👉 To support this effort, a community fundraising page has been established: www.cepamd.org

🚨 UPDATE: Community Concerns Remain – Preparing for Next Steps
After meeting with the Superintendent and reviewing his responses, our community continues to have serious concerns about the current recommendation for the Crown High School boundary decision.

Originally, this process was presented as a data-driven boundary study. However, the current recommendation raises critical questions:

👉 Is the decision truly driven by data—or is data being selected to support a predetermined outcome?

At the first town hall following its release, over 95% of participants expressed opposition, yet it continues to be described as a “community-requested” solution.

In addition, there are still unresolved concerns regarding:

Transportation and safety analysis
Walkability data
Consistency with Board policy (FAA)
⏳ The Board of Education will vote on 3/26/2026

Your voice and participation in the process are important at this stage.

 ⚖️ Preparing for Possible Legal Action
Given the significance of this decision and the concerns regarding process and policy alignment, members of the community have begun organizing resources to explore potential legal options if necessary.

All contributions will go toward legal consultation and potential next steps to ensure that decisions are made transparently, fairly, and in accordance with established policy.

Save Wootton and Crown High Schools – Say NO to option H- Keep Wootton at Rockville

Option H would permanently move Wootton HS to Crown area, then be treated as a holding school.
Wootton cluster is a mature, established community with stable feeder schools — not a product to be moved, traded, or relocated. Our students deserve stability, not disruption.

Local Crown families have waited years for a school built to serve their community.
Wootton families deserve stability.
Families in Churchill and surrounding areas deserve predictable, long-term planning too.

Keep Wootton AND Crown. Make the community stable. This region needs both schools.

MCPS previously stated that overcrowding required a new high school and committed major public funding.

March 2022: Board of Education approved the design plans
FY2024–2025: Construction funds were appropriated (Phase I completed the building shell; Phase II was planned)

MCPS had been actively working on the Crown/Damascus Boundary Study for the 2027–2028 school year, releasing boundary-based options (A, B, C, and D) in October 2025 and updated a new boundary based on community feedback.

However, only one month later, instead of narrowing the existing plans, MCPS suddenly claimed on December 1 that enrollment had declined and introduced new Options E–H, bringing the total to eight. Under Option H, Wootton would be turned into a “holding school,” effectively removing a real, permanent high school from this region. Under modified Option H, Wootton would merge with Crown high school to be a super high school. 

Why This Is So Harmful
Merging Wootton and Crown does not solve a problem — it reduces capacity and eliminates a school. When a region loses a permanent high school:

The entire area has fewer seats for future students
School boundaries become more unstable and unpredictable
Families in Wootton, Churchill, and surrounding communities face greater long-term uncertainty
This creates more risk, not less.

Growth Is Being Ignored
There are active housing developments around both Wootton and Crown, and both areas are growing. New schools attract families, and enrollment naturally increases over time. Eliminating a school now ignores future growth and guarantees instability later.

Data Concerns
Current enrollment projections rely heavily on children born between September 2019 and September 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 crisis — an abnormal period of temporary birth-rate decline. Using this data to justify eliminating a permanent school is not responsible long-term planning.

Our Demands
✅ Reject option H
✅ Keep both Wootton and Crown as real, permanent schools
✅ Stop reducing school capacity in this region
✅ Protect long-term stability for Wootton, Churchill, and surrounding communities
✅ Stop shifting planning failures onto families

Don’t abandon Wootton. Don’t abandon Crown.
Sign to protect our schools and our communities.

MCPS boundary survey link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdcFN_JbLaP77to1k2yw99M6qmNZ1nkA5HzU_0-v1aTm8IGIg/viewform

Sign the survey to save Wootton High School.

We invite current families and Wootton alumni to stand together.
Wootton has shaped generations of students and remains a lasting community, and alumni support is a powerful reminder that this school and its community are worth protecting.

Support real, data-based boundary study options (A-D) and reject merging two high schools into a single super school.
Your voice matters.

Petition Update – February 17, 2026

After the Superintendent recommended Option H—a plan that would close Wootton High School’s Rockville campus and permanently relocate Wootton students to Crown—Rockville Mayor and City Council responded with a formal letter dated February 13, 2026. In it, City leaders raised serious concerns about permanently closing a long-standing community high school and emphasized that this decision should not be rushed. They proposed a “Modified Recommendation” that keeps Crown High School serving its local community while using Crown as a temporary site during renovations (when needed), rather than permanently shutting down Wootton. The City also urged MCPS to pursue CIP funding for a Major Capital Project or renovations to keep Wootton open on its current campus. With continued residential growth in both Rockville and the Crown/Gaithersburg area, long-term planning requires two strong high schools—not a consolidation that destabilizes communities and is difficult to reverse once implemented. We respectfully urge members of the Board of Education to seriously consider Rockville’s Modified Recommendation and choose a sustainable, transparent path forward that preserves Wootton as a vital community hub.