School re-districting in HoCo?

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  • pleasant1911

    Ultimate Member
    Apr 12, 2012
    10,221
    Does anybody know the status of school redistricting in Howard county, specifically around the areas for Hammond/reservoir/appleton High Schools?

    Wife tells me its in the HoCo agenda. We live in the appleton HS district, and wife tells me that its getting redistrict to Hammond HS :(. She has a friend who is a realtor, and her friend told her, bc of the redistricting of these HSs, people are losing money on the value of their homes?

    Any info would be appreciated.
     

    dontpanic

    Ultimate Member
    Jul 7, 2013
    6,631
    Timonium
    Does anybody know the status of school redistricting in Howard county, specifically around the areas for Hammond/reservoir/appleton High Schools?

    Wife tells me its in the HoCo agenda. We live in the appleton HS district, and wife tells me that its getting redistrict to Hammond HS :(. She has a friend who is a realtor, and her friend told her, bc of the redistricting of these HSs, people are losing money on the value of their homes?

    Any info would be appreciated.

    I have been through the redistricting process twice now. When you start attending the meetings, do not use your property values as an argument. This is not taken into account, even though this is usually a person's major concern.

    Better arguments are neighborhood unity. Cohesive history and demographics including FARMS and special needs.

    This process is very long, with many opportunities for input. All that said, the wealthiest schools in our area got exactly what they wanted each time.

    Good luck. Hope it works out for you.
     

    danb

    dont be a dumbass
    Feb 24, 2013
    22,704
    google is your friend, I am not.
    Appleton? Do you meam Atholton?

    Howard County is perrenially redistricting. plans are here: http://www.hcpss.org/school-planning/

    They put out plans A, B, C, ... make tweaks to each one based on "feedback", then decide in Plan Q. Whatever the plan is now will change.
    Generally kids move from East to west. east schools are overcrowded, west schools are underutilized. There is also a lot of school construction.

    There are 100 reasons for home price changes. I doubt its redistricting in that area. There has been a *lot* of new construction. Why buy an older home when you can get a shiny new one?

    Redistricting happens too slowly. Plus, its a sign of demand. New construction, or federal jobs moving out are more likely.
     

    danb

    dont be a dumbass
    Feb 24, 2013
    22,704
    google is your friend, I am not.
    Read the 2017 feasibility study (on web page above). Figure 5.3

    Some polygons are indeed moving from Atholton to Hammond, it affects 337 students, but not until 2018-2019 as I read the changes. gotta find your polygon on the school map and see if it affects you.

    But also, 325 students are moving from Hammond to Atholton! Like a circle jerk.

    But these are not final and will go through 35 revisions until adopted.... I highly doubt any effect on property prices. As I said, lots of new construction is probably the culprit.
     

    whistlersmother

    Peace through strength
    Jan 29, 2013
    8,948
    Fulton, MD
    Reservoir is perennially overcrowded with the board saying there's enough capacity in the western district to avoid redistricting until at least 2020 or 2022... One daughter is almost done and the other is pretty entrenched, so redistricting now would be a boon-dongle.

    I seriously doubt Reservoir will be redistricted anytime soon. If it does, I would expect kids to the west of the school (out MD216) to be sent to Atholton or maybe River Hill.
     

    pleasant1911

    Ultimate Member
    Apr 12, 2012
    10,221
    Interesting. Thanks for the info! Atholton is where my neighbors daughter went and wife tells me, we ll be changed to Hammonds, which is not good. Gorman ES, Murray hill MS will be schools my kids will go, but there are kids who lives five minutes away who goes to another ES and MS, but there are kids who live 10-15 minutes away in that same direction who goes to Gorman and Murray Hill. Just new to me.
     

    cap6888

    Ultimate Member
    Oct 2, 2011
    2,556
    Howard County
    It's kind of like the school time change plan. They have an agenda. Whatever they want to do will happen. My kids got redistrected when the built the new middle school, and of course, it will be changed again in this new plan. Luckily my daughter is already in JROTC at Howard, and now my son wants to do the same.

    OP, if you are affected by the redistricting, and want to go to Atholton, they have have a very good JROTC program there too.
     

    TheBert

    The Member
    MDS Supporter
    Aug 10, 2013
    7,685
    Gaithersburg, Maryland
    Interesting. Thanks for the info! Atholton is where my neighbors daughter went and wife tells me, we ll be changed to Hammonds, which is not good. Gorman ES, Murray hill MS will be schools my kids will go, but there are kids who lives five minutes away who goes to another ES and MS, but there are kids who live 10-15 minutes away in that same direction who goes to Gorman and Murray Hill. Just new to me.

    Here in the Peoples Republic of Montgomery County my kids rode a bus past two middle schools to get to their middle school. A co-worker, 20 years ago, had his kids ride a bus past 4 elementary schools before the bus stopped at their elementary school.

    Good Luck!
     

    Melnic

    Ultimate Member
    MDS Supporter
    Dec 27, 2012
    15,278
    HoCo
    I used to live in the sliver that jets to the south for Atholton. When we bought the house 20 years ago, it was districted to Hammond. It was at Atholton when we were there and looks like it was staying.
    Because the maps don't show all streets, the one way way to find out which polygon you are in is the school bus locator page
    https://schoollocator.hcpss.org/SchoolLocator/
    Another way is the PDF map
    http://www.hcpss.org/f/schoolplanning/map_polygon201213.pdf

    input your info and at the top, it shows you the polygon.

    Look at the linked report at the table for each school type and where the polygons are moving (ES=Page 39, MS= Page 40, HS= Page 41).
    http://www.hcpss.org/f/schoolplanning/2017-feasibility-study.pdf?a

    For example, if you are in polygon 2011 (Atholton HS), look at page 41 Sending under Atholton, you will see Atholton is sending polygon 2011 to Hammond at the top row there

    HC will listen to people at hearings and do what they want in the end (unless you have direct influence with the "deciders").
    It will affect property values WITHOUT A DOUBT!!!! anyone who says otherwise is not experienced in what parents of kids look for in a house. School district and the school ratings play a major part for MANY home buyers and when you reduce the buyers looking at your house, prices go down and sell time takes longer. Our house had good school ratings for ES,MS, HS and sold in 4 days (plus it looked really good).

    My new place is not changing, nor is our old place
     
    Last edited:

    danb

    dont be a dumbass
    Feb 24, 2013
    22,704
    google is your friend, I am not.
    Redistricting in HoCo does not affect home prices as much as people think. It's true people look at schools, but in HoCo the home prices are positively outrageous. There is always someone in PG or Baltimore fleeing a worse school willing to move in. People in Oakland Mills or Long Reach are always looking to "move up," and when they do there is no problem selling their house to someone lower on the totem pole.

    You might get a few double income whiny hypocritical people who make $400k willing blow $60,000 on taxes and transfer fees to sell their $750k house and move to Clarksville, because liberals in HoCo love diversity unless it affects them, but they wont have a problem selling their house either.
     

    smokey

    2A TEACHER
    Jan 31, 2008
    31,412
    Thankfully my school's slated to pickup an additional 85 kids or so, so my coworker and I don't have to worry about being surplussed any time soon. The downside is that it'll basically force us to have more classes double-up...so, 2 classes in one of the smaller gyms in the county at a time. Most of our classes now are doubles, this screws the few that we get to see by themselves. You can get so much more done with 30 kids in a room instead of 60.
     

    pleasant1911

    Ultimate Member
    Apr 12, 2012
    10,221
    I used to live in the sliver that jets to the south for Atholton. When we bought the house 20 years ago, it was districted to Hammond. It was at Atholton when we were there and looks like it was staying.
    Because the maps don't show all streets, the one way way to find out which polygon you are in is the school bus locator page
    https://schoollocator.hcpss.org/SchoolLocator/
    Another way is the PDF map
    http://www.hcpss.org/f/schoolplanning/map_polygon201213.pdf

    input your info and at the top, it shows you the polygon.

    Look at the linked report at the table for each school type and where the polygons are moving (ES=Page 39, MS= Page 40, HS= Page 41).
    http://www.hcpss.org/f/schoolplanning/2017-feasibility-study.pdf?a

    For example, if you are in polygon 2011 (Atholton HS), look at page 41 Sending under Atholton, you will see Atholton is sending polygon 2011 to Hammond at the top row there

    HC will listen to people at hearings and do what they want in the end (unless you have direct influence with the "deciders").
    It will affect property values WITHOUT A DOUBT!!!! anyone who says otherwise is not experienced in what parents of kids look for in a house. School district and the school ratings play a major part for MANY home buyers and when you reduce the buyers looking at your house, prices go down and sell time takes longer. Our house had good school ratings for ES,MS, HS and sold in 4 days (plus it looked really good).

    My new place is not changing, nor is our old place

    AWESOME INFO!!!
     

    Stoveman

    TV Personality
    Patriot Picket
    Sep 2, 2013
    27,985
    Cuba on the Chesapeake
    Thankfully my school's slated to pickup an additional 85 kids or so, so my coworker and I don't have to worry about being surplussed any time soon. The downside is that it'll basically force us to have more classes double-up...so, 2 classes in one of the smaller gyms in the county at a time. Most of our classes now are doubles, this screws the few that we get to see by themselves. You can get so much more done with 30 kids in a room instead of 60.



    60 kids in a class? Wow. :shocked4:
     

    smokey

    2A TEACHER
    Jan 31, 2008
    31,412
    60 kids in a class? Wow. :shocked4:

    It's doubled, so the other PE teacher is there too coteaching, but it does make it tricky to do things like hockey or golf when you're stuck inside the gym together. When I taught at veterans, we had triples. Three kindergarten classes, or first grade, sharing a gym made for interesting times. We didn't have enough equipment for lots of things, so two classes would have to work on one thing, and the other class does something different. That or we'd set up stations to spread the equipment around or otherwise try to be creative to get anything meaningful done. It's also tricky because the same classes aren't always together.

    K, 1, and 2 have three 30 minute classes, so if the red class a, b, and c... a&b might be together Monday, b&c wed with it being c's first day, a&c thurs, and each by itself some other day. It forces you to have to be a little redundant occasionally and isn't super ideal.

    Things like this happen in schools over capacity, but also happen a lot in large schools with one gym, like veterans. They've got two art rooms, two music rooms, two technology rooms, but only the one gym... so we get stuck with two or three classes sharing the same learning area.

    Meanwhile, schools on the western side of the county are often under capacity, with unused rooms. However, as the eastern side expands and enrollments go up, they keep redistricting to jump kids west(usually as parent get pissed that city kids are being moved into their kids school, or they fight to get their kids moved out of the more urban schools to be the ones moved west.

    It got nasty at an old school of mine, where parents made an online group putting the school down for being too ghetto and wanting their kids moved to a nicer(ah hem, whiter) school the last redistricting. They were successful and it was devastating to the school. The school is historically a segregated black school and hasn't overcome that stigma. It was turning around and getting pretty successful when all the "good families" got redistricted to a different school further west.
     

    ericoak

    don't drop Aboma on me
    Feb 20, 2010
    6,806
    Howard County
    Atholton is projected to go from 48% to 33% white, 20% to 9% Asian, 19% to 37% black.

    The neighborhood is apparently not happy. Kids that live hundreds of feet from Atholton will be sent miles away and kids that miles away will be sent to Atholton.
     
    Last edited:

    Stoveman

    TV Personality
    Patriot Picket
    Sep 2, 2013
    27,985
    Cuba on the Chesapeake
    It's doubled, so the other PE teacher is there too coteaching, but it does make it tricky to do things like hockey or golf when you're stuck inside the gym together. When I taught at veterans, we had triples. Three kindergarten classes, or first grade, sharing a gym





    I would drive off a bridge on my way home. God bless you for doing what you do.
     

    whistlersmother

    Peace through strength
    Jan 29, 2013
    8,948
    Fulton, MD
    All the Korean families are buying out in Centennial.

    Glenelg is projected at 80% capacity while Reservoir, at the same time, is projected at 110% - and yet the school board twiddles their thumbs...
     

    pleasant1911

    Ultimate Member
    Apr 12, 2012
    10,221
    Atholton is projected to go from 48% to 33% white, 20% to 9% Asian, 19% to 37% black.

    The neighborhood is apparently not happy. Kids that live hundreds of feet from Atholton will be sent miles away and kids that miles away will be sent to Atholton.

    I guess the school admins. believe that diversifying and de-diversifying is what makes a school great, and not the actual students who work hard to get good grades.

    They do that around our way, sending kids who live down the street from us to a school miles away, while they are in walking distance from the school in their own neighborhood.
     

    smokey

    2A TEACHER
    Jan 31, 2008
    31,412
    I guess the school admins. believe that diversifying and de-diversifying is what makes a school great, and not the actual students who work hard to get good grades.

    They do that around our way, sending kids who live down the street from us to a school miles away, while they are in walking distance from the school in their own neighborhood.

    When I was a student, they redistricted a few dozen kids from hilltop to come to centennial. They had an immediate negative impact on the school. We suddenly had groups of black kids screaming "we guns run this school" and trying to jump kids. They may have made a mistake in messing with a certain wrestling captain at one point and were quickly shown some humility when I took sudden issue with someone tossing fruit gummies at the back of my head.
     

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