An earlier blog entry asked where the kids would attend school if a family moved into one of the new developments in our area. Let’s take a look. On the EYA web site, I found a townhouse in the Hyattsville Arts District which has completed construction and is available to move in today. OK, I can’t afford this townhouse, but if I did purchase it my children would attend an elementary school which is at 117% capacity, a middle school at %132 and a high school at 122%.
Hmmmm…I decided to try looking for another location to buy or rent. But it turns out there are other overcrowded elementary schools in our area. If I decide to buy a condo at the University Town Center, my children would attend a more crowded elementary school.
The truth is, in the Route 1 corridor, there are more children than seats in elementary, middle and high schools. New development will likely increase the number of children attending.
Are all of the new housing units going to be occupied by young professionals with no children or empty nesters nearing retirement age? I hardly think so. I think the new residents will be very much like people who already live in our communities. They will have chosen to live here for the same reasons we did: good schools, friendly diverse neighborhoods, a short commute to DC and proximity to the University of Maryland. Some of them, quite possibly many, will have children and these children will need to attend school.
Planning for population growth is complicated. It’s hard to determine how many additional children will live in the 138 townhouses being built at the Arts District or the 310 condos at University Town Center. But certainly as the number of approved housing units grows, we need to ensure that future students will not attend school in temporary classroom buildings set up to handle the overcrowding.
A retired teacher recently said to me that temporary buildings should have a ‘use by’ date. I have to agree. Temporaries already can be found at nearly every school in our communities. Yet, no school in our area is slated for additions or new construction in the next 5 years.
The county school officials need a plan to handle the growth in our area. From looking at the 2008-2013 Capital Improvements Plan it would seem their plan for additional middle school construction (project F-1), a high school (F-8 or F-9) or Hyattsville area elementary school (F-11) are in the future beyond 2013.
What can we do as concerned citizens who value and support our public schools? We can write to our county council, school board representative and Region 5 PGCPS executives. Encourage officials to evaluate the impact of the Landy project and other development on our community schools. Ask the school district to re-evaluate the priority of these future projects as listed in the 2008-2013 Capital Improvements Plan. –Michelle H.
Route 1 Growth 
When all else fails use the “poor school children” excuse to SABATOGE Upscale Modernize Develoment fr PG County/Maryland.
Its Odd no one makes these Off The Wall Baseless Arguments against any of the Massive Upscale Modernize Development Projects in Northern Virginia and DC.
Its almost like these people want to see PG County/Maryland to fail and force state residence/tax payers to continue to Flood DC and Northern Virginia to work and Shop.
I guess this is also part of an long term goal/attempt to chase out Middle/Upper Class Residence from Maryland along with discouraging Middle/Upper Class people from moving to Maryland……………..
Public school overcrowding is the sad reality in Riverdale Park, University Park and Hyattsville. For 30 years I have lived in this area, raised two children and now as a senior citizen believe it is important to speak up for quality public schools for the next generation of young families who have moved here and who may want to move here. Well built, uncrowded, healthy neighborhood schools are a benefit to all. I hope everyone living in our community and those who wish to do business in our towns will join forces to work towards this goal.
Sandra Eichbaum
July 17th, 2007 at 9:13 am
Public school overcrowding is the sad reality in Riverdale Park, University Park and Hyattsville. For 30 years I have lived in this area, raised two children and now as a senior citizen believe it is important to speak up for quality public schools for the next generation of young families who have moved here and who may want to move here. Well built, uncrowded, healthy neighborhood schools are a benefit to all. I hope everyone living in our community and those who wish to do business in our towns will join forces to work towards this goal.
The Simple Solution to that is build a Larger School but that will be too much of a Positive Solution to you people that don’t want to see PG County progress with Upscale/Modenize Growth because you people don’t want to attract High Paying Professional Employment along with people that normally don’t travel to PG County that normally stay around DC and Northern Virginia.
What is sad is that you people want PG County/Maryland to remain looking like an 18th Century Tragic Story while Secretely encouraging more Economic/Business/Revenue Support for DC and Northern Virginia………………..
One of the problems with the schools seems to be that money is collected from the developers but it does not get spent to fix the school overcrowding. Will any highly paid professionals consider moving to this area with families if the schools continue in their current state? The developers can say that they are trying to attract those folks but is that really going to happen?
It seems that each hand does not know what the other is doing: the County planning folks approve these vast increases in population but the Board of Ed is not providing for the change in enrollment in the schools. In the last boundary dispute, the school system said it could only make plans based on current enrollment figures. Obviously, there is going to be a considerable lag if that is the case. Of course, it appears that in Bowie they got a high school (one that should have come to North County) because of anticipated growth.
Tom, while it is true building a larger school could theoretically help, there are no plans to do so in our area. And it is not so easy to do. Lots of the land is being developed for these commercial ventures. When they tried to find a site in North County for a high school, there were not many options that met all of the criteria for a site.
What is sad is that you people want PG County/Maryland to remain looking like an 18th Century Tragic Story while Secretely encouraging more Economic/Business/Revenue Support for DC and Northern Virginia………………..
I think the 18th century tragic story is exploitation by people trying to make money out of Prince George’s but who don’t live here or really care about the community. Once the developers have “developed”, they will be out of here and we will be left to deal with the consequences. Let’s try to make them positive ones.