Upcounty MCPS parent comments:
The soon to be completed Seneca Valley High School expansion will have a fantastic array of Career and Technical Education programs which include automotive technology, health professions, child development, construction, cyber technology, hospitality and law enforcement.
These programs are the exact type of educational program which could benefit many FARMS students.
But in his
Upcounty Boundary Study recommendation, the Superintendent is proposing to send FARMS students who live near Seneca Valley High School to Clarksburg High School. The Superintendent's plan sends FARMS students from Fox Chapel ES and Captain Daly ES to Clarksburg High School.
The question is why? The answer is FARMS rates. The Superintendent and Board of Education now have a singular focus on decreasing disparities in FARMS rates between schools. As the Superintendent stated in his report:
“ My goals in developing my recommendation were to minimize the FARMS disparities at both the high school and middle school levels.”
The answer may be, their goal is as much ideological as educational: to break up what they see as privileged schools, even though many of these schools are racially diverse, such as Rocky Hill Middle School.
…. [former Board of Education member] Jill Ortman-Fouse.....criticized the idea that "when you buy a house, you buy a school. ..." Jeannette Dixon added that "an easy commute to school" should not be a criteria for school assignment.
Board member Judith Docca explicitly called out the "W school" clusters, and said that busing of students must include those students from more affluent families....
Improving academic performance among students at high FARMS rates schools is an important objective, and the Board of Education is correct to be concerned about this issue.
The problem is how the Board of Education is going about trying to address this problem, the possible unintended consequences of their actions, and the complete lack of public hearings on their plan to decrease disparities in FARMS rates.
The Superintendent's boundary plan will not only harm FARMS students, it will also harm the Clarksburg students he wants to bus out of their community, and the five elementary schools he wants to split articulate to different middle and high schools.
