Immersion parent from SSIMS here with an outside perspective and some data:

- French immesion enrollment been fairly robust (30 or more students per grade) while Spanish immersion has had 20 or fewer per grade. There is no issue at all between the two programs, and additional students from Westland would no doubt be welcome if they help push enrollment toward two sections per grade.
- discilpline problems at "the other middle school"? Assuming this is not a code for supposed issues in more diverse schools, you should know that SSIMS has had an extaordinary administration in place that steadily improved behavior and brought up test scores (which track SES) across all subgroups. Check out the most recently available suspension data from MCPS at http://montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/sharedaccountability/reports/2009/SuspensionTables2009.pdf
- just a guess, but if the Key/SSIMS boundary parents can continue to B-CC from Westland, it probably has less to do with Westland and more to do with the high school which by all accounts is a great place to study language.

"Nice conspiracy theory. This is the standard SI propaganda. Watch the November 18th BOE meeting on webcast. By the way, it's not perception that Westland is overcrowded, it is a reality. What does "limited sense of community" mean anyway? I had no opinion on this issue until you started these posts. Now I'm rooting for you to get moved to SSIMS next year. And if it happens, don't let the door hit you on the @ss on the way out."

In any given year more students could very easily move into or out of the the cluster than would be forceably removed to SSIMS. This change will have virtually no impact on Westland, other than to disrupt the lives and family intentions and friendships of dynamic students who would bring diversity with them to Westland. It is not complicated to understand that parents heard very good things about the continuation of the immersion program at Westland and chose to sacrifice to bring their children to a less convenient elementary school to obtain this opportunity, and would like the county to follow through on the assurances given to them. Instead, parents are being asked to require their children to leave their friends and community to satisfy the irrational hatred of a very few parents who do not want to share their school with a few others from outside their neighborhoods. It does not surprise me that you do not know what is a community, since you do not appear to have any decency.

Anonymous wrote:Here's a really interesting article that speaks to the problems that 00:36 is experiencing at RCF in the EA program.

http://educationnext.org/all-together-now/

This is a great article, thanks for posting.

Anonymous wrote:

Interesting, your argument has been made verbatim by an SP parent at RCF. Here's the problem: magnets are not established primarily for the pupose of providing innovative instruction. They exist first and foremost for the purpose of voluntary desegregation. How does sending all middle class kids, most of them white, to Westland further that goal? Answer: it doesn't. SS should have two immersion progrms b/c the neighborhoods are lower SES than over in the Westland direction which is quite affulent. Why are you worried it will hurt the French program any more than the elem magnet is harming the neighborhood program? The everyone takes Spanish dynamic is one we know well and you clearly agree that it can be a negative situation, don't you? Also, Weast is not sending CCES and NCES to Westland right now anyway.

Are you the poster who keeps accusing everyone of being someone other than what they state are? I am the PP to which you refer and I am a non-RCF parent (but great minds think alike). I agree that magnets are designed for integration, which is a major function of the SP immersion at RCF. And, as part of integration, county officials realized a long time ago, that parents would only stay in the system and move to under-performing, high FARMS and minority schools if there was ... (wait for it) .... innovative instruction. No parent is going to voluntarily put their child in a poor school unless the academic program is going to be strong and have continued resourcing. This is the explicit promise that was made at the creation of many of the magnets years ago (a promise that MCPS now seeks to renege on in many instances, but that's another thread) So, the two really go hand in hand.

You're right that overall, although RCF benefits from the integrative effects of the SP program, Westland doesn't need to be integrated -- now. The cluster as a whole is more white and affluent and well performing, and since all cluster kids go to Westland, by MS the racial/FARMS stats are more well-balanced. BUT, what is likely to happen in the next 10 years is that the cluster will split into 2 middle schools. The new school will likely serve the eastern part of the BCC cluster which has higher FARMS, higher minority and higher ELL rates. Westland will likely take students from the western part of the cluster which is overwhelmingly white and affluent. We will have a similar problem at the MS level that we do at the elem. level w/ significant differences in the FARMS/ELL/racial balance between the 2 future middle schools. One way to solve this problem is to ..... wait for it .... institute an innovative program at the new middle school to attract more of the white affluent parents from within the cluster to place their children at BCC MS2 instead of Westland. Wouldn't the SP immersion be perfect for that? I think it's incredibly short-sighted of MCPS and BoE officials, to remove the MS level of the immersion from Westland and place it at SS, all for having 80 more seats at Westland (a school which will be overcrowded by several hundred +) when it likely would be very helpful in the semi-near future. (Kind of like the way MCPS closed Leland MS and now is looking to open a new middle school for exactly the population that Leland used to serve .....) And, BTW, I don't really think it's unfair to allow kids to continue on in the cluster they started in. It's freaking hard for parents to keep track of 2 cluster's worth of programs and placements, and it's also hard for kids to break up friendships, etc. Let's cut everyone a little slack?

Maybe what should happen is that the SP program at RCF and Westland should remain, but have an admission preference to some extent for kids from within the BCC cluster. Or maybe the programs at SSIMS, KEY and Westland all should remain, but kids should have to apply to designated SP immersion in their cluster or group of clusters (as is currently the case for the HGCs). But, oh wait, then Weast wouldn't be able to say he's doing anything to relieve the overcrowding (that he proposes to cause) at Westland.....

Anyway, it's a curious thing looking at Weast's answer on RCF/Westland SP that 15 of the 80 students out of boundary come from SSIMS and Key MS, both of which have their own (partial) immersion programs. I could be paranoid and look at those numbers and think .... oh, those social climbing, racist parents just want to get into the BCC cluster w/o paying BCC prices.... or I could say to myself "what on earth would make a parent send a kid miles away at great effort for what looks to be a similar program? Is it because parents prefer full to partial immersion (I know I would). Is it because there are disciplinary problems at the other MS?

BTW, I think your comparison between elementary magnets and the regular track at a school and the SP/FR is inapposite (or however you spell that).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:None of these responses offer a reason why the continuation of the Spanish Immersion program at Westland should not move to Silver Spring International Middle School...

Non-RCF parent here. I don't think it's a good idea for MCPS to consolidate immersion programs. These should be spread out, but still large enough so that they have a critical workable mass (i.e. a one-class immersion probably wouldn't work well). Kids all over the county apply to immersion. For someone who lives in W. MoCo, RCF/Westland is much closer than Silver Spring. If kids were moved from Westland to SSIMS, then the only remaining MS SP immersion programs would be SSIMS and Key, both of which are in Silver Spring. Why should SS have 2 SP immersion programs and the rest of the county none? Also, SSIMS is the continuation for the French immersion elementary, and I think it is wiser to have approximately equal number of MS immersion students in each program at SSIMS. French is a harder language to sustain in terms of getting enough interested students. It's not a helpful dynamic to have twice as many fluent SP immersion students as French. The within school dynamic becomes "everyone takes Spanish," which is already hard enough to fight.

Also, Rolling Terrace and SSIMS are partial immersion programs, but Rock Creek Forest and Westland are full immersion. This means if you re-route RCF/Westland students to SSIMS, you will have problems with the kids from the two different programs having differing level and scope of fluency.

Plus, personally, as a BCC cluster parent, although my kids aren't in immersion, I'm glad it's in the cluster. It probably raises the level of Spanish at the high school level, enables more upper level Spanish classes at BCC, benefits the IB program, etc. The number of SP immersion kids at Westland won't significantly relieve capacity pressure at Westland. (What's the difference between being 400 over capacity and 500, really?)

Weast's focus on the immersion is a diversionary tactic, pretending to help address a problem at Westland that he wants to create by sending the CCES/NCC 6th grades to Westland when that school doesn't have the capacity.

Interesting, your argument has been made verbatim by an SP parent at RCF. Here's the problem: magnets are not established primarily for the pupose of providing innovative instruction. They exist first and foremost for the purpose of voluntary desegregation. How does sending all middle class kids, most of them white, to Westland further that goal? Answer: it doesn't. SS should have two immersion progrms b/c the neighborhoods are lower SES than over in the Westland direction which is quite affulent. Why are you worried it will hurt the French program any more than the elem magnet is harming the neighborhood program? The everyone takes Spanish dynamic is one we know well and you clearly agree that it can be a negative situation, don't you? Also, Weast is not sending CCES and NCES to Westland right now anyway.

it's true that the immersion at Westland is partial, but the students that feed into it have had full immersion for six years, so their level of Spanish would be higher than those from a partial immersion program, in theory.

0:34 - The S[anish Immersion program at Westland is also partial.

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/specialprograms/middle/immersion_spanish_middle.shtm

Anonymous wrote:None of these responses offer a reason why the continuation of the Spanish Immersion program at Westland should not move to Silver Spring International Middle School where there is already a SP immersion program as part of the effort to relieve capacity pressures on Westland. If it strengthens immersion, then consolidating the program to one location should be a good thing for the majority of students whose base area is the DCC.

The smaller number of immersion students who are in the Westland boundary will be able to apply to Blair's CAP program if they continue with immersion at Silver Spring International since that great program is only open to students who attend DCC middle schools. And, barring any changes next year, MCPS already provides transportion.

Non-RCF parent here. I don't think it's a good idea for MCPS to consolidate immersion programs. These should be spread out, but still large enough so that they have a critical workable mass (i.e. a one-class immersion probably wouldn't work well). Kids all over the county apply to immersion. For someone who lives in W. MoCo, RCF/Westland is much closer than Silver Spring. If kids were moved from Westland to SSIMS, then the only remaining MS SP immersion programs would be SSIMS and Key, both of which are in Silver Spring. Why should SS have 2 SP immersion programs and the rest of the county none? Also, SSIMS is the continuation for the French immersion elementary, and I think it is wiser to have approximately equal number of MS immersion students in each program at SSIMS. French is a harder language to sustain in terms of getting enough interested students. It's not a helpful dynamic to have twice as many fluent SP immersion students as French. The within school dynamic becomes "everyone takes Spanish," which is already hard enough to fight.

Also, Rolling Terrace and SSIMS are partial immersion programs, but Rock Creek Forest and Westland are full immersion. This means if you re-route RCF/Westland students to SSIMS, you will have problems with the kids from the two different programs having differing level and scope of fluency.

Plus, personally, as a BCC cluster parent, although my kids aren't in immersion, I'm glad it's in the cluster. It probably raises the level of Spanish at the high school level, enables more upper level Spanish classes at BCC, benefits the IB program, etc. The number of SP immersion kids at Westland won't significantly relieve capacity pressure at Westland. (What's the difference between being 400 over capacity and 500, really?)

Weast's focus on the immersion is a diversionary tactic, pretending to help address a problem at Westland that he wants to create by sending the CCES/NCC 6th grades to Westland when that school doesn't have the capacity.

How sad that these immersion parents seem to care more about the back door into the b-cc cluster than for the program itself.

Anonymous wrote:You had no opinions, right. Tell us another one -- perhaps you could repeat what you said at the PTA meeting the other night.

I haven't been doing any speaking at any PTA meetings. Although, please, tell us what I am purported to have said.

I think they probably will move the program -- it's an easy sop for the board. It does nothing significant to address overcrowding at Westland but it will appease certain loudmouth parents who have an axe to grind and, as shown above, an odd hostility to the SI program that isn't based on anything concrete. The board can say they did what they could. Meanwhile, families who already have a kid at Westland will apply for a change of school and will get it. Families who live in the cluster but who do SI will still go. Ultimately, no more than 20 fewer kids will go to Westland in any given year -- but really, that many more kids could move into the cluster at any time, so the total enrollment of Westland might not change at all.

All this hostility, all this angst .... and nothing will really change.

Good work, people.

You had no opinions, right. Tell us another one -- perhaps you could repeat what you said at the PTA meeting the other night.

Anonymous wrote:There is no justification for removing students from their peers in the same cluster because of a perception that Westland is overcrowded. It makes about as much sense to send students from another elementary feeder school to SSIMS or another middle school in the county. This is just the usual sense of entitlement of a few parents who have a very limited sense of community, and feel invaded by residents of less prosperous parts of the county.

Nice conspiracy theory. This is the standard SI propaganda. Watch the November 18th BOE meeting on webcast. By the way, it's not perception that Westland is overcrowded, it is a reality. What does "limited sense of community" mean anyway? I had no opinion on this issue until you started these posts. Now I'm rooting for you to get moved to SSIMS next year. And if it happens, don't let the door hit you on the @ss on the way out.

There is no justification for removing students from their peers in the same cluster because of a perception that Westland is overcrowded. It makes about as much sense to send students from another elementary feeder school to SSIMS or another middle school in the county. This is just the usual sense of entitlement of a few parents who have a very limited sense of community, and feel invaded by residents of less prosperous parts of the county.

None of these responses offer a reason why the continuation of the Spanish Immersion program at Westland should not move to Silver Spring International Middle School where there is already a SP immersion program as part of the effort to relieve capacity pressures on Westland. If it strengthens immersion, then consolidating the program to one location should be a good thing for the majority of students whose base area is the DCC.

The smaller number of immersion students who are in the Westland boundary will be able to apply to Blair's CAP program if they continue with immersion at Silver Spring International since that great program is only open to students who attend DCC middle schools. And, barring any changes next year, MCPS already provides transportion.