Plano schools competitiveness?

[Sprawling_Homeowner]

Originally Posted by widespreadfan

My kids attend feeder schools into Plano West. I hate to break it to all of you, but not everyone in the world is rich. Having economic diversity in schools prepares kids for the real world. Shoot these people in apartments pay way more for rent than I do for my monthly house payment.

How, exactly? I'm genuinely curious.

[DFWGuy422]

Originally Posted by Sprawling_Homeowner

How, exactly? I'm genuinely curious.

Because there is a lot of economic diversity in the real world

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by Wittgenstein's Ghost

Yes, you are probably right in that most people have in mind some sort of direct situational luck and assume the broader sort of luck in these discussions. I'm certainly not defending what Leonard is arguing.

The end game of my critique is probably an existential threat to any normative claims about humans, whether they be judgments against serial killers or praise for Mother Theresa.

Sorry I missed this earlier. The second part may be the best reply in the history of CD.

[jsnww81]

Originally Posted by DFWGuy422

Some of this can be explained by the fact that the attendance zones changed during that time period: Plano West absorbed a large chunk of what used to be Plano senior, which might include more economically disadvantaged kids but also included one of the highest performing feeder tracks (Rice to Jasper). I remember vaguely this causing some controversy.

The 2009-2010 attendance zone changes were controversial pretty much across the district. The district wanted to move to a "pure" feeder model with each 11-12 senior high fed by two 9-10 high schools (Shepton and Jasper to West, Vines and Clark to PSHS, and Williams and then-new McMillen to PESH), but pretty much everyone had an issue with it:

- The Clark area didn't want to leave PESH, even though it meant their kids wouldn't have to cross Highway 75 anymore;
- the district chopped up the proposed McMillen zone to avoid concentrating socioeconomically disadvantaged kids at Williams, and parents in Murphy/Richardson didn't like it at all;
- The Rice/Jasper pattern didn't want to move to leave PSHS for West (originally, only the Robinson/Jasper kids went to West);
- The Schimelpfenig area pushed hard to stay at PSHS but continue attending Jasper for 9-10, breaking the concept of pure feeders. The district fought back hard for the pure model and things got quite ugly, with threats of legal action. Ultimately the Schimmy zone was moved to Clark and kept at PSHS.

In the end, the district got the balanced enrollment and the pure feeder pattern it wanted, and the noise died down as kids moved around and parents learned boundary changes weren't the end of the world. The West zone was left with the largest concentration of apartments of any of the three senior high schools, mostly in North Dallas and along Preston Road. As those apartments have aged over the last decade, the proportion of disadvantaged kids at West has risen.

Aging apartments anywhere in Dallas always lead to an influx of poor kids in the local schools. Ask Richardson, Garland, Irving and Carrollton-Farmers Branch. Unlike Richardson ISD - which got completely blindsided in the early 1990s when adults-only apartment complexes were ruled illegal, and spent most of the next decade trying to salvage itself - PISD has managed the transition fairly well. But the 1980s-1990s heyday of lily-white Plano schools is long, long dead.

[TheOverdog]

PISD is running low on students, and the east side of town has far more apartments than the west. Maybe back in the early to mid 2000s before most of western side of town was even constructed the proportion of apartments was higher, but the number is lower. And Plano West is a higher performing school now than it was then, and Plano Senior with the least apartments (and least students) is the worst school of the three.

[MurphyPl1]

Originally Posted by jsnww81

The 2009-2010 attendance zone changes were controversial pretty much across the district. The district wanted to move to a "pure" feeder model with each 11-12 senior high fed by two 9-10 high schools (Shepton and Jasper to West, Vines and Clark to PSHS, and Williams and then-new McMillen to PESH), but pretty much everyone had an issue with it:

- The Clark area didn't want to leave PESH, even though it meant their kids wouldn't have to cross Highway 75 anymore;
- the district chopped up the proposed McMillen zone to avoid concentrating socioeconomically disadvantaged kids at Williams, and parents in Murphy/Richardson didn't like it at all;
- The Rice/Jasper pattern didn't want to move to leave PSHS for West (originally, only the Robinson/Jasper kids went to West);
- The Schimelpfenig area pushed hard to stay at PSHS but continue attending Jasper for 9-10, breaking the concept of pure feeders. The district fought back hard for the pure model and things got quite ugly, with threats of legal action. Ultimately the Schimmy zone was moved to Clark and kept at PSHS.

In the end, the district got the balanced enrollment and the pure feeder pattern it wanted, and the noise died down as kids moved around and parents learned boundary changes weren't the end of the world. The West zone was left with the largest concentration of apartments of any of the three senior high schools, mostly in North Dallas and along Preston Road. As those apartments have aged over the last decade, the proportion of disadvantaged kids at West has risen.

Aging apartments anywhere in Dallas always lead to an influx of poor kids in the local schools. Ask Richardson, Garland, Irving and Carrollton-Farmers Branch. Unlike Richardson ISD - which got completely blindsided in the early 1990s when adults-only apartment complexes were ruled illegal, and spent most of the next decade trying to salvage itself - PISD has managed the transition fairly well. But the 1980s-1990s heyday of lily-white Plano schools is long, long dead.

You nailed this. Except I want to clarify one point: "the district chopped up the proposed McMillen zone to avoid concentrating socioeconomically disadvantaged kids at Williams, and parents in Murphy/Richardson didn't like it at all;"

like 90% of the Murphy Richardson parents weren't as worried about the socio economic issue as much as they were going suggesting having kids from the furtherest east point in the district going to Bowman and the kids in the furthest west point in the east cluster going to Murphy. Essentially driving past each other and eating into their days longer. When they took a look at the ES feeder and made a few tweaks nearly everyone was happy. Except for a few in the Stinson feeder who were pissed about the trailer park kids. Most ended up moving to Rolling Ridge in Murphy to avoid that. A$$holes to a one.

[jsnww81]

Originally Posted by MurphyPl1

like 90% of the Murphy Richardson parents weren't as worried about the socio economic issue as much as they were going suggesting having kids from the furtherest east point in the district going to Bowman and the kids in the furthest west point in the east cluster going to Murphy. Essentially driving past each other and eating into their days longer. When they took a look at the ES feeder and made a few tweaks nearly everyone was happy. Except for a few in the Stinson feeder who were pissed about the trailer park kids. Most ended up moving to Rolling Ridge in Murphy to avoid that. A$$holes to a one.

I couldn't remember when that whole Bowman fracas had gone down... I forgot that Otto Middle School opened in 2010 as well and so the whole east-side pattern got rearranged. In my head, Otto had been there a lot longer, but I'm getting older, so...

Plano longtimers have told me the 2010 boundary fights were nothing compared to the drama in 1980 when PESH was about to open and the district was being split between two 11-12 campuses for the first time. Folks were so upset about their kids not graduating as Wildcats, it was apparently even suggested that the Wildcat mascot and colors be transferred to PESH, since the historic core of Plano was being zoned there.

The funny thing is, I remember the 1999 rezoning (when West opened) being almost a complete non-issue. Shepton and a chunk of Jasper shifted over, and that was that. Fascinating history, even if it is a bit of a digression from the OP's question (sorry, OP!)

[TheOverdog]

Folks were so upset about their kids not graduating as Wildcats, it was apparently even suggested that the Wildcat mascot and colors be transferred to PESH, since the historic core of Plano was being zoned there.

Wow that's crazy. All of Plano's schools have the laziest mascots they probably spent all of 5 minutes thinking up, but people fought over that? Too funny.