For the first time in four decades, the FCPS school board redrew school boundaries across the entire county in an 8-3 vote on Jan. 22. These changes aim to resolve a variety of issues including split feeders, or schools from which students matriculate into multiple higher-level schools instead of one; attendance islands, geographic areas assigned to a particular school even though the area is outside the school’s main boundary; and overcrowding.
For McLean, the new boundaries are expected to address its prevalent overcrowding issue. By redistricting around 200 students located in Tysons to Langley, it reduces the McLean’s capacity utilization from 109% to 100%. In turn, it will increase Langley’s capacity from 94% to 102%.
“I’d stay at McLean [despite the boundary change],” freshman Aspen Anderson said. “Adjusting to a new environment and leaving my friends behind would be hard, and I’ve already joined lots of clubs and sports here. I don’t see a reason to move to Langley if my parents can give me a ride [to McLean], and I’m going to get my license soon.”
The new boundaries have faced backlash from students and families in affected areas. Many have criticized FCPS for creating split feeders and attendance islands with their newest proposal—two issues the county was originally seeking to resolve with the boundary review.
“I live in the Beechtree area, and we’re a super tight-knit community,” said Odessa Jansen, a junior at Justice High School. “Most of my friends only live in my neighborhood, so it would be really difficult to stay connected [if we] split off into our own schools.”
To satisfy these concerns, the county will tailor parts of the new proposal to communities that are especially affected.
“There are between five and 10 additional communities undergoing some sort of boundary change process, and different scenarios will be presented to those individual communities,” said at-large school board member Ryan McElveen, who voted against the proposal. “There’s one community on the border of Falls Church [that feeds into] McLean that might be affected.”
For students who remain at their original school, a major concern is the availability of transportation. Per FCPS’s own estimates, contouring new transportation routes based on the new boundary adjustments would require the county to hire 57 more bus drivers and buses at a cost of $4.6 million and $5.9 million, respectively.
The school board rejected a proposal in December 2025 that would have tied new transportation routes to the redistricting, citing concerns that the proposal would affect equitable access to transportation.
“We should be paying for these transportation costs because it’s in our policy to cover student transportation,” McElveen said. “There’s some other options under consideration like a central hub spot where people could go to a spot in the community and take the bus to their previously zoned school. That would be of less cost than running double routes throughout the county.”
Due to the Virginia High School League’s eligibility requirements, students who choose to stay at their current school will not be able to participate in athletic programs for a year after the boundary change process is completed.
“International Baccalaureate (IB) is currently not deemed as a special program by Virginia that would allow for students to play sports at their destination school,” McElveen said. “But we’re currently working with the state to make sure that [students] could access sports at their destination school.”
According to FCPS’s Policy 8130, which was adopted in late 2025, the county must conduct a boundary review every five years. As a result, many of the changes that FCPS will implement may be subject to frequent changes in the coming years—meaning that any current decision will likely not be concrete.
This also implies a recurring cost for the county, who will need to expend considerable amounts of resources to reassess boundaries.
“We’re going to have a situation where we have five to 10 studies going on [at a time],” McElveen said. “This has become a perpetual study, which I don’t think anyone wanted or asked for.”
