My dad went to Mt. Vernon HS back in the early and mid 80s. The school was a good school then, how and when did it become so bad, poor, and overrun with illegals.

I attended Mt. Vernon back in the late 1960's when it was still located on Route 1. It was a shit school even back then.

My girl Nardos effect up MV. I'm her wig.

_det Wrote:
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> My dad went to Mt. Vernon HS back in the early and
> mid 80s. The school was a good school then, how
> and when did it become so bad, poor, and overrun
> with illegals.


I may have known him. I graduated in '87

MV began to "turn to shit" the day Gerry Hyland was elected Supervisor of the MV district in Nov. 1987. He stayed in office for more than 25 yrs and ushered in an era of massive Section 8 Housing initiatives along the Route 1 Corridor. As time passed, more people sent their kids to private schools. The demographics of the student body were radically altered. SAT scores plummeted. The percentage of students enrolling in 4 yr colleges plummeted.

when I went there it was bad but now its going down to helll....

phelpsmarc Wrote:
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> MV began to "turn to shit" the day Gerry Hyland
> was elected Supervisor of the MV district in Nov.
> 1987. He stayed in office for more than 25 yrs and
> ushered in an era of massive Section 8 Housing
> initiatives along the Route 1 Corridor.

It wasn't just Gerry. It was the entire BOS from the 1980s that did it. When Jack Herrity committed to turning Fairfax County from a bedroom community for government workers into a business center, he created a growing demand for low paid workers. There were not sufficient pockets of low cost housing in Fairfax County to meet those needs, and growing affluence in surrounding areas meant those areas could not meet those needs either. WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN DONE WAS TO ESTABLISH AREAS OF LOW COST HOUSING IN THE AREAS IMMEDIATELY SURROUNDING THE DEVELOPING BUSINESS DISTRICTS, but property owners and developers didn't want that to happen. So instead the County decided to let other areas of the county go so they could become low cost housing districts. Since the Route 1 corridor was away from the developing business districts and it had large numbers of smaller older homes and apartments, it became one of the dumping grounds.

You can trace Mt Vernon's demise with the rise of high tech in the area, much like an earlier poster pointed to.

Once. Mt Vernon High and Fort Hunt High (closed in 85) were amongst the best in the nation.

The economic engine for northern Virginia was the Pentagon, and overall, the US Government. Most government contracting took place at Crystal City.

Mt Vernon and Fort Hunt benefited from their locations along the Potomac, between Fort Belvoir and the Pentagon.

AT one point I remember reading Ft Hunt High School was 44% senior military...and back then, besides local based business owners (like car dealers, motel owners, construction firms, etc), those were the money makers in this area.

Then, in the mid 80's. almost coinciding with the end of the cold war (which took the area's military population down) the toll road to Dulles was completed...and, Reston and Tysons become high tech hubs, and McLean and Great Falls, already expensive areas, exploded...and Rt 7 out to Leesburg exploded with golf course communities, all fed by Reston and Tysons.

Meanwhile, on the opposite end of the county, those aging military populations became empty nesters...

Mt Vernon and Ft Hunt were the places to be in the 70's and early 80's for those employed by the economic engine of the time, the US Military.

May come back, though, with turnover and expansion at Belvoir.

When exactly?

By my math...about 43,000 beaners ago.