the magic solution to demographics. While they look balanced, the create the imbalance at neighborhood schools, like Carlin Springs, Barcroft, Drew, Randolph (more?). If the can’t move then maybe they should cease to exist.

If more McKinley students can walk to Reed then to can walk to McKinley, common sense demands Reed is a shifted McKinley.

Anonymous wrote:Sad to see the recolonization of Key.

Actually, the ‘natives’ (ie neighborhood) we’re ousted by the colonialists (lottery) in 2017.

This is more akin to the end of an occupation.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The only voices that matter are those of the Board Members. There are Good arguments on both sides. Punt for further analysis!

No, there are not good arguments on both sides. There are logical sound reasons on the staff side, and their are emotion based arguments from the 'no moves' side.

That’s an emotional take.

Anonymous wrote:The only voices that matter are those of the Board Members. There are Good arguments on both sides. Punt for further analysis!

No, there are not good arguments on both sides. There are logical sound reasons on the staff side, and their are emotion based arguments from the 'no moves' side.

Sad to see the recolonization of Key.

The only voices that matter are those of the Board Members. There are Good arguments on both sides. Punt for further analysis!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So after 73 pages...it still seems like it’s a toss up as to whether the move happens.

I’m imagining Jim Carrey in “Dumb and Dumber” saying “so you’re saying there’s a chance!”

Wow, you must be ancient with that movie reference.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^^ Right, but there is a way to not take the Barcroft Apartments or Columbia Hills, or the high rises along the Pike with high housing voucher utilization. It may be a better strategy to balance demographics than trying to move South Fairlington, since the SB already rejected that idea. Ultimately, some Abingdon PUs have to move. I’d prefer they move ones that don’t negatively affect Drew, and that the SB will support.

I just told you, that plan mostly avoided those apartments. People underestimate the poverty there and in green valley. Lots of people living free and clear in homes where grandma paid off the mortgage 30 years ago.

Here’s another data point for you. PU 36030 is the only Columbia Forest Unit without a large apartment complex. It’s mostly SFH and geographically the largest PU in the neighborhood. It also has only 50 students, half which opt out of abindgon. And 15 of the 50 are FRL (30 percent), and it’s probably not the FRL kids opting out so you can be fairly sure that the percentage FRL from that unit is more like 50 percent. And that’s the least impoverished CF PU. Now you see the problem. Even the least poor unit in CF would make things worse at drew, and moving it probably wouldn’t help reduce overcrowding much at Abington anyway. You can find these tables of PU data on the APS website.

Anonymous wrote:So after 73 pages...it still seems like it’s a toss up as to whether the move happens.

I’m imagining Jim Carrey in “Dumb and Dumber” saying “so you’re saying there’s a chance!”