Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Trying to align all the middle schools with the high schools is a fool's errand. It can't be done.

They need to draw the KAA boundaries in a way that makes sense and doesn't disrupt the boundaries for all the other schools in the area, and call it a day.

You can get a lot closer and diminish the number of splits coming out of the MS, which would benefit the students at those MS. It so happens that the kids who are attending Carson would be a quick drive over to the new HS. The biggest issue would be the number of students pulled from Westfield.

I think it's clear they should redo the MS boundaries to align with the new HS boundaries. It would be really simple if they stopped the AAP transfers.

Once they are done with that, it should look something like:

Carson- KAA and either SL or Oakton
Franklin- Westfield and Oakton
Hughes- SL
Rocky Run- Chantilly
Stone- Westfield
Liberty- Centreville

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Sandy Anderson has been one of the worst, if not the worst school board rep on boundaries.

She has actively worked against her Springfield District families on this issue, and has been miserable with communication, alternating between completely ignoring or dismissing constituents from multiple neighborhoods, to promoting neighborhoods from outside her schools over the schools she represents (pushing to displace and rezone Hunt Valley/Irving/WSHS families and replacing them with Lewis/Key neighborhoods)

It is unbelievable that anyone would think that Sandy Anderson is the face of resistance against rezoning. This rezoning is Sandy Anderson's pet project.

I don't think anyone called Sandy Anderson the face of resistance against rezoning. She was, however, one of the first Board members out of the gate to start expressing dissatisfaction with what Thru Consulting was recommending and proposing their (her) own alternatives.

It's distressing if you're affected by her proposed changes, but it underscores what a total mess this review, which the Board approved for Reid to oversee, has been. The more clear it becomes that this School Board and Superintendent are not up to the task of proposing and executing county-wide boundary changes, the better.

No she wasn't.

Ask any constituent who has spoken to her.

She claimed ignorance and keeps quoting some crazy fcps showing WSHS at ober 120% capacity, even though that does not match any of the historical growth patterns or any of the current enrollment at the elementary schools, which are declining fairly steadily.

The only thing she has been consistently firm on is rezoning Key/Lewis/Rolling Valley students from Lewis to WSHS, as her reason why Hunt Valley can't be grandfathered. Thru has that neighborhood staying at Key/Lewis, and miving to Saratoga so they no longer split for high school or middle school, btw.

Otherwise, she has been unavailable and unhelpful to her constituents.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I saw this article on The Hill and immediately thought about the boundary review. The Democratic Party has hemorrhaged voters lately, in part for being out of touch on its policies. Exhibit 1 is the boundary review.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5395563-democrats-losing-support-white-voters/

Ignore the URL mention of white voters, because the article is not really about that.

Here’s a quote from the article - “We do better when we first meet voters where they are and then bring them along on other issues. … And nine times out of 10, what they really care about is whether or not they’re going to be able to afford health care, whether or not their kids are going to be able to go to a good school … housing, living paycheck to paycheck.”

Since all politics are local, the school board is doing immense damage to the Democratic brand with the unnecessary comprehensive boundary review.

I wonder how the election of Sandy Anderson, who was already trying to undermine the Thru Consulting recommendations, as the new School Board chair, will affect the boundary review. At some point will there be a confrontation between the School Board and Reid where they throw Reid under a bus?

Sandy Anderson has been one of the worst, if not the worst school board rep on boundaries.

She has actively worked against her Springfield District families on this issue, and has been miserable with communication, alternating between completely ignoring or dismissing constituents from multiple neighborhoods, to promoting neighborhoods from outside her schools over the schools she represents (pushing to displace and rezone Hunt Valley/Irving/WSHS families and replacing them with Lewis/Key neighborhoods)

It is unbelievable that anyone would think that Sandy Anderson is the face of resistance against rezoning. This rezoning is Sandy Anderson's pet project.

It’s her pet project for sure. Interesting that her neighborhood isn’t touched, but a neighborhood right behind hers is slotted to move without much reason.

It is CRAZY to mive those few streets from Silverbrook/South County to Sangster/Lake Braddock.

It easily triples their commute, and forces them on some very busy main roads, one of which has recent teen driving deaths.

Then, they are basically flipping that neighborhood with a similar sized Sangster/Lake Braddock neighborhood that is very happy with their current school, which is about the same distance or closer, who also do not want to change schools.

Why would they even do something like this, flipping two clusters of streets, neither of which want to get rezoned, even though all the new schools are great options.

That Sangster/Silverbrook/Soco/LB rezoning is simply rezoning just to say you rezoned something, particularly for the Silverbrook streets.

I can't help but think that one is a revenge rezoning against someone who ticked off the school board member. It is just such a weird chouce for rezoning to LB

Anonymous wrote:Trying to align all the middle schools with the high schools is a fool's errand. It can't be done.

They need to draw the KAA boundaries in a way that makes sense and doesn't disrupt the boundaries for all the other schools in the area, and call it a day.

You can get a lot closer and diminish the number of splits coming out of the MS, which would benefit the students at those MS. It so happens that the kids who are attending Carson would be a quick drive over to the new HS. The biggest issue would be the number of students pulled from Westfield.

Anonymous wrote:

Sandy Anderson has been one of the worst, if not the worst school board rep on boundaries.

She has actively worked against her Springfield District families on this issue, and has been miserable with communication, alternating between completely ignoring or dismissing constituents from multiple neighborhoods, to promoting neighborhoods from outside her schools over the schools she represents (pushing to displace and rezone Hunt Valley/Irving/WSHS families and replacing them with Lewis/Key neighborhoods)

It is unbelievable that anyone would think that Sandy Anderson is the face of resistance against rezoning. This rezoning is Sandy Anderson's pet project.

I don't think anyone called Sandy Anderson the face of resistance against rezoning. She was, however, one of the first Board members out of the gate to start expressing dissatisfaction with what Thru Consulting was recommending and proposing their (her) own alternatives.

It's distressing if you're affected by her proposed changes, but it underscores what a total mess this review, which the Board approved for Reid to oversee, has been. The more clear it becomes that this School Board and Superintendent are not up to the task of proposing and executing county-wide boundary changes, the better.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I saw this article on The Hill and immediately thought about the boundary review. The Democratic Party has hemorrhaged voters lately, in part for being out of touch on its policies. Exhibit 1 is the boundary review.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5395563-democrats-losing-support-white-voters/

Ignore the URL mention of white voters, because the article is not really about that.

Here’s a quote from the article - “We do better when we first meet voters where they are and then bring them along on other issues. … And nine times out of 10, what they really care about is whether or not they’re going to be able to afford health care, whether or not their kids are going to be able to go to a good school … housing, living paycheck to paycheck.”

Since all politics are local, the school board is doing immense damage to the Democratic brand with the unnecessary comprehensive boundary review.

I wonder how the election of Sandy Anderson, who was already trying to undermine the Thru Consulting recommendations, as the new School Board chair, will affect the boundary review. At some point will there be a confrontation between the School Board and Reid where they throw Reid under a bus?

Sandy Anderson has been one of the worst, if not the worst school board rep on boundaries.

She has actively worked against her Springfield District families on this issue, and has been miserable with communication, alternating between completely ignoring or dismissing constituents from multiple neighborhoods, to promoting neighborhoods from outside her schools over the schools she represents (pushing to displace and rezone Hunt Valley/Irving/WSHS families and replacing them with Lewis/Key neighborhoods)

It is unbelievable that anyone would think that Sandy Anderson is the face of resistance against rezoning. This rezoning is Sandy Anderson's pet project.

It’s her pet project for sure. Interesting that her neighborhood isn’t touched, but a neighborhood right behind hers is slotted to move without much reason.

Anonymous wrote:Why do people in McLean have to pay for their community center when the rest are not taxed? Is it super fancy?

It’s not super fancy but it has meeting rooms, performances, and various classes for kids and adults. There is a similar surcharge in Reston to support the Reston Community Center.

These community centers are not the same as the county recreation centers in various locations, including McLean (Spring Hill).

Why do people in McLean have to pay for their community center when the rest are not taxed? Is it super fancy?

Anonymous wrote:What do you mean, "zoned for McLean Community Center" ? That's not a thing.

There is an area called the McLean Tax District that pays an additional tax on top of other county taxes to fund the McLean Community Center. It includes some areas with Falls Church addresses that feed to Haycock. I thought the areas that feed to Lemon Road are outside that MTD area, but I could be wrong.

In any event, while Lemon Road is in the Marshall pyramid, the area around the school off Idylwood Road itself feeds to McLean and is closer to Longfellow than to Kilmer. Thru hasn’t proposed to move the Lemon Road families at Longfellow/McLean to Kilmer/Marshall and, if they did, most families would oppose that move.

Anonymous wrote:What do you mean, "zoned for McLean Community Center" ? That's not a thing.

it is in the McLean Community Center tax district.

What do you mean, "zoned for McLean Community Center" ? That's not a thing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the goal is to eliminate all split feeders. The goal is to eliminate the sliver splits. The ones where only a few students split off - like 10%. Those could be eliminated or expanded such that a higher percentage of a MS or ES class goes to the same school.

What's frustrating is that Thru was hired and not given clear guidelines and priorities. If FCPS had told them "no split feeders, that's the first priority" or "no over capacity schools, that's the first priority" then the maps would make sense and we could guess what was going to happen next.

They were given priorities. Top priority is removing attendance islands, which is the objective of Scenario 1. Next priority is reducing split feeders, specifically in instances where the split is less than 20 (or is it 30)%, so Scenario 2 is Scenario 1 plus split feeder mitigation. Third priority is capacity exceeding 105%, and Scenario 3 is Scenario 2 plus capacity shuffling.

Now, do they do this with any nuance or understanding of walk zones, community cohesion, or access across major roads and highways? No. But they technically do have priorities and have presented them as such.

It seems so pointless, shuffling kids around when it makes no discernible difference whether 35 percent or 40 percent of a school feeds into another high school.

It makes a bigger difference at the elementary level. Some schools are small. 20% of their grade splitting may mean only a dozen of them are moving on to join a 7th grade class of 500 students.

Does that literally happen anywhere? That seems like an extreme example.

Yes. Vienna ES and Lemon Road off the top of my head. Westgate probably sends less than 20 kids per grade to Longfellow.

And most of those Vienna families want to stay at Madison, just like most of those Lemon Road and Westgate families want to stay at McLean.

And then when they propose to eliminate the Lemon Road split feeder by sending all the kids to McLean, the Lemon Road families who live next door to Marshall don’t want to move, either.

None of that should surprise anyone who paid attention to the prior surveys.

Majority of Vienna ES goes to Thoreau/Madison, it’s the small number that go onto Kilmer/Marshall. Thru wants the move the Kilmer/Marshall families to Freedom Hill while the families want the opposite, which is to stay at Vienna ES and go onto Thoreau/Madison.

Lemon Road and Westgate are more difficult because they’re halfway between both Marshall and McLean. I don’t think you can make them a straight feeder (although they’re trying) without walkers being moved. I think the better path is to make them more even splits.

Lemon Road is also more problematic as the current area zoned to Longfellow/McLean is also zoned for the McLean Community Center - that neighborhood tends to also be active in the McLean scouts, sports and various pools. In a long past failed iteration of boundary changes, Lemon Road was slated to expand its boundary into Kent Gardens and instead, Lemon Road allowed transfers from that area without the usual rigamarole.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the goal is to eliminate all split feeders. The goal is to eliminate the sliver splits. The ones where only a few students split off - like 10%. Those could be eliminated or expanded such that a higher percentage of a MS or ES class goes to the same school.

What's frustrating is that Thru was hired and not given clear guidelines and priorities. If FCPS had told them "no split feeders, that's the first priority" or "no over capacity schools, that's the first priority" then the maps would make sense and we could guess what was going to happen next.

They were given priorities. Top priority is removing attendance islands, which is the objective of Scenario 1. Next priority is reducing split feeders, specifically in instances where the split is less than 20 (or is it 30)%, so Scenario 2 is Scenario 1 plus split feeder mitigation. Third priority is capacity exceeding 105%, and Scenario 3 is Scenario 2 plus capacity shuffling.

Now, do they do this with any nuance or understanding of walk zones, community cohesion, or access across major roads and highways? No. But they technically do have priorities and have presented them as such.

It seems so pointless, shuffling kids around when it makes no discernible difference whether 35 percent or 40 percent of a school feeds into another high school.

It makes a bigger difference at the elementary level. Some schools are small. 20% of their grade splitting may mean only a dozen of them are moving on to join a 7th grade class of 500 students.

Does that literally happen anywhere? That seems like an extreme example.

Yes. Vienna ES and Lemon Road off the top of my head. Westgate probably sends less than 20 kids per grade to Longfellow.

And most of those Vienna families want to stay at Madison, just like most of those Lemon Road and Westgate families want to stay at McLean.

And then when they propose to eliminate the Lemon Road split feeder by sending all the kids to McLean, the Lemon Road families who live next door to Marshall don’t want to move, either.

None of that should surprise anyone who paid attention to the prior surveys.

Majority of Vienna ES goes to Thoreau/Madison, it’s the small number that go onto Kilmer/Marshall. Thru wants the move the Kilmer/Marshall families to Freedom Hill while the families want the opposite, which is to stay at Vienna ES and go onto Thoreau/Madison.

Lemon Road and Westgate are more difficult because they’re halfway between both Marshall and McLean. I don’t think you can make them a straight feeder (although they’re trying) without walkers being moved. I think the better path is to make them more even splits.

You’re right about Vienna ES. I just remembered Thru was proposing a “fix” that the purported beneficiaries didn’t want. I guess the fix was to move the small number of Marshall families to Freedom Hill, which feeds entirely to Marshall, whereas they want to stay at Vienna and, if moved at all, moved to Thoreau/Madison instead.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the goal is to eliminate all split feeders. The goal is to eliminate the sliver splits. The ones where only a few students split off - like 10%. Those could be eliminated or expanded such that a higher percentage of a MS or ES class goes to the same school.

What's frustrating is that Thru was hired and not given clear guidelines and priorities. If FCPS had told them "no split feeders, that's the first priority" or "no over capacity schools, that's the first priority" then the maps would make sense and we could guess what was going to happen next.

They were given priorities. Top priority is removing attendance islands, which is the objective of Scenario 1. Next priority is reducing split feeders, specifically in instances where the split is less than 20 (or is it 30)%, so Scenario 2 is Scenario 1 plus split feeder mitigation. Third priority is capacity exceeding 105%, and Scenario 3 is Scenario 2 plus capacity shuffling.

Now, do they do this with any nuance or understanding of walk zones, community cohesion, or access across major roads and highways? No. But they technically do have priorities and have presented them as such.

It seems so pointless, shuffling kids around when it makes no discernible difference whether 35 percent or 40 percent of a school feeds into another high school.

It makes a bigger difference at the elementary level. Some schools are small. 20% of their grade splitting may mean only a dozen of them are moving on to join a 7th grade class of 500 students.

Does that literally happen anywhere? That seems like an extreme example.

Yes. Vienna ES and Lemon Road off the top of my head. Westgate probably sends less than 20 kids per grade to Longfellow.

Oh and Westbriar, which sends such a small portion to Cooper MS, that you don’t notice it on most maps.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think the goal is to eliminate all split feeders. The goal is to eliminate the sliver splits. The ones where only a few students split off - like 10%. Those could be eliminated or expanded such that a higher percentage of a MS or ES class goes to the same school.

What's frustrating is that Thru was hired and not given clear guidelines and priorities. If FCPS had told them "no split feeders, that's the first priority" or "no over capacity schools, that's the first priority" then the maps would make sense and we could guess what was going to happen next.

They were given priorities. Top priority is removing attendance islands, which is the objective of Scenario 1. Next priority is reducing split feeders, specifically in instances where the split is less than 20 (or is it 30)%, so Scenario 2 is Scenario 1 plus split feeder mitigation. Third priority is capacity exceeding 105%, and Scenario 3 is Scenario 2 plus capacity shuffling.

Now, do they do this with any nuance or understanding of walk zones, community cohesion, or access across major roads and highways? No. But they technically do have priorities and have presented them as such.

It seems so pointless, shuffling kids around when it makes no discernible difference whether 35 percent or 40 percent of a school feeds into another high school.

It makes a bigger difference at the elementary level. Some schools are small. 20% of their grade splitting may mean only a dozen of them are moving on to join a 7th grade class of 500 students.

Does that literally happen anywhere? That seems like an extreme example.

Yes. Vienna ES and Lemon Road off the top of my head. Westgate probably sends less than 20 kids per grade to Longfellow.

And most of those Vienna families want to stay at Madison, just like most of those Lemon Road and Westgate families want to stay at McLean.

And then when they propose to eliminate the Lemon Road split feeder by sending all the kids to McLean, the Lemon Road families who live next door to Marshall don’t want to move, either.

None of that should surprise anyone who paid attention to the prior surveys.

Majority of Vienna ES goes to Thoreau/Madison, it’s the small number that go onto Kilmer/Marshall. Thru wants the move the Kilmer/Marshall families to Freedom Hill while the families want the opposite, which is to stay at Vienna ES and go onto Thoreau/Madison.

Lemon Road and Westgate are more difficult because they’re halfway between both Marshall and McLean. I don’t think you can make them a straight feeder (although they’re trying) without walkers being moved. I think the better path is to make them more even splits.