Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There actually is a lot of residency fraud at Pyle. It's hard to combat it, though you can send a cluster social worker to go investigate the home address they have given if there is suspicion. People use employers' addresses (ie elder care or child care), they rent an inexpensive apartment and claim to live there, they pretend to be cohabiting with a friend in the cluster, etc.

Maybe we can switch to a system where kids can go to any school in the county. The way it stands now, only people who are willing to be dishonest ('shared housing') are able to choose where their kids attend school.

And how would that work?

How about instead you go to your local elementary school only and there are no COSA's. No external programs either. Your school is your school. Period.

But it doesn't work that way. People who have large families use family member's addresses, or people who own rental property use that address. So, it seems pretty unfair.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There actually is a lot of residency fraud at Pyle. It's hard to combat it, though you can send a cluster social worker to go investigate the home address they have given if there is suspicion. People use employers' addresses (ie elder care or child care), they rent an inexpensive apartment and claim to live there, they pretend to be cohabiting with a friend in the cluster, etc.

Maybe we can switch to a system where kids can go to any school in the county. The way it stands now, only people who are willing to be dishonest ('shared housing') are able to choose where their kids attend school.

And how would that work?

How about instead you go to your local elementary school only and there are no COSA's. No external programs either. Your school is your school. Period.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There actually is a lot of residency fraud at Pyle. It's hard to combat it, though you can send a cluster social worker to go investigate the home address they have given if there is suspicion. People use employers' addresses (ie elder care or child care), they rent an inexpensive apartment and claim to live there, they pretend to be cohabiting with a friend in the cluster, etc.

Maybe we can switch to a system where kids can go to any school in the county. The way it stands now, only people who are willing to be dishonest ('shared housing') are able to choose where their kids attend school.

Anonymous wrote:There actually is a lot of residency fraud at Pyle. It's hard to combat it, though you can send a cluster social worker to go investigate the home address they have given if there is suspicion. People use employers' addresses (ie elder care or child care), they rent an inexpensive apartment and claim to live there, they pretend to be cohabiting with a friend in the cluster, etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Elementary schools should be walking distance or close to it. Drawing boundaries all over the county to make it all equal would cost a fortune in bussing and create a less-involved community. Plus, parents of kids in poor schools aren't the issue. These are parents that are middle class trying to move a little bit higher up the ladder.

Why? I grew up in the northern part of the county. There was nothing "walking distance or close to it" to my house except farms. The whole county doesn't look like Rockville/Bethesda/Silver Spring.

When you grew up in the northern part of the county, it was farms and you were bussed to the closest school. You weren't bussed 30min to Rockville, correct?

And I am pretty sure we are talking about NOW and pretty much all areas have an elementary school within 10min bussed. You wanting kids bussed all over to appease this perfection of FARMS will never ever happen.

I don't really have a "want" for anything as far as who goes where. I just don't think there's one perfect scenario of what elementary school bus routes "should" look like. Who is being bussed "all over"? Give examples of students who have 30 minute bus rides, when another elementary school is within a 10 minute buss ride. But yeah, my bus ride was 20-30 minutes, with all the stops. They haven't built any new schools in Damascus, so it probably still would be.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Elementary schools should be walking distance or close to it. Drawing boundaries all over the county to make it all equal would cost a fortune in bussing and create a less-involved community. Plus, parents of kids in poor schools aren't the issue. These are parents that are middle class trying to move a little bit higher up the ladder.

Why? I grew up in the northern part of the county. There was nothing "walking distance or close to it" to my house except farms. The whole county doesn't look like Rockville/Bethesda/Silver Spring.

When you grew up in the northern part of the county, it was farms and you were bussed to the closest school. You weren't bussed 30min to Rockville, correct?

And I am pretty sure we are talking about NOW and pretty much all areas have an elementary school within 10min bussed. You wanting kids bussed all over to appease this perfection of FARMS will never ever happen.

Anonymous wrote:

Elementary schools should be walking distance or close to it. Drawing boundaries all over the county to make it all equal would cost a fortune in bussing and create a less-involved community. Plus, parents of kids in poor schools aren't the issue. These are parents that are middle class trying to move a little bit higher up the ladder.

Why? I grew up in the northern part of the county. There was nothing "walking distance or close to it" to my house except farms. The whole county doesn't look like Rockville/Bethesda/Silver Spring.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RM is is surrounded by low income? Yes it is a diverse area but I don't think the folks in the Wootten Cluster (just south) and QO Cluster just west would like your description. Rockville HS to the east has some great neighborhoods too.

RM actually has low income and a lot of it. Lincoln Park, Twinbrook, HUD apartments by college gardens ES, low income apartments off Rockville Pike near Wintergreen. Heritage House is all HUD/low income. MPDU sales in all the new apartment buildings in fallsgrove, park potomac, new condos in twinbrook, king farm, etc... Most of them go for 100K max mortgage. I think 25% of Rockville Town Center is low income rentals as well. Where do you think all the FARMS come from? Ritchie Park 25%, College Gardens 15%, Beall 28%, Twinbrook 65% RM is no different than QO and Rockville has a slightly higher Hispanic and FARMS.

I am not sure of the appeal of RM.

Elementary schools should be walking distance or close to it. Drawing boundaries all over the county to make it all equal would cost a fortune in bussing and create a less-involved community. Plus, parents of kids in poor schools aren't the issue. These are parents that are middle class trying to move a little bit higher up the ladder.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yet another reason to aim for the better W's, people with money have less reasons to pretend to get over on the system. Of course the system is set up to help them but why not take the help if you qualify?

But don't people try to get COSAs or do 'shared housing' for those better ESs? I would think people want to get their kids into those schools. We're in the RM cluster and there are quite a few 'shared housing' arrangements at our ES. It's a good school but not like Somersat, lol.

There are quite a few people who do this to get their kids into all types of schools, how are the W schools immune to this issue?

Yes but most of the people who would try stuff like this aren't the type who have friends that could afford to live in the some of the better W zones. And even if they did get in they would stick out like a sore thumb, an ESOL kid from Langley park would blend in to a next door Takoma Park school but that same kid at Bannockburn might be the only poor Latino immigrant in the entire school making harder to fake. The biggest problem the W schools have is when the parents live in the Ws and their kids use their address.

You are at much higher risk when like as the OP states,you live near a marginal area and people find ways in. Look at Westbrook in Bethesda, it is surrounded by Somerset, Woodacres, Janney, none of those kid's parents would bother to cheat to get into a school that wouldn't have their local friends that at best is just as good and some hapless parent else where doesn't even know about it because these have never really been in that part of the city.

Where I grew up and attended Piney Branch Elementary, I went to birthday parties in PG and DC while they claimed an Aunt or what not on Maple Ave in a small apt. That is the problem with the RM cluster is it really is the edge with low income areas all around it. Where as there are areas closer in and in the west that are surrounded by affluence for miles in every direction, they are simply sheltered from many of these types of problems save for the occasional maid's kid using an employers address.

THIS IS STILL FRAUD. It's not better because it's a grandparent's house instead of a tia's house.

Again, this happens all the time, even in the non-W clusters. People use a grandparent's address to gain access to a different ES.

But, interesting take on ESs that are surrounded by wealthier areas, versus more middle-class areas that are surrounded by mixed income areas.

as a side note the edge areas leave they selves vulnerable to this by the down right bigoted zones that are often drawn for them. They intentional clump the middle class areas in one school and right next door the clump all the low & mixed income housing to a different one causing a disparity where one side gets shafted and look for ways around it. If they just drew boundaries that were diverse, people would be dis-incentivized from cheating.

I personally couldn't imagine putting a child through having to lie about where they live for their entire school life. That is the real crime.