Dear Village Neighbor / Friend,
If these weekly enews aren’t in your inbox by Thursday evening, it might be in your suspected spam or junk folder. Had another issue with @aol.com addresses bouncing back at me for reasons well beyond my skill level. But we are fairly sure the fix is on your side of cyberspace. It may be bigger than just aol given that we only had 33 confirm receipt of last week’s news. Was it something I said?
1. Calendar (Refer to your community directory and / or our website www.westspringfieldvillage.org):
- 13 May – Village Virtual Meeting, Tonight, Thursday, 7:30 PM
- 22 May – Scheduled Day for Village-Wide Yard Sale (virus permitting)
- 29 May – Memorial Day Picnic and Pool Party is CANCELLED due to Covid-19 restrictions
- 5 June – Rain Date for Yard Sale
- 12 June – Community Cleanup is CANCELLED due to Covid-19
- 20 June – Father’s Day (I told my kids that every day is Father’s Day!)
2. Virtual Village Meeting – Tonight, Thursday, 13 May starting at 7:30 PM – via zoom. Main agenda item is to set the annual dues for FY2022. Please Join the Village Zoom Meeting and voice your opinion.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85993005376?pwd=cTBTWDJnaEV3c2ttUW93SlljQjZsUT09
Meeting ID: 859 9300 5376
Passcode: 373042
One tap mobile
+19292056099,,85993005376#,,,,*373042# US (New York)
+13017158592,,85993005376#,,,,*373042# US (Washington DC)
Dial by your location929 205 6099 US (New York)
+1 301 715 8592 US (Washington DC)
Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kepxZilkTR
3. Covid-19 – 12 – 15 year olds can now get vaccinated, but only with the Pfizer vaccine. A parent or guardian must accompany anyone under the age of 18 to their appointment. Click here https://vaccinefinder.org to find who has which vaccine and to schedule an appointment.
4. Community Yard Sale & Free for All – 22 May from 8:00 AM – 2:00 PM, rain date is 5 June. It will be up to each participant to determine how to conduct the sale safely for you and for your customers. Please let me know if you intend to participate. Would also like a general category listing of items you have to sell and / or if you will put out items clearly marked as free for anyone who stops by. Free stuff is enticement for customers to visit.
We’ll make a list of participants by address and that category listing and attach a copy of our village map so you can give to your customers (if they don’t already have one) to guide them to the next participant. This has worked very well in past years, but do recommend you spice up you listing. We’ll include locations of lemonade/refreshment stands.
These are the addresses I have recorded: 7912 Springfield Village Drive, 7001 Barnack Drive, 8134 Springfield Village Drive, 6806 Landor Lane, 6802 Landor Lane, 8008 Springfield Village Drive, 6808 Ontario, and 6716 Rolling Road.
Still need a volunteer or two to put out signs, pick them up after the sale and to distribute the lists to participants.
5. Rolling Road FaceBook Group – a Rolling Road resident asked for a chat room or similar communications platform where RR residents could discuss issues and experiences concerning the project. So, our Webmaster Bob Havey set up a closed (private) Facebook group for those along RR to share their experiences as VDOT continues property acquisition from those 57 village homes. Go to FB, search for “Rolling Road Widening” and then ask to join. Asking to join is a necessary step to help insure privacy of those in the group.
6. Village West Pool News – from Pool President, Jen Guernsey Yes! Village West Community Pool will be open this year. For more information on pool membership, swim team, and COVID policies, please visit our website, www.villagewestpool.com. You may want to email the pool at villagewestpool@gmail.com and/or the swim team at villagewestvikings@gmail.com with any questions.
There is plenty to be done around the pool. Anyone interested in doing a Scout project, racking up some service hours, or just helping maintain this asset of our neighborhood is welcome to lend a hand. We have scheduled work days on May 15 and 16 from 8 AM to 4 PM and May 19 from 10 AM to 6 PM, but you can also email villagewestpool@gmail.com and we will set you up for a time that works for you.
7. Featured Directory Advertiser – Donna’s Nails – Professional Nail Care for Men & Ladies. Specializing in acrylic nails, gel nails, silk nails, manicure, pedicure, hand designs, pink & white nails and waxing. Go visit them at 6442 Landsdowne Center in Alexandria (Corner of Telegraph & Beulah) and thank them for their ad in our directory. 703/339-9510.
8. Tutor and Baby Sitter Wanted - Jonathan Janik and Roberta Pinheiro (Loudoun Lane) are looking for a private tutor for their rising kindergartener (Vinícius), who hasn’t received in-person instruction in over a year.
They are also looking for a weekend/weeknight babysitter to look after 2 boys for summer months and into the fall season. Call/text us at 617/852-7506 (Roberta) or 617/515-6311 (Jonathan).
9. Equity Education – by now all should be aware of this controversial policy initiative in FCPS and at state. They asked for public input even though they had already invested money in their plan and had decided to implement.
I responded (for myself and no one else) that they should instead work to provide the best possible public education for each and every child by challenging them, giving each the same opportunities, similar resources and reinforcement / remedial training as needed. That system was developed by our military services and adopted by many educational institutions because it works!
Our elected Springfield District School Board Member, Laura Jane Cohen responded to my input:
As you may be aware FCPS is committed to realizing a vision of educational equity in which every student thrives academically, socially, and emotionally. FCPS believes that to achieve educational equity, we need to analyze and address the beliefs and policies that inform teaching practices along with what is taught in schools. The school division is revising the existing Controversial Issues Policy and will develop a new Anti-Racism, Anti-Bias Education Curriculum Policy.
As a school district, we take the responsibility to maximize the potential of every student in FCPS very seriously. We believe that engaging all stakeholders in authentic discussion and collecting their input will support more inclusive and equitable curricular policies, which includes the optional survey for families to share their perspectives as well as looking at historical data trends that demonstrate patterns of inequities for certain student and family groups in access and opportunity. We will continue to partner with the community to strive for equity, truth, and transparency in our actions and words for all students and families. Additionally, we will work internally with staff across the division to examine our own teaching and engagement practices as we engage in this process. We truly value the community’s many perspectives.
Any of you willing to translate that into Army-speak? You can reach Laura Jane Cohen at LauraJane.Cohen@fcps.edu.
10. Directory Editor Needed – Kirby Myers has served in this capacity for several years now, but needs to stand down. I hope to get a replacement from one of you on the east side of Rolling Road. Kirby has made it very easy and not time consuming to produce the directory during November and early December of each year. For the sake of continuity, hoping to get a volunteer who will work it for several years. It wasn’t difficult when I did the directory back when, but Kirby has made it very doable for those having basic computer skills.
John Cooley, CAWSV