County School Board Approves School Boundary Line Shifts

The Fairfax County School Board voted Thursday evening to approve adjustments to school attendance areas in an effort to alleviate overcrowding at Fairfax High School and Lanier Middle School in Fairfax City. 

Students in the Fairfax Station, Fairview Woods, and Fairfax Manor subdivisions of the Oak View Elementary School attendance area will move from Frost Middle and Woodson High schools to Robinson Secondary School, eliminating an attendance area "island" at the middle and high school levels and sending these students "to a much closer school," officials said. 

The boundary changes will be phased in beginning in the 2014-15 school year, with an option for families to move their rising seventh-grade students and rising ninth-grade students to their newly-assigned schools in fall 2013, with transportation provided, to avoid having to transfer after one year in the current pyramid.

Rising eighth-grade students and rising eleventh- and twelfth-grade students will be allowed to remain at their current schools in the fall of 2014. 

The Board also approved an amendment that reassigns the Penderbrook and Fairfax Farms areas of the Waples Mill Elementary School attendance area from Lanier Middle to Franklin Middle School starting with the next school year, 2013-14; and from Fairfax High to Oakton High School starting with school year 2014-15, thereby eliminating a split-feeder assignment for Waples Mill Elementary School. 

Approximately 540 students from Fairfax High and 245 students from Lanier Middle will be reassigned by the school year 2017-18 in order to relieve overcrowding at those schools, which officials projected could be over capacity by as much as 600 students by that time.

Some Fairfax Station parents were upset that their children would no longer be in the Frost-Woodson pyramid, and would instead be sent to Robinson.

“We tried to accommodate as many of the concerns aired by parents and citizens who participated in the community engagement process as possible,” said School Board Chair Ilryong Moon.

“The School Board was faced with the challenge of reducing enrollment at two facilities maintained by the City of Fairfax, and we made every effort to avoid split-feeders, whenever possible, in order to accomplish this task.” 

The approved boundary changes include the following moves:

• Students in the Greenbriar West Elementary School attendance area, east of Stringfellow Road, will move from Lanier Middle and Fairfax High schools to Rocky Run Middle and Chantilly High schools, eliminating the current split-feeder assignment for Greenbriar West.

• Students in the Fairfax Villa Elementary School attendance area will move from Lanier Middle and Fairfax High schools to Frost Middle and Woodson High schools.

• In addition, the advanced academic program (AAP) assignment for students moving from Lanier to Frost Middle School will change to Frost; the AAP assignment for students moving from Frost to Robinson will change to Lake Braddock Secondary School. 

Students living in the City of Fairfax are not impacted by the boundary changes. 

Additional information about the boundary changes can be found online. 

For more information, contact the FCPS Office of Facilities Planning at 571-423-2330. 

What do you think of the board's vote, and the new school attendance pyramids? How about the way the changes are being phased in? Tell us in the comments below.