Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 22:18     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:FCPS says that the cost of reducing the elementary class size formula by just .5 student (from 26.75 to 26.25) would be $7.0 million. See page 14 of the attached.

http://www.boarddocs.com/vsba/fairfax/Board.nsf/files/9T8AWB70B1D4/$file/FY2016Responses%20for%20Posting1-28-15.pdf

I imagine this group is not proposing a tax increase, so the funds for this proposal will have to be cut from somewhere else in the budget. Do they actually identify where the money would come from, or is this just a political "we should get more without having to make any hard decisions" deal?


7.0M out of a budget of 3.8 Billion.

If they found 2% worth of waste/fraud/abuse in the budget they could reduce the class size to 21.25 ((3,800,000,000*.02)=(76M/7.0M) =~11*.5) = class size of ~21.25)

....but they are not looking very hard

We don't need more taxes. They just need to spend the money they have wisely.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 21:56     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Many years ago –when Title I was relatively new—I taught Title I kids. In those days, the kids were Title I—not the school. We were given quite a bit of money. However, we were required to spend it on equipment. That meant tape recorders, filmstrip projectors (I said this was a long time ago!) etc. The teachers were livid. How much equipment do you need? Of course this was before computers. (By the way, our classes were mixed Title I and non-Title I kids). We were not supposed to use Title I equipment with non-Title I kids. It was ridiculous. We screamed and with the help of a caring principal and a brilliant teacher, we wrote up a program to hire additional teachers to reduce class size. We also used the money for a reading specialist and a math specialist dedicated to these kids. These specialists took every child every day. The math specialist took half of my class (first grade) and worked with the kids in her math lab while I drilled and did worksheets with the other half. She worked on concepts while I worked on rote. Then, we switched groups. We did the same thing with reading. Reading specialist worked on phonics, I worked on sight words and comprehension. At the end of the year, the math results were amazing. Reading was not as impressive. One teacher took the non Title I kids and the rest of us had entirely Title I. The class sizes were too big—29, as I recall, but the extra help from the specialists was critical. These “specialists” were real teachers who worked with kids—not “instructional coaches” giving advice to teachers.
FCPS spends entirely too much money on people that do not work with kids. Someone needs to figure this out. Teachers don’t need advice—the kids need real help.
I guarantee you, the Title I money could be better spent.

NO class in FCPS should have double the size of another--except special needs.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 21:45     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Janie Strauss, the School Board member who both lives in McLean and represents the McLean schools, made an appearance at Karen Garza's "listening tour" last night and said she did NOT support the MCA resolution or taking any money away from higher-needs schools to reduce class sizes elsewhere. The MCA resolution was drafted by Louise Epstein, who also lives in McLean and narrowly lost to Strauss in the 2011 School Board election.

It seems the battle lines for the 2015 contest for the Dranesville seat are being drawn.


Louise Epstein was the first Republican I have voted for since I moved to Virginia in 1990. If the Democrats don't get their acts together, it looks like I will do so again.


My Lord, please don't encourage this blowhard to run for School Board and embarrass Dranesville again by publicly playing these kind of destructive, divisive, "me first" interest group politics. It's bad enough she has a mouthpiece through the MCA which, as another poster mentioned, is a totally unrepresentative, insignificant organization that has lost any influence it may once have had by moving well into Tea Party territory. No one listens to the MCA these days. These are simply right-wingers who are sitting in an echo chamber patting themselves on their backs for demanding that "their tax dollars" be spent on "their children." Thankfully, Dranesville was smart enough to reject Louise's pandering and smart enough to know that someone as divisive as she is in person should never wield influence anywhere outside the MCA.

Anybody who tells you, as this resolution basically does, that they can lower class sizes in McLean without spending a dime more in the Schools budget is obviously making an empty promise, and counting on you not to really think it through. Do you really think, as this resolution implies, that kids in small classes who have special needs, speak ESOL, or live below the poverty line are "making out like bandits?" Yeah, I'm quoting Catherine Lorenze, who was Louise Epstein's campaign manager last time around. Shame on you for voting for her in the first place. People with these kinds of beliefs have no place in truly public education.


I am sorry you feel this way, I stand by my vote. Janie Straus has not represented my children nor has she been responsive when I have tried contacting her- she just rubber stamps whatever comes from staff. Voting Ms Straus out is first on my list.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 21:04     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I just don't understand why its controversial to increase the title 1 class sizes. If there is a cap (21?) why not staff up to the cap? A class size of 10 at one school when other schools have 30+ per class is bizarre.


I'm not sure where your confusion is. Hypothetically, if there are 46 kids in 2nd grade, at a non-Title 1 school, they would be divided into 2 classes, each with 23 kids. But in a Title 1 school, where there are apparently caps for grades K-3 of 22 kids per class, there are two possibilities: 2 classes with 22 kids each and 1 class with only 2 kids OR 3 classes with 15-16 kids each. Either way, there will be 3 classes at the Title 1 school, needing 3 teachers. The optics may look bad when you say, hey how come they have only 15 kids in a class, but, really, when you say "staff up to the cap" are you really advocating they do classes of 22, 22 and 2, just so they can say, hey only one of the classes is below the cap? That's goofy.


What they could do though is use title 1 money for that extra teacher they need instead of getting three teachers through the FCPS formula and then spending all their title 1 money on an instructional coach.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 21:01     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Janie Strauss, the School Board member who both lives in McLean and represents the McLean schools, made an appearance at Karen Garza's "listening tour" last night and said she did NOT support the MCA resolution or taking any money away from higher-needs schools to reduce class sizes elsewhere. The MCA resolution was drafted by Louise Epstein, who also lives in McLean and narrowly lost to Strauss in the 2011 School Board election.

It seems the battle lines for the 2015 contest for the Dranesville seat are being drawn.


Louise Epstein was the first Republican I have voted for since I moved to Virginia in 1990. If the Democrats don't get their acts together, it looks like I will do so again.


My Lord, please don't encourage this blowhard to run for School Board and embarrass Dranesville again by publicly playing these kind of destructive, divisive, "me first" interest group politics. It's bad enough she has a mouthpiece through the MCA which, as another poster mentioned, is a totally unrepresentative, insignificant organization that has lost any influence it may once have had by moving well into Tea Party territory. No one listens to the MCA these days. These are simply right-wingers who are sitting in an echo chamber patting themselves on their backs for demanding that "their tax dollars" be spent on "their children." Thankfully, Dranesville was smart enough to reject Louise's pandering and smart enough to know that someone as divisive as she is in person should never wield influence anywhere outside the MCA.

Anybody who tells you, as this resolution basically does, that they can lower class sizes in McLean without spending a dime more in the Schools budget is obviously making an empty promise, and counting on you not to really think it through. Do you really think, as this resolution implies, that kids in small classes who have special needs, speak ESOL, or live below the poverty line are "making out like bandits?" Yeah, I'm quoting Catherine Lorenze, who was Louise Epstein's campaign manager last time around. Shame on you for voting for her in the first place. People with these kinds of beliefs have no place in truly public education.


Actually I think the non-title one kids in classes with well under 20 students are making out like bandits, especially if either they are paying no real estate taxes or if they are not special needs/esol/farm and are having small classes. The school board even says the actual title 1 money doesn't even get used for the most part for smaller class sizes. It goes towards extra resource teachers. So these schools get lower class sizes and more resource teachers and esol specialists and special ed specialists. I agree the MCA resolution asks too much, but the current situation is also too much for certain schools to handle, especially when those schools also have ESOL and special needs children in them as well. "Brown kids" do not have the monopoly on esol and special needs. Just FARMS rates. They probably asked for this wanting something in between. If the state's max ratio is 24.5, there is no reason each school's ratio needs to be much higher than the state's max.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 20:59     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Janie Strauss, the School Board member who both lives in McLean and represents the McLean schools, made an appearance at Karen Garza's "listening tour" last night and said she did NOT support the MCA resolution or taking any money away from higher-needs schools to reduce class sizes elsewhere. The MCA resolution was drafted by Louise Epstein, who also lives in McLean and narrowly lost to Strauss in the 2011 School Board election.

It seems the battle lines for the 2015 contest for the Dranesville seat are being drawn.


Louise Epstein was the first Republican I have voted for since I moved to Virginia in 1990. If the Democrats don't get their acts together, it looks like I will do so again.


My Lord, please don't encourage this blowhard to run for School Board and embarrass Dranesville again by publicly playing these kind of destructive, divisive, "me first" interest group politics. It's bad enough she has a mouthpiece through the MCA which, as another poster mentioned, is a totally unrepresentative, insignificant organization that has lost any influence it may once have had by moving well into Tea Party territory. No one listens to the MCA these days. These are simply right-wingers who are sitting in an echo chamber patting themselves on their backs for demanding that "their tax dollars" be spent on "their children." Thankfully, Dranesville was smart enough to reject Louise's pandering and smart enough to know that someone as divisive as she is in person should never wield influence anywhere outside the MCA.

Anybody who tells you, as this resolution basically does, that they can lower class sizes in McLean without spending a dime more in the Schools budget is obviously making an empty promise, and counting on you not to really think it through. Do you really think, as this resolution implies, that kids in small classes who have special needs, speak ESOL, or live below the poverty line are "making out like bandits?" Yeah, I'm quoting Catherine Lorenze, who was Louise Epstein's campaign manager last time around. Shame on you for voting for her in the first place. People with these kinds of beliefs have no place in truly public education.


I can assure everyone in McLean, etc. that students on this side of the county are not making out like bandits, despite their smaller class sizes.

There is some fraud and waste in the FARMS system that could be weeded out, but no one at Gatehouse wants to make the unpopular decision to do it. I don't think they verify any information on a single FARM form. There is just no way that if your household gross combined income is $44k, that you just bought a $400k house - but I digress.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 19:57     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:There are 1st-3rd grade classes with 10 students in them and others with over 30. It's gotten completely out of whack and I don't blame parents for being upset. There should not be that much discrepancy. I haven't read the demand, but most parents just think things need to be shifted a bit so that all class sizes are a bit more manageable and the difference between the largest and smallest class size in FCPS for the same grade is a little smaller than 20 plus students.


Maybe those overly burdened Mc lean kids should be bused to the Title 1 schools with 10 kids per class.


But most of those kids are brown!


So you're actually OK with increasing the class sizes in Title I schools, but only if we inconvenience other students and spend more on transportation in the process?



I think PP was being sarcastic.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 19:56     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Janie Strauss, the School Board member who both lives in McLean and represents the McLean schools, made an appearance at Karen Garza's "listening tour" last night and said she did NOT support the MCA resolution or taking any money away from higher-needs schools to reduce class sizes elsewhere. The MCA resolution was drafted by Louise Epstein, who also lives in McLean and narrowly lost to Strauss in the 2011 School Board election.

It seems the battle lines for the 2015 contest for the Dranesville seat are being drawn.


Louise Epstein was the first Republican I have voted for since I moved to Virginia in 1990. If the Democrats don't get their acts together, it looks like I will do so again.


My Lord, please don't encourage this blowhard to run for School Board and embarrass Dranesville again by publicly playing these kind of destructive, divisive, "me first" interest group politics. It's bad enough she has a mouthpiece through the MCA which, as another poster mentioned, is a totally unrepresentative, insignificant organization that has lost any influence it may once have had by moving well into Tea Party territory. No one listens to the MCA these days. These are simply right-wingers who are sitting in an echo chamber patting themselves on their backs for demanding that "their tax dollars" be spent on "their children." Thankfully, Dranesville was smart enough to reject Louise's pandering and smart enough to know that someone as divisive as she is in person should never wield influence anywhere outside the MCA.

Anybody who tells you, as this resolution basically does, that they can lower class sizes in McLean without spending a dime more in the Schools budget is obviously making an empty promise, and counting on you not to really think it through. Do you really think, as this resolution implies, that kids in small classes who have special needs, speak ESOL, or live below the poverty line are "making out like bandits?" Yeah, I'm quoting Catherine Lorenze, who was Louise Epstein's campaign manager last time around. Shame on you for voting for her in the first place. People with these kinds of beliefs have no place in truly public education.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 16:20     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:There are 1st-3rd grade classes with 10 students in them and others with over 30. It's gotten completely out of whack and I don't blame parents for being upset. There should not be that much discrepancy. I haven't read the demand, but most parents just think things need to be shifted a bit so that all class sizes are a bit more manageable and the difference between the largest and smallest class size in FCPS for the same grade is a little smaller than 20 plus students.


Maybe those overly burdened Mc lean kids should be bused to the Title 1 schools with 10 kids per class.


But most of those kids are brown!


So you're actually OK with increasing the class sizes in Title I schools, but only if we inconvenience other students and spend more on transportation in the process?
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 16:09     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I just don't understand why its controversial to increase the title 1 class sizes. If there is a cap (21?) why not staff up to the cap? A class size of 10 at one school when other schools have 30+ per class is bizarre.


I'm not sure where your confusion is. Hypothetically, if there are 46 kids in 2nd grade, at a non-Title 1 school, they would be divided into 2 classes, each with 23 kids. But in a Title 1 school, where there are apparently caps for grades K-3 of 22 kids per class, there are two possibilities: 2 classes with 22 kids each and 1 class with only 2 kids OR 3 classes with 15-16 kids each. Either way, there will be 3 classes at the Title 1 school, needing 3 teachers. The optics may look bad when you say, hey how come they have only 15 kids in a class, but, really, when you say "staff up to the cap" are you really advocating they do classes of 22, 22 and 2, just so they can say, hey only one of the classes is below the cap? That's goofy.


Good reason why the collar may need to be adjusted with a higher cap at the low end.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 16:07     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:There are 1st-3rd grade classes with 10 students in them and others with over 30. It's gotten completely out of whack and I don't blame parents for being upset. There should not be that much discrepancy. I haven't read the demand, but most parents just think things need to be shifted a bit so that all class sizes are a bit more manageable and the difference between the largest and smallest class size in FCPS for the same grade is a little smaller than 20 plus students.


Maybe those overly burdened Mc lean kids should be bused to the Title 1 schools with 10 kids per class.


But most of those kids are brown!
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 16:02     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:I just don't understand why its controversial to increase the title 1 class sizes. If there is a cap (21?) why not staff up to the cap? A class size of 10 at one school when other schools have 30+ per class is bizarre.


I'm not sure where your confusion is. Hypothetically, if there are 46 kids in 2nd grade, at a non-Title 1 school, they would be divided into 2 classes, each with 23 kids. But in a Title 1 school, where there are apparently caps for grades K-3 of 22 kids per class, there are two possibilities: 2 classes with 22 kids each and 1 class with only 2 kids OR 3 classes with 15-16 kids each. Either way, there will be 3 classes at the Title 1 school, needing 3 teachers. The optics may look bad when you say, hey how come they have only 15 kids in a class, but, really, when you say "staff up to the cap" are you really advocating they do classes of 22, 22 and 2, just so they can say, hey only one of the classes is below the cap? That's goofy.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 14:43     Subject: Re:Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Janie Strauss, the School Board member who both lives in McLean and represents the McLean schools, made an appearance at Karen Garza's "listening tour" last night and said she did NOT support the MCA resolution or taking any money away from higher-needs schools to reduce class sizes elsewhere. The MCA resolution was drafted by Louise Epstein, who also lives in McLean and narrowly lost to Strauss in the 2011 School Board election.

It seems the battle lines for the 2015 contest for the Dranesville seat are being drawn.


Louise Epstein was the first Republican I have voted for since I moved to Virginia in 1990. If the Democrats don't get their acts together, it looks like I will do so again.


Dranesville includes schools in the Herndon, Langley and McLean pyramid, and one school in the Marshall pyramid (Lemon Road).

In 2011, Epstein won heavily in the precincts zoned for Langley HS in 2011, but Strauss won every precinct that fed into Herndon, McLean or Marshall HS. My guess is that, in the 2015 election, the Republican-endorsed candidate will get all the Langley precincts again, the Democratic-endorsed candidate will get all the Herndon precincts and the Pimmit precinct that feeds into Marshall, and the McLean precincts will split, quite possible over this very issue of class sizes.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 14:25     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:51% of the classes with more than 30 kids in them are AAP.


______________

Is this true? There's an extremely simple solution for that.


And people complain that the AAP program costs too much money.
Anonymous
Post 03/11/2015 14:22     Subject: Fairfax County: McLean Citizens Association demands smaller class sizes
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:51% of the classes with more than 30 kids in them are AAP.


______________

Is this true? There's an extremely simple solution for that.


Add an additional teacher per grade per center school? Simple.


+4 trailers.