Anonymous wrote:
Because it limited the number of kids in the FARMs segment of the population and made it a more manageable level thus allowing less resources and time to be dedicated only to those kids but too all the kids.
And I have to be honest, if you are overall pleased with Hammond, I think your bar for education is pretty darn low. The school has an over 75% FARMs rate and they have to teach to the lowest common denominator there. Really I am not try to slam you but if you haven't looked around at other school systems or privates, I would encourage you to do so and really compare the curriculum and expectations side by side.

When you divide by 2 (or 3) you get the same ratio. So if you have (as you say) 75% FARM, 25% not FARM, its a 3:1 ratio, last time I checked 25 and 8.3 were the same. How is that breaking it down to a "more manageable level?"

I don't understand that reply - that it limited the number of kids in the FARMs segment. When the schools were separated, they worked to keep the demographic ratios the same across the schools, % of males/females, blacks, whites, hispanics, FARMs - so when the schools are recombined, the ratios will stay the same.

I'm a parent of a current GW student and a high school student who attended GW while it was 2 schools. My only hesitation about recombining the schools is the disruption the reorganization may cause.

I can't imagine how the combined school will have a negative impact on my child's education. We will still have the same teachers we've been happy with. The elective classes already draw from both schools, so the change doesn't seem like that big a deal. Recombining the 2 schools will end the grumbling among the students about who has more or better field trips - and why it's not fair that one school is required to do history day or science fair projects, while the other is not...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unfortunately, I think the result will be that less white, wealthy parents send their kids to GW and thus the trend of doing better will reverse.

But why?!?! I don't get why anything about the new model would scare off a parent who was otherwise planning on sending their kid. I'm not trying to be dense, I just honestly don't get the downside.

I'm the Hammond parent again, and we are overall pleased with our experience, especially the teachers. So, things are okay for us under the current system, and I think they will be even better under the new system. I know there are parents that are just in general worried about middle school, but I guess I just don't see why this issue becomes the tipping point?

Because it limited the number of kids in the FARMs segment of the population and made it a more manageable level thus allowing less resources and time to be dedicated only to those kids but too all the kids.

And I have to be honest, if you are overall pleased with Hammond, I think your bar for education is pretty darn low. The school has an over 75% FARMs rate and they have to teach to the lowest common denominator there. Really I am not try to slam you but if you haven't looked around at other school systems or privates, I would encourage you to do so and really compare the curriculum and expectations side by side.

Anonymous wrote:Unfortunately, I think the result will be that less white, wealthy parents send their kids to GW and thus the trend of doing better will reverse.

But why?!?! I don't get why anything about the new model would scare off a parent who was otherwise planning on sending their kid. I'm not trying to be dense, I just honestly don't get the downside.

I'm the Hammond parent again, and we are overall pleased with our experience, especially the teachers. So, things are okay for us under the current system, and I think they will be even better under the new system. I know there are parents that are just in general worried about middle school, but I guess I just don't see why this issue becomes the tipping point?

Unfortunately, I think the result will be that less white, wealthy parents send their kids to GW and thus the trend of doing better will reverse.

Anonymous wrote:^ Really why?


As to the poster talking about what the teachers wanted. I was at those meetings. Most wanted to merge - I don't know where you get your information from.

Correct. As to people saying "parents and admin" wanted to keep the schools separate. Uh, YEAH, the principals wanted to keep the schools separate. They wanted to stay lead principal!

Teachers at both campuses wanted go the one school model. Keep in mind, this isn't going back to "the way it was". There are new elements in place that were never there before.
People were concerned about discipline? Okay! Here's your new Dean of Students position.
People were concerned about rigor? Okay! Here's your new TAG resource teacher.
People were concerned about personalization continuity for families throughout the three years? Okay! You'll have the same guidance counselor (with fewer assigned students) and the same academic principal follow your child for the three years they are at the school.

I'm appalled a vocal minority of GW parents seems to be so fixated on the what they see as a "betrayal" in going to this new model. It's like they aren't even listening to any of rationale for the new model. They heard "one school" and just stopped listening and went on the warpath. They are told that it's what the majority of teachers want, and they still don't care.

I have yet to hear someone give a sound explanation for why the new model will harm their kids. All I hear is anger directed at the School Board and ACPS staff.

Signed,
Hammond parent pleased with the vote

^ Really why?


As to the poster talking about what the teachers wanted. I was at those meetings. Most wanted to merge - I don't know where you get your information from.

Anonymous wrote:A representative for the ACPS Teacher's Association addressed the Board Thursday also. She emphasized the system's dependence on their teachers, the hours they spend and that they are the key to the students. She requested an in-step raise as well as a 2% overall raise if I recall correctly to our Board.

As the Post article reflects, this merger of middle schools calls for more principals and guidance counselor positions, although they might come from a re-shuffle, I don't know.

I support raises for our teachers. It was never a principal at ACPS who had great impact on our kids, and marginally the counselors. But teachers, definitely.

“It is imperative that we have a plan in place to effectively impact student achievement and develop those critical relationships between teachers and students,” said board Chairman Karen A. Graf.

Completely, totally disagree.

A representative for the ACPS Teacher's Association addressed the Board Thursday also. She emphasized the system's dependence on their teachers, the hours they spend and that they are the key to the students. She requested an in-step raise as well as a 2% overall raise if I recall correctly to our Board.

As the Post article reflects, this merger of middle schools calls for more principals and guidance counselor positions, although they might come from a re-shuffle, I don't know.

I support raises for our teachers. It was never a principal at ACPS who had great impact on our kids, and marginally the counselors. But teachers, definitely.

“It is imperative that we have a plan in place to effectively impact student achievement and develop those critical relationships between teachers and students,” said board Chairman Karen A. Graf.

^ What do you base this on? Initially GW was going to remain two schools, and the school board was on board with that (at the time those initial results came out). Then, teachers in particular questioned the survey results/conclusions that that had been based on, and meetings took place with parents and teachers.

After those meetings, it was stated their new conclusion was that the majority favored going back to one school.

While yes, the overall vote on Thursday proved all on the school board were in favor, they were in favor of the overall plan, and there was some discussion regarding GW remaining 2 schools (via Williams amendment).

And by the way, the Washington Post clarified in their article related to this, that consolidating doesn't mean starting from scratch with their AYP results (SOL tests impact on accreditation) but they will have one advantage...they go to whichever smaller school had the better accreditation from last year. So GW will take on GW1 and be fully accredited, and Hammond takes Hammond1 is in only the first year of warning status...but not at the beginning of the cycle, so they are still indeed impacted by how "poorly" they had previously done. I say poorly in quotes, because I don't believe using only testing to rate a school is a good method of analysis.

Here is the Post article referenced:http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/alexandria-school-board-reconsolidates-middle-schools/2014/02/21/508ecac0-9b1f-11e3-975d-107dfef7b668_story.html" target="_new" rel="nofollow"> http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/alexandria-school-board-reconsolidates-middle-schools/2014/02/21/508ecac0-9b1f-11e3-975d-107dfef7b668_story.html

Anonymous wrote:^ hate to break it to you! but most of the teachers favor a merge. There is only one on the GW1 side that is aggressively against it.

Parents and admins hate the merger, and most teachers never weighed in. this is just coming from the school board.

^ hate to break it to you! but most of the teachers favor a merge. There is only one on the GW1 side that is aggressively against it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The school board "bought" passing grades, and less-awful failing grades, for GW and FCH middle schools by merging the failing school units into the passing ones. That works one time, during the transition year, then the entire middle school complex statistically fails. The cumbersome admin isues that flow from this are just huge. The tremendous insult to GW parents will produce a political blowback. This is the new school board.

I believe this was with full support (recommendation) of Interim Superintendent Crawley and current Central Office Administration, not just the ACPS Board.

Crawley is an interim; he and Mann were just doing what three board members dictated. They had to change the results of their own working group to come to this idiotic decision; they had previously recommended doing the opposite for GW. And they acted against the wishes of the PTA and the citywide PTA board. They claim that the GW teachers wanted to merge up, but they quoted only a summary of one informal meeting that not everyone was even invited to. This was done to trick up numbers. That's all.

Anonymous wrote:The school board "bought" passing grades, and less-awful failing grades, for GW and FCH middle schools by merging the failing school units into the passing ones. That works one time, during the transition year, then the entire middle school complex statistically fails. The cumbersome admin isues that flow from this are just huge. The tremendous insult to GW parents will produce a political blowback. This is the new school board.

I believe this was with full support (recommendation) of Interim Superintendent Crawley and current Central Office Administration, not just the ACPS Board.

Anonymous wrote:The school board "bought" passing grades, and less-awful failing grades, for GW and FCH middle schools by merging the failing school units into the passing ones. That works one time, during the transition year, then the entire middle school complex statistically fails. The cumbersome admin isues that flow from this are just huge. The tremendous insult to GW parents will produce a political blowback. This is the new school board.

Yes, by merging ACPS failing middle sub-schools with the passing middle sub-school, ACPS has bought itself a year's time with the state in terms of accreditation ramifications. That was the major driver here it seems, but the prior school board would have done the same buying of time.