School Facilities Study to Be Released June 9
Recommendations regarding school construction and renovation will be released in a public session of the Falls Church City School Board June 9 at City Hall. The study, conducted by PSA-Dewberry, a Peoria, Ill.-based architectural and engineering firm with a large presence in Northern Virginia, will provide recommendations regarding the optimal use of resources at a time of severe budget limitations for the City.
Decisions facing the City include whether to replace or renovate George Mason High School, which was built in the 1950s, and how to address a burgeoning school population at Mt. Daniel Elementary. Already, school officials have decided to place a new trailer at Mt. Daniel next year to accommodate a large entering class.
A key question will be how much the City can afford. The City currently has budgeted a $30 million expenditure for school construction in 2013, but the cost of a new high school has been estimated at $50 million or more.
PSA-Dewberry recently conducted a similar study regarding City government facilities. The two plans are intended to be coordinated through the City Comprehensive Plan.
The school facilities presentation will begin at 7pm June 9 in Council Chambers at City Hall. The public will have an opportunity to comment following the presentation.
By Stan Fendley, Falls Church City
June 2, 2009
Most urgent facility need: A K-5 facility at TJ, first add on, then renovate. Sell Mt. Daniel to the county to pay back the building costs.
Saves a lot of money on duplication of personnel and facilities
Puts the 5th grade back where it belongs and subsequently the 8th grade back where it belongs
Puts all our elementary students in one place under one set of administrators and allows for more continuity of services and communication between the elementary staff
I’ve heard Dreaming’s suggestion before (not sure if it was from Dreaming or not) and it might be the way to go – but I worry about whether or not there is enough space to add on to TJ. How much of the outdoor play area would be lost?
No play space would be lost if an addition of several stories were built on the front of TJ, from the second grade wing down to the end of the gym. This space is now occupied by the front walk area, a garden, and some trailers. The front of the new building would be close to the street but no closer than the second grade wing and the trailers already are. After the addition was built the current TJ population could move into it and then the old building could be renovated. After that was done the Mt. Daniel population and the fifth graders could move in. Then the eighth grade could move over to MEH.
Significant research documents the negatives associated with SIXTH graders being in a middle school environment, fifth graders definitely don’t belong there. They should be allowed to be the elementary students they are, and the eighth graders should be middle school students. Our current 5-7 middle school and 8-12 high school models exists only due to budgetary and facility issues, NOT because anybody decided this was the best thing for the children.
The preschool is an issue, a decision could be made whether it would be best for those students to be housed at the elementary school or in another location. The daycare office could either stay on site at TJ or move up to the flower building with the rest of the central offices.
I believe the savings in duplication of staff and facilities costs, plus the money gained by selling Mt. Daniel, would offset most or all of the cost of an addition and renovation at TJ.
This solution does not address the need for a renovation of the GM building but it does provide for more space at GM when the eighth grade moves to MEH.
If this scenario has not been considered in the facility study then they ought to reconvene. Having a separate building for two grades and a preschool makes very little sense. I’ve heard the argument that Mt. Daniel is a nurturing environment for our youngest students, but I think that TJ is also a very nurturing environment and the benefits of combining our elementary grades into one school far outweigh any negatives.
I am very receptive to opinions that differ from mine, I’d like to know what others think of this idea.
The facilities study (a draft of which is available for download via Boarddocs at http://www.fccps.org) covers the state of the existing buildings as well as many different possible scenarios. The goal at this point is NOT to start moving on specific projects — it is to set a long range plan consistent with the system goals that will then shape the individual decisions and planning, so that we are not doing things piecemeal.
There is plenty of time to look over the plan and comment, and it will be revised over time. The board saw the draft for the first time last night. The board will continue discussions about the plan at a June 9 meeting and additional meetings going forward.
At this point, the board is thinking about what strategic guidelines and community values should guide the long term plan. One major consideration is the grade configuration — for example, should the high school be 9-12, should one building be 6-12, etc. The board appeared to agree last night that configuration should be driven by educational benefits, but there is research out there pointing in several different and sometimes conflicting directions, even though each of us may think we know an obvious answer.
Another question is how big should any one school be. For example, a K-5 elementary school would have to be built to hold around 1200 students. Is that too large for Falls Church? Larger can be more cost effective, but can create other problems.
“Green” issues are another factor. For, example, should parking be tiered or underground to reduce the paved areas (and yes they also talked about using permeable surfaces for parking, lighting options, materials, etc. Is it better to build something new that is more energy efficient with a smaller footprint, or try to work with existing structures.
Sites are another topic of contention. Should the plan focus on current sites, look for other sites, should sites all be in the city or outside the city?
Of course, cost is a huge issue. Costs include the construction, but also the dislocation of how you stage construction and continue teaching and learning during construction.
Lots of issues, lots of suggestions, so feel free to chime in. In the meantime, we still have to deal with the day to day issues of how many kids are showing up next year and where are we putting them all.
Ron
Thanks Ron, interesting information.
You said 1200 students, that is definitely projecting a large increase in students isn’t it? By my calculations (140 per class) our K-5 population would be around 840, so you are figuring that we should build for a population that would increase by about 350 or more? I’m not saying this is a bad idea, just want to let people know we do not currently have 1200 K-5 students.
A 6-12 building would have to currently house nearly 1200 students so maybe that’s what you were referring to? Such a thought boggles the mind but I guess it’s an option. I thought it worked out relatively well when the GM building housed 6-12 because the middle schoolers were mostly kept completely separate from the high schoolers, although they shared the cafeteria and gym so not completely separate.
An elementary school with one principal and one assistant principal housing 8-900 students is not uncommon at all in other districts. I think we tell ourselves in FC that our two building model is better somehow, but I don’t really see much benefit and I do see some real negatives, both financially and for the students.
I’m glad to hear that my idea and all other viable possibilities are going to be considered.
Dreamingin:
Sorry if I was a little confusing with the numbers. The study has a whole section on demographic projections, and there is quite a debate over how to best project out growth patterns. While the current projections are less than 200 students per grade level, there was also a consideration of possible maximums over time, and a discussion of how to size the “core” parts of the building to handle increases over time — it is easier to add additional classrooms than core space such as gyms, cafeterias, hallways, stairways, etc. I was using the 200 per grade level maximum for my example, which might be on the high side, though it could happen.
You are correct that many school districts have much larger schools. Where I came from before Falls Church our prototype sizes were around 1500-1600 for a high school, 900-1200 for a middle school, and 700-800 for an elementary school. My own kids initially attended an elementary school with over 1000 students and did fine, but some students do better in smaller schools — there are pros and cons for each option. It should be an interesting debate here!
Ron
Thanks, Ron, I appreciate your clarification and comments.
I agree in theory with “some students do better in smaller schools” but what we have here is a little different than that. It’s also true that some (or most) fifth graders do better if they are actually in an elementary school, some (or most) eighth graders do better if they are actually in a middle school, and some (or most) second graders do better if their teachers can actually confer easily and regularly with their teachers, administrators and specialists from the previous years.
I think the continuity and cohesiveness that would exist if all our K-5 students were in one school would outweigh the “smaller school” benefit, because you can call our current configuration “smaller schools” but I think what it really amounts to is an odd breakdown of grades in different buildings that does not necessarily confer the benefits of “smaller schools” on the students, or if it does it is at the expense of other more important issues.
If we had two K-5 elementary schools I could see your point, but the way it is now causes more problems than it solves, at least in my opinion.
I know there is research out there and I’d probably defer to that but my gut feeling is that having 5th graders in middle school is the worst part of the current configuration. After that I think 8th graders in high school is probably not ideal (do they play sports with/against 12 graders?). The split of K-1 and 2-4 into different schools seems less problematic to me (in terms of the experience for the kids) but I can certainly see how that probably adds some operational inefficiencies and, as Dreaming mentions, impacts that ability for teachers to communicate with each other.
I will say that I like the fact that all the kids stay in the same school with each other throughout the process – I think it’s one of the unusual aspects of going to school in Falls Church that makes it appealing. I’ve heard that there’s some chance that one class of 1st graders might have to go to TJ instead of MD, which would be a bummer (and hopefully avoidable).
The bottom line is that we have a limited amount of land for school buildings. We need more land at TJ to build upon. The red parcel in this pic should be purchased by the City upon which to build more school facilities. It is a single parcel and is by orders of magnitude way out of proportion to the neighborhood parcels around it. It is directly across from the TJ entrance. This screenshot from the City parcel PDF shows how large it is. The entire MT Daniel school could fit onto this single parcel for example, and share the larger TJ field. The road could even wrap around it if needed, which would also calm traffic around the school. The current owner of course would be fairly compensated, thus preventing this parcel from being subdivided and sold off piecemeal.
http://i43.tinypic.com/9i70n9.jpg