Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Could you please provide a link to APS middle school SOL data that shows results for all the schools by race? I have been looking for this and haven't been able to find it.

Some years ago I looked up similar data for Arlington elementary schools (SOL results by school by race) and found that the white students performed equally regardless of school. Unfortunately now I can't find this data online but would like to see actual numbers for the middle schools. TIA

If you go to this site, you can look up any Virginia school and see SOL results demographic data, etc.: http://schoolquality.virginia.gov/

Found it - thank you.

So I looked up 2016-2017 SOLs for Kenmore and Swanson, results for white students only.

Grade 8 English - Reading
Kenmore 95 passed, 49 proficient
Swanson 95 passed, 57 proficient

Grade 8 Mathematics
Kenmore 88 passed, 83 proficient
Swanson 95 passed, 78 proficient

Grade 8 Science
Kenmore 93 passed, 70 proficient
Swanson 99 passed, 56 proficient

So I found this interesting. Swanson did better in math and science pass rate, although Kenmore students were more "proficient," whatever that means.

One other factor to consider is the overall number of white students per school. Swanson had 846 white students vs Kenmore's 282. I'm no statistician but I think that says to me the white Kenmore students had less room for error to achieve similar results (for example on reading, where both groups had a 95 percent pass rate). At Kenmore, 267 students of the 282 had to pass reading, whereas at Swanson 803 of 845 had to pass to achieve the same result (95 percent). That means 42 white Swanson students did NOT pass while only 15 of the white students at Kenmore didn't pass. Amateur analysis here, but these results are not telling me that white students at an "inferior" school are doing less well than their white peers at high-performing schools.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Could you please provide a link to APS middle school SOL data that shows results for all the schools by race? I have been looking for this and haven't been able to find it.

Some years ago I looked up similar data for Arlington elementary schools (SOL results by school by race) and found that the white students performed equally regardless of school. Unfortunately now I can't find this data online but would like to see actual numbers for the middle schools. TIA

If you go to this site, you can look up any Virginia school and see SOL results demographic data, etc.: http://schoolquality.virginia.gov/

Anonymous wrote:Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Could you please provide a link to APS middle school SOL data that shows results for all the schools by race? I have been looking for this and haven't been able to find it.

Some years ago I looked up similar data for Arlington elementary schools (SOL results by school by race) and found that the white students performed equally regardless of school. Unfortunately now I can't find this data online but would like to see actual numbers for the middle schools. TIA

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Getting my popcorn ready...

That's strange. In FCPS it's almost the opposite. White kids in West Potomac and Herndon actually score higher on the SAT than many highly regarded schools. I pulled this from an old list.

TJ 2212
Langley 1838
McLean 1836
Woodson 1819
Marshall 1802
Oakton 1792
Madison 1788
South Lakes 1754
Herndon 1745
Robinson 1739
West Potomac 1733
West Springfield 1727
Lake Braddock 1714
Chantilly 1704
South County 1693

Anonymous wrote:Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Getting my popcorn ready...

Dude, you are all missing the point. When people talk about test scores, what they really mean are test scores for the wealthier kids. And, the test scores for wealthier kids in most south arlington schools are LOWER than north arlington. Yes, white kids at Kenmore generally have lower scores than Williamsburg. Decades of studies show that wealthier kids generally do not perform as well when they are in lower performing schools.

It is clear to me that no one is talking about the scores for poorer kids, because for the most part they are the same across the county. It is generally those schools in the 'sweet spot' of about 30% poorer kids where everyone does well (such as Henry and Oakridge). Otherwise, not so good.

So stop pretending that most of you care about performance of poorer kids.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.

How many houses did this apply to? And how many houses in Arlington Forest, where students are on a bus, could SEE W-L from their homes? It doesn't matter. Walk, don't walk, see, don't see. No more North Arlington PU's are going to be sent to South Arlington, and the fr/l rate in South Arlington is going to continue to climb. But I guess this is what "everyone" wants, so whatever.

I never said everyone wants the continuing disparity between schools, but the feedback APS has been getting is that for the most part, people all over the county want their kids to be able to go to their neighborhood school rather than riding a bus further away (unless they're interested in a choice program, which is a different issue). For those in lower-performing schools, they don't want their kids sent to a better-performing school in another part of the county, they want APS to make their local school better-performing and allow their kids to continue to go there. Sure, you could just bus some kids from the north to the south and their test scores will boost the overall performance of the school, but that doesn't address the real issue of how strongly correlated individual student performance is with SES (which is just as true at Williamsburg as at Kenmore). Busing in rich kids doesn't give lower-SES kids the resources they need to overcome the disparate resources at home, it would just be a way to conceal the problem better and let people pat themselves on the back that they "fixed" the diversity problem while making it easier for those kids to fall through the cracks without the public noticing.

Most experts don't agree with your take on this. But whatever, we're not being led by experts and I am constantly reminded of this fact at every turn (boundary decisions are the least of it).

Then why are the SOL pass rates for ED students at Willamsburg and Kenmore are virtually identical?

Why are you measuring success by test scores? This is about more than test scores. That's very short-sighted.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Barbara, the school board chair, met with several community association this past week. She clearly said that walkers would not turn into bussed children as a result of this redistricting.

Dance with them that brung ya. Or for them.

Thank you for that.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.

How many houses did this apply to? And how many houses in Arlington Forest, where students are on a bus, could SEE W-L from their homes? It doesn't matter. Walk, don't walk, see, don't see. No more North Arlington PU's are going to be sent to South Arlington, and the fr/l rate in South Arlington is going to continue to climb. But I guess this is what "everyone" wants, so whatever.

I never said everyone wants the continuing disparity between schools, but the feedback APS has been getting is that for the most part, people all over the county want their kids to be able to go to their neighborhood school rather than riding a bus further away (unless they're interested in a choice program, which is a different issue). For those in lower-performing schools, they don't want their kids sent to a better-performing school in another part of the county, they want APS to make their local school better-performing and allow their kids to continue to go there. Sure, you could just bus some kids from the north to the south and their test scores will boost the overall performance of the school, but that doesn't address the real issue of how strongly correlated individual student performance is with SES (which is just as true at Williamsburg as at Kenmore). Busing in rich kids doesn't give lower-SES kids the resources they need to overcome the disparate resources at home, it would just be a way to conceal the problem better and let people pat themselves on the back that they "fixed" the diversity problem while making it easier for those kids to fall through the cracks without the public noticing.

Most experts don't agree with your take on this. But whatever, we're not being led by experts and I am constantly reminded of this fact at every turn (boundary decisions are the least of it).

Then why are the SOL pass rates for ED students at Willamsburg and Kenmore are virtually identical?

Anonymous wrote:Barbara, the school board chair, met with several community association this past week. She clearly said that walkers would not turn into bussed children as a result of this redistricting.

Dance with them that brung ya. Or for them.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.

How many houses did this apply to? And how many houses in Arlington Forest, where students are on a bus, could SEE W-L from their homes? It doesn't matter. Walk, don't walk, see, don't see. No more North Arlington PU's are going to be sent to South Arlington, and the fr/l rate in South Arlington is going to continue to climb. But I guess this is what "everyone" wants, so whatever.

I never said everyone wants the continuing disparity between schools, but the feedback APS has been getting is that for the most part, people all over the county want their kids to be able to go to their neighborhood school rather than riding a bus further away (unless they're interested in a choice program, which is a different issue). For those in lower-performing schools, they don't want their kids sent to a better-performing school in another part of the county, they want APS to make their local school better-performing and allow their kids to continue to go there. Sure, you could just bus some kids from the north to the south and their test scores will boost the overall performance of the school, but that doesn't address the real issue of how strongly correlated individual student performance is with SES (which is just as true at Williamsburg as at Kenmore). Busing in rich kids doesn't give lower-SES kids the resources they need to overcome the disparate resources at home, it would just be a way to conceal the problem better and let people pat themselves on the back that they "fixed" the diversity problem while making it easier for those kids to fall through the cracks without the public noticing.

Most experts don't agree with your take on this. But whatever, we're not being led by experts and I am constantly reminded of this fact at every turn (boundary decisions are the least of it).

Barbara, the school board chair, met with several community association this past week. She clearly said that walkers would not turn into bussed children as a result of this redistricting.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.

How many houses did this apply to? And how many houses in Arlington Forest, where students are on a bus, could SEE W-L from their homes? It doesn't matter. Walk, don't walk, see, don't see. No more North Arlington PU's are going to be sent to South Arlington, and the fr/l rate in South Arlington is going to continue to climb. But I guess this is what "everyone" wants, so whatever.

I never said everyone wants the continuing disparity between schools, but the feedback APS has been getting is that for the most part, people all over the county want their kids to be able to go to their neighborhood school rather than riding a bus further away (unless they're interested in a choice program, which is a different issue). For those in lower-performing schools, they don't want their kids sent to a better-performing school in another part of the county, they want APS to make their local school better-performing and allow their kids to continue to go there. Sure, you could just bus some kids from the north to the south and their test scores will boost the overall performance of the school, but that doesn't address the real issue of how strongly correlated individual student performance is with SES (which is just as true at Williamsburg as at Kenmore). Busing in rich kids doesn't give lower-SES kids the resources they need to overcome the disparate resources at home, it would just be a way to conceal the problem better and let people pat themselves on the back that they "fixed" the diversity problem while making it easier for those kids to fall through the cracks without the public noticing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.

How many houses did this apply to? And how many houses in Arlington Forest, where students are on a bus, could SEE W-L from their homes? It doesn't matter. Walk, don't walk, see, don't see. No more North Arlington PU's are going to be sent to South Arlington, and the fr/l rate in South Arlington is going to continue to climb. But I guess this is what "everyone" wants, so whatever.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not PP, but really I think the county NEEDS to invest more in transportation infrastructure even if it means higher taxes, because we're just too dense and too urban to pretend like we're the sleepy suburb of yesteryear. MS kids are old enough to use public transportation by themselves safely, if we had a more robust transit network. There's no reason why the special snowflakes of NOVA must be driven door-to-door. NONE. There are students in Switzerland and Germany who ride public buses alone to Kindergarten. If our kids can't handle that by 6th grade, they deserve to fail. So much for American exceptionalism.

That may be, but it isn't going to happen by September 2019. Transportation is a huge cost. APS has insufficient busses, drivers, and bus storage. Public transport can't fill the gap. Turning large numbers of children walking to neighborhood schools into bus riders is inefficient, expensive, and totally against stated County and APS goals of walkability and car free diet community.

Wanting your child at their nearby, neighborhood school isn't ridiculous. It isn't racist. It's a common sense and quality of life factor for hundreds or maybe thousands of families. APS stated that they heard it loud and clear both from English and Spanish speaking families that they wanted their kids at neighborhood schools.

Think twice, Arlington parents, about who you vote for on November 7th at the County Board. Sure, the election was really last spring, but there's nothing wrong with sending a message that the County Board is screwing up our schools with bad development policy and urban planning.

This was not on the table, so stop repeating it again and again. They was no scenario that increased the overall number of bus riders, or took away "neighborhood schools" (bus ridership is going up w/number of students in the system). What was on the table was a compromise position, or doing nothing. What's on the table now is doing nothing or doing nothing, when promoting diversity is ALSO A STATED GOAL.

There is not candidate in Arlington who is EVER going to say that it's more important to be thoughtful about placement of AH rather than to build out the max number of units. We can only build out the max with infill development. Enjoy the segregation you're voting for!

Yes, for a number of us, proposals would have taken away neighborhood schools so I will repeat it again because it is factually accurate. Families who live two and three blocks from a school would be put on a bus to another school not in their neighborhood. This is turning neighborhood walkers into bus riders, to fix bad decisions at a county level. That's not a compromise. That's telling some kids "sorry, the adults fucked up and are continuing to make the same mistake again and again, so we need to use you to fix it."

Neighborhood schools don't mean you get to pick where they draw the boundary, or that you'll always get to go to the closest school. Look at the two options they've given. They're moving kids who are closer to Swanson up to Williamsburg in both. In the HS decision, they moved kids who were closer to W-L over to Yorktown. Since they will always have to do this to some extent, because our schools aren't built in perfect locations, they should take each opportunity to address school segregation. It's not like it will get easier to do at some future point.

If you can see the school from your house with your naked eye, that's clearly your neighborhood school, and earlier maps that would have moved people in that position to a different school miles away were ridiculous. If you'd be taking a bus either way, your claim to one or the other being your neighborhood school becomes a bit more tenuous.