Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am one of the "accidental activists" in the OpenFCPS group and previous posters are correct. Prior to this year, I didn't follow our school board much, if at all. But I have watched probably 70% of the board meetings (some 4+ hours long), read every set of board documents and read mounds of research and media articles. And it's with that knowledge that I became involved in the recall effort. I am incredibly unhappy with the direction of our board and district. I want to elect members to the board who don't have political agendas and who want to get into the nitty gritty of the management. I think there is far too much group think on the board and I am looking forward to electing members who can represent my voice.

Yes x1000.

The current Board basically has three factions: the far-left activists, the pork barrel politicians who look only to benefit their neighborhoods and ignore everyone else in their districts, and Megan McLaughlin, who would have been a typical Board member years ago but now is a voice in the wilderness. The first two factions scratch each other’s backs and the losers are the families in the county who’d prefer a board that focuses on academics and prudent fiscal oversight.

Anonymous wrote:I am one of the "accidental activists" in the OpenFCPS group and previous posters are correct. Prior to this year, I didn't follow our school board much, if at all. But I have watched probably 70% of the board meetings (some 4+ hours long), read every set of board documents and read mounds of research and media articles. And it's with that knowledge that I became involved in the recall effort. I am incredibly unhappy with the direction of our board and district. I want to elect members to the board who don't have political agendas and who want to get into the nitty gritty of the management. I think there is far too much group think on the board and I am looking forward to electing members who can represent my voice.

Anonymous wrote:I am one of the "accidental activists" in the OpenFCPS group and previous posters are correct. Prior to this year, I didn't follow our school board much, if at all. But I have watched probably 70% of the board meetings (some 4+ hours long), read every set of board documents and read mounds of research and media articles. And it's with that knowledge that I became involved in the recall effort. I am incredibly unhappy with the direction of our board and district. I want to elect members to the board who don't have political agendas and who want to get into the nitty gritty of the management. I think there is far too much group think on the board and I am looking forward to electing members who can represent my voice.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Whether it's the Fairfax GOP or unaffiliated candidates who haven't sought party endorsements, we need something different from what the Democrats served up in 2019.

I personally think the Fairfax GOP is their own brand of crazy just like the FCDC. I don't trust them. I want unaffiliated candidates.
-former R

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Whether it's the Fairfax GOP or unaffiliated candidates who haven't sought party endorsements, we need something different from what the Democrats served up in 2019.

I personally think the Fairfax GOP is their own brand of crazy just like the FCDC. I don't trust them. I want unaffiliated candidates.
-former R

The FCDC will claim any candidates they haven’t endorsed are crazy right-wing Republicans, so get ready for that.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Whether it's the Fairfax GOP or unaffiliated candidates who haven't sought party endorsements, we need something different from what the Democrats served up in 2019.

I personally think the Fairfax GOP is their own brand of crazy just like the FCDC. I don't trust them. I want unaffiliated candidates.
-former R

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Whether it's the Fairfax GOP or unaffiliated candidates who haven't sought party endorsements, we need something different from what the Democrats served up in 2019.

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Anonymous wrote:The Fairfax GOP should be able to give you what you need.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t sign it. You couldn’t even give me a concrete answer to my question on Cohen. Go do something productive with your life and stop wasting people’s time. Vote in new school board members when you can, but this recall BS is stupid.

I really don't understand the intense hatred for this SB. It's almost like a group of people latched onto this because their kids did not go back to school. FCPS followed the general trend of the area. The SB would have received hate no matter what the decision had been last year. I can't even imagine having to make those decisions. I doubt some of you would have performed any better. All I read and see is a bunch of grown people having a fit but not able to actually verbalize how this SB failed.

I think the difference between the way you feel and what they feel is that those people have watched the school board meetings from start to finish for well over a year now, and as a result have developed a comprehensive understanding of how deficient, political and negligent this school board actually is.

Also, many of the most involved parents in that petition movement are parents of kids with special needs, who have been utterly screwed over by this school board, often in illegal ways. It has continued even through this summer with the ESY mess. They are motivited by the natural instinct of mess with my chiod and there will be hell to pay.

The parents who are the most upset with the school board are the ones who have taken the time to be very informed. The more they learn, the more upset and motivated they get.

And they are bipartisan, particularly the leadership group which splits fairly evenly between Ds and Rs.

That's very well said and quite accurate IMHO.

I know people who engaged politely with the School Board on a range of issues for years, and now they are just exasperated and wand these SB members gone. Of the three, Cohen has probably been the biggest tool of the teachers' organizations that consistently lobbied against returning to classroom instruction. On the other hand, Tholen has proven to be tone-deaf and self-serving, and Omeish has used (and abused) her platform as a SB member to weigh in on global political issues, encourage graduates to engage in "jihad," and tell students their schools sit on "stolen land." Replacing any or all of them would be an improvement.

+1,000 to both PPs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t sign it. You couldn’t even give me a concrete answer to my question on Cohen. Go do something productive with your life and stop wasting people’s time. Vote in new school board members when you can, but this recall BS is stupid.

I really don't understand the intense hatred for this SB. It's almost like a group of people latched onto this because their kids did not go back to school. FCPS followed the general trend of the area. The SB would have received hate no matter what the decision had been last year. I can't even imagine having to make those decisions. I doubt some of you would have performed any better. All I read and see is a bunch of grown people having a fit but not able to actually verbalize how this SB failed.

I think the difference between the way you feel and what they feel is that those people have watched the school board meetings from start to finish for well over a year now, and as a result have developed a comprehensive understanding of how deficient, political and negligent this school board actually is.

Also, many of the most involved parents in that petition movement are parents of kids with special needs, who have been utterly screwed over by this school board, often in illegal ways. It has continued even through this summer with the ESY mess. They are motivited by the natural instinct of mess with my chiod and there will be hell to pay.

The parents who are the most upset with the school board are the ones who have taken the time to be very informed. The more they learn, the more upset and motivated they get.

And they are bipartisan, particularly the leadership group which splits fairly evenly between Ds and Rs.

That's very well said and quite accurate IMHO.

I know people who engaged politely with the School Board on a range of issues for years, and now they are just exasperated and wand these SB members gone. Of the three, Cohen has probably been the biggest tool of the teachers' organizations that consistently lobbied against returning to classroom instruction. On the other hand, Tholen has proven to be tone-deaf and self-serving, and Omeish has used (and abused) her platform as a SB member to weigh in on global political issues, encourage graduates to engage in "jihad," and tell students their schools sit on "stolen land." Replacing any or all of them would be an improvement.

+1,000 to both PPs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t sign it. You couldn’t even give me a concrete answer to my question on Cohen. Go do something productive with your life and stop wasting people’s time. Vote in new school board members when you can, but this recall BS is stupid.

I really don't understand the intense hatred for this SB. It's almost like a group of people latched onto this because their kids did not go back to school. FCPS followed the general trend of the area. The SB would have received hate no matter what the decision had been last year. I can't even imagine having to make those decisions. I doubt some of you would have performed any better. All I read and see is a bunch of grown people having a fit but not able to actually verbalize how this SB failed.

I think the difference between the way you feel and what they feel is that those people have watched the school board meetings from start to finish for well over a year now, and as a result have developed a comprehensive understanding of how deficient, political and negligent this school board actually is.

Also, many of the most involved parents in that petition movement are parents of kids with special needs, who have been utterly screwed over by this school board, often in illegal ways. It has continued even through this summer with the ESY mess. They are motivited by the natural instinct of mess with my chiod and there will be hell to pay.

The parents who are the most upset with the school board are the ones who have taken the time to be very informed. The more they learn, the more upset and motivated they get.

And they are bipartisan, particularly the leadership group which splits fairly evenly between Ds and Rs.

That's very well said and quite accurate IMHO.

I know people who engaged politely with the School Board on a range of issues for years, and now they are just exasperated and wand these SB members gone. Of the three, Cohen has probably been the biggest tool of the teachers' organizations that consistently lobbied against returning to classroom instruction. On the other hand, Tholen has proven to be tone-deaf and self-serving, and Omeish has used (and abused) her platform as a SB member to weigh in on global political issues, encourage graduates to engage in "jihad," and tell students their schools sit on "stolen land." Replacing any or all of them would be an improvement.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t sign it. You couldn’t even give me a concrete answer to my question on Cohen. Go do something productive with your life and stop wasting people’s time. Vote in new school board members when you can, but this recall BS is stupid.

I really don't understand the intense hatred for this SB. It's almost like a group of people latched onto this because their kids did not go back to school. FCPS followed the general trend of the area. The SB would have received hate no matter what the decision had been last year. I can't even imagine having to make those decisions. I doubt some of you would have performed any better. All I read and see is a bunch of grown people having a fit but not able to actually verbalize how this SB failed.

DP. The reasons have been stated repeatedly - perhaps you’re just not paying attention. Yes, the return to school issue was huge. But so are the priorities of this SB - focusing on renaming schools, changing TJ admission to a lottery, trying to add CRT to the curriculum… these things may not bother you, but they definitely bother thousands of other Fairfax residents.

These issues do bother me a lot, but you are targeting three people for recall - Tholen lied about something to her constituents, Omeish is using the position for unrelated political grandstanding, so why Cohen? If you have a problem with the whole school board, then why not try to recall them all? You had some reason for choosing those three as your focal points. Also, i am just wondering if this will be effective at all. I imagine recalls rarely are.