In Fairfax County kindergarten classes, school system’s future comes into focus

In Fairfax County kindergarten classes, school system’s future comes into focus - The Washington Post: "Long an enclave of predominantly white, middle-class families with a top-class school system, Fairfax has experienced a dramatic demographic shift in recent years that is nowhere more obvious than in the county’s kindergarten classrooms.
The white student population is receding and is being replaced with fast-growing numbers of poor students and children of immigrants for whom English is a second language. 
More than one-third of the 13,424 kindergartners in the county this year qualified for free or reduced-price meals, a federal measure of poverty, and close to 40 percent of the Class of 2026 requires additional English instruction, among the most ever for a Fairfax kindergarten class.
The demographic changes in Fairfax are likely to have long-term implications for the school system:
Most of this year’s kindergarten class will spend the next 12 years in county schools.
Schools officials believe that the challenges that come with a less-affluent and less-prepared population will exacerbate the system’s struggles with a widening achievement gap for minorities and ballooning class sizes.
The rising enrollment — the overall student body has surged by more than 22,000 since 2004 — is not sustainable at the current funding level, schools officials said, "