May 1 2 - 1 8, 2 0 1 6
Fa lls Chur c h, V i r g i ni a • ww w. fc np. c om • Fr ee
Fou n d ed 1991 • Vol. X X V I No. 12
Falls Church • Tysons Corner • Merrifield • McLean • North Arlington • Bailey’s Crossroads
Inside This Week FBI Investigating F.C. Bank Robbery
The FBI has taken the lead in an investigation of a robbery at the Wells Fargo Bank branch at 1000 W. Broad St. in Falls Church yesterday afternoon. See News Briefs, page 8
TJ Elementary Names New Principal
Paul Swanson, an elementary principal in Indiana, has accepted the position as the new principal at Falls Church’s Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, replacing the departing Robert Palermo.
4 F.C. Principals Appeal to School Board to Protect IB K-12 Programs
Extraordinary Show Of Support for Core F.C. Schools’ Value
by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
the groups to which they’ve been assigned. The current 23 students follow the 17 students who were successfully placed in a similar manner when the program was first introduced a year ago. Carol Loftur-Thun of the CBC originated and spearheaded the development of the unique program, called the CBC Youth Representative Initiative. It originally came before the City Council for a go-ahead in May of 2014 and last May came the first crop of appointees.
The embattled Falls Church School Board, tasked with finding almost $1 million in cuts from its FY17 requested budget that resulted from a 4-3 City Council vote last month, Tuesday night heard their school system’s four principals present an eloquent and impassioned defense of the educational values and effectiveness of the system’s International Baccalaureate program that now runs from kindergarten through the 12 grade. The appeal was to avoid any cuts to personnel or vital components that make the International Baccalaureate, known as IB, program (called Primary Years Program, or PYP, and Middle Years Program, or MYP, in years before high school). George Mason High School principal Tyrone Byrd, accompanied by assistant principal and IB coordinator Kevin Clark, Mary Ellen Henderson Middle School principal Ty Harris, Thomas Jefferson Elementary School principal Robert Palermo and Mt. Daniel Elementary principal Kathy Halayko and assistant principal Erin Kelly took turns in front of a packed house in the audience in telling the seven School Board members what the IB program means for the system, overall, and of the catastrophic consequences of allowing it to diminish. In a statement on the Falls Church City Public Schools’ website, the International Baccalaureate program is described as “aiming to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help
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See News Briefs, page 8
David Brooks: Putting Grit In its Place
We all know why it exists, but the grade-point average is one of the more destructive elements in American education. See page 14
Press Pass with Handsome Ghost
Handsome Ghost, a musical project started by Tim Noyes, recently released the single “Graduate” from the band’s upcoming LP, which Noyes hopes to release on Photo Finish Records this fall. See page 25
THE PRINCIPALS of all four schools in the Falls Church City School System gave an extraordinary defense of the International Baccalaureate program in its K – 12 iterations before the Falls School School Board Tuesday night. Left to right are Ty Harris, Robert Palermo, Tyrone Byrd and Kathy Halayko, In the foreground is School Board vice chair John Lawrence. (Photo: News-Press)
F.C. City Council Votes 23 Youth Reps to Board & Commissions by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
Index
Editorial..................6 Letters..............6, 10 News & Notes.12-13 Comment......... 14-17 Sports..................18 Calendar.........20-21
Business News....22 Food & Dining......23 Classified Ads .....28 Comics, Sudoku & Crossword...........29 Critter Corner.......30
At the outset of Monday night’s Falls Church City Council meeting, the Council voted 7-0 to confirm the appointment of no fewer than 23 high school students to youth membership on the City’s boards, commissions and civic organizations. The students all came from Falls Church’s George Mason High School. With proud parents crowding the front of the room to get good angles for the photo opportunities that were provided the students with mem-
bers of the Council, it was noted that nowhere else in the U.S., to anyone’s knowledge, has a similar program been implemented on such a scale, run entirely by volunteers. All the students were asked to apply and then vetted by members of the Citizens for a Better City (CBC), Falls Church’s venerable non-partisan civic group, in personal interviews and evaluations. Thus, all the students came highly recommended by the CBC. The students will be non-voting members of all the groups they asked to serve with and are asked to attend all but closed sessions of