"Zone checking" schools such as Houston Lamar and Glenda Dawson to ensure student behavior

[Kiovo]

Originally Posted by hbcu

look at Katy High...their the only school in Katy ISD that wins big in football but Morton Ranch down the street can't buy that success? They are doing something internally no one has caught onto yet

People specifically move to neighborhoods zoned to Katy High so their boys can play football. Several in our neighborhood have done this. No different then Parents who put their kids in certain schools for academic reasons.

Of course the schools are going to say No you can't use someone's address. I understand the reasons, Schools would be disproportionate, home values might go down etc etc. I just don't think it's worth the time and effort to track them down and shame the kids over it.

[crone]

The school might say no to using an aunt's address, but I know families who are currently paying the utilities at a friend's house to get their kid in a good school. You also can fill out a form provided by the school that says that aunt has custody of the kid and no problem. Klein sometimes goes to Auntie's to check the kids room. Just stock it and let Auntie tell them the kid is with their dad. If Auntie provides before and after school care, again, it's OK. That care thing stops when they are in high school.

BTW, they own and pay taxes on a 450K house in a great subdivision. It just happens to be zoned to a school with 65% reduced and free lunches and low test scores.

If people are paying the same tax rate, they should have access to any school in that district. This zoning crap is just another way to segregate. It won't work much longer due to demographic changes. Those high levels of reduced and free lunch kids are also the result of another kind of scam.

[Vicman]

If my guess is correct, is it Greenwood Forest neighborhood/Klein Forest High?

It would be interesting if Houston ISD did something like the New York City DOE and eliminated high school zoning but I'm not sure if the homeowners zoned to Bellaire (where they get a premium on the property values for being zoned to Bellaire) would like that. I am not sure eliminating high school zoning will be feasible for Klein ISD.

Personally I would make school districts themselves generally larger so it's easier to go within district: One central district including all of the residential parts (not including limited annexation of businesses) of the City of Houston (roughly a triangle from Clear Lake City to Kingwood to Alief) would be one. East Harris (Pasadena, La Porte, Deer Park, Galena Park, Sheldon) would be another, Spring and Klein combine to form North Harris, and Huffman, Baytown, Humble, Crosby, and Atascocita form Northeast Harris.

Originally Posted by crone

The school might say no to using an aunt's address, but I know families who are currently paying the utilities at a friend's house to get their kid in a good school. You also can fill out a form provided by the school that says that aunt has custody of the kid and no problem. Klein sometimes goes to Auntie's to check the kids room. Just stock it and let Auntie tell them the kid is with their dad. If Auntie provides before and after school care, again, it's OK. That care thing stops when they are in high school.

BTW, they own and pay taxes on a 450K house in a great subdivision. It just happens to be zoned to a school with 65% reduced and free lunches and low test scores.

If people are paying the same tax rate, they should have access to any school in that district. This zoning crap is just another way to segregate. It won't work much longer due to demographic changes. Those high levels of reduced and free lunch kids are also the result of another kind of scam.

[crone]

Consolidation would sure save on transportation.

I sit at the stop light and watch buses from 4 districts passing watch other. That 1/2 mile tip of Klein that goes from the creek down almost to HISD has to be costing a ton on transportation. It is 26 miles from the southern end of Klein to the IB school at Oak.

A friend who works at a newish Aldine school said they had to put up a sign designating the school in Aldine ISD due to people thinking it was a Klein campus.

New Yorkers still pay a premium for a good elementary school zone, but nothing like people trying to get into Highland Park ISD. Any high school and a transit pass makes it a lot cheaper in the long run. My G S lived at CPW and 96th and went on the subway to the Village every day. NYC BOE will also pay private school tuition for kids whose needs cannot be met at their local school.

[gsmj]

Originally Posted by hbcu

look at Katy High... They are doing something internally no one has caught onto yet

Yeah, it's called good coaching.

[majicdonjuan]

Originally Posted by Vicman

When you deal with high income/"driven" parents, especially those who have the money to put kids in private schools (and therefore you see them in private schools a lot) they would love to make sure the administration is "doing its job". If they perceive teachers as being insensitive to their little ones and ask the administration to do something about them, then you bet they'd ask the administration to "do their job" or else they will do it for them.

And as Bellaire/West U get richer you'll see more and more of these parents and HISD may want to keep them to get alumni donations/prestige for their schools.



1. Klein ISD would be getting nothing from a family zoned to Eisenhower as that's in Aldine ISD. That would be unless Aldine ISD was giving money to Klein.
2. In Lamar's case the number of students has been officially over the stated capacity of 2,500 students and there's talk of the school letting too many people in. If people try to fake their way in through a bogus address, the school is "forced" to take them.

2,500 kids at Lamar????? I graduated from there a decade ago and we had 3,500 kids and a graduating class of 750 then. I don't think anyone currently at Lamar has ever seen student numbers that low. That ain't happening, especially considering the school is on the cusp of a nearly complete rebuild next year.

The whole zone-checking idea seems absurd. I transferred in the "proper" way to Lamar, but I knew plenty of people who used their aunt's address (so to speak), and plenty of people who were zoned to Lamar, on top of the transfers. There were troublemakers in both camps but certainly more that had transferred, and at that time Lamar did a pretty good job of making sure that they were gone by the end of freshman year.

Those that were using fake addresses to be zoned there (and there were certainly a few) generally had parents that, as many have said here, were focused on education and had strict rules against drawing attention, ostensibly in fear of being discovered. I don't recall any actually being discovered and having to leave, but I might reach out to some of my contacts at Lamar just to get the story there.

Anecdotally though, I see these kids as generally more of a positive than a negative for schools. They tended to be more driven (both externally by their parents and internally), and for the most part they had no desire to do anything more than keep their heads down and take care of their business. Not the element that you'd want to actively try to discourage (moreso than the rules already do, of course).

[hbcu]

good coaching or getting better talent than others? Not hard to win in high school football these days inf your zone is effective

Again, if HISD enforced zoning no telling how some schools could come back academically...is Lamar good because of where its located or because they're taking the best and brightest out of each neighborhood in HISD?

Once again, Booker T's enrollment is smaller than ever because Reagan has taken all the kids

[Vicman]

2,525 is the "official capacity" of the school but it's been over that for awhile HISD faces politically tough choices in closing schools - Houston Chronicle

Originally Posted by majicdonjuan

2,500 kids at Lamar????? I graduated from there a decade ago and we had 3,500 kids and a graduating class of 750 then. I don't think anyone currently at Lamar has ever seen student numbers that low. That ain't happening, especially considering the school is on the cusp of a nearly complete rebuild next year.