By Angela Woolsey, reprinted from ffxnow.com, June 16th, 2025

Fairfax County Public Schools is taking over King Abdullah Academy’s campus in the Floris area south of Herndon.

The Fairfax County School Board voted 9-0 with three abstentions last Thursday (June 12) to approve a $150 million acquisition of approximately 30 acres at 2949, 2950 and 2954 Education Drive, where the Islamic private school will cease operations after July.

Described by school board members as a “once-in-a-generation” opportunity, the purchase, which is expected to close by Aug. 14, 2025, ends a years-long search for a new high school site in the western part of the county.

“I am very grateful that we were able to move forward on this, because I think that it is a unique opportunity to be able to capture a school property that is almost complete,” said School Board Vice Chair and Springfield District Representative Sandy Anderson, who introduced the motion. “I think that it offers an elegant solution to a problem that we have been grappling with for a very long time, trying to figure out a location for a western high school.”

Serving 1,030 students in kindergarten through 12th grade, King Abdullah Academy announced in January that it would close at the end of the 2024-2025 academic year after the Saudi Arabian government ceased funding and no “viable financial path to self-sustainability” emerged.

When they learned about the news from a constituent and FFXnow’s story, respectively, Sully District School Board Representative Seema Dixit and Mount Vernon District Representative Mateo Dunne saw an opening to address crowding in western Fairfax County — a concern since at least 2009.

With Metro’s Silver Line promising new development, planning and boundary studies in 2010 called for two new elementary schools and a high school for the Route 28 and Dulles corridors, per past capital improvement programs (CIP), which guide school construction, renovation and maintenance projects.

The future “western high school” officially entered the CIP for the first time in 2015, and voters approved a school bond referendum in 2021 that included $13.5 million for the site acquisition.

However, with the Silver Line’s second phase opening in 2022, competition for land in the Dulles area with development potential is fierce. Rising property and construction costs have jacked up the project’s price tag from an estimated $120 million in the fiscal years 2016-2020 CIP to over $431 million in the FY 2026-2030 CIP adopted on Feb. 6.

That exceeds the $428 million in bond funding that FCPS currently has for billions of dollars worth of renovation and maintenance needs. School bond referendums go on the ballot every two years, with the next one seeking $460 million this November.

“[The western high school] would consume all of the money for two years,” Dunne told FFXnow. “It would mean that there would be nothing else accomplished in that time frame in terms of renovation, and that’s just not something that’s conscionable.”

According to Dunne, King Abdullah Academy was willing to sell at a “cost-effective” price, but FCPS still had to jockey with developers interested in the property for housing, data centers and other uses.

Several school board members praised FCPS Superintendent Michelle Reid and her staff for their work on the deal, which covers the main school, two administrative buildings and all furniture and equipment.

“It was amazing teamwork, and … I appreciate all the support from my colleagues to make this happen,” said Dixit, who represents the area. “The school will be in the district where it needs the most, and also being supported by all of you, it means a lot.”

Because the school is generally in “fantastic condition,” no significant construction should be needed, Dunne says.

The property and its extensive amenities — including an indoor swimming pool, three gyms, a theater, and ceramics and robotics studios — could be ready for temporary use in the upcoming school year and become fully operational for fall 2026.

Site acquisition is “first step”

However, there remain “a lot of unanswered questions,” At-Large Representative Ilryong Moon noted before joining Rachna Sizemore Heizer (Braddock District) and Melanie Meren (Hunter Mill) in abstaining from the vote.

With the sale not closing until later this summer, it’s unclear how the new school will be incorporated into FCPS’ ongoing, county-wide boundary overhaul — which the school board hopes to finalize in early 2026 — or if a separate rezoning might be necessary.

That uncertainty has already irked some residents. The Citizens for Great Falls, a nonprofit advocacy group recently formed by ousted Great Falls Citizens Association leaders, lamented a “lack of transparency and disregard for citizen participation,” saying the move overshadows “months of work and meetings” by community members on the superintendent’s Boundary Review Advisory Committee.

“Major policy choices like building new schools in our community or acquiring major new facilities should involve public engagement and not be decided behind closed doors,” Citizens for Great Falls President John Halacy and Vice President Manny Dacoba said in a press release. “We are eager to learn more about how this planned proposal will fit into the overall strategy for addressing school capacity issues, boundaries, and budget.”

According to Dunne, FCPS had to pursue the acquisition “below the radar” to avoid jeopardizing its chances in the competitive bidding process. Last week’s vote was the first time the pending purchase could be discussed publicly.

“We expect that the superintendent will bring a project plan in the near-future to kind of lay out the timelines for determining the best use for the high school,” Dunne said. “I have no doubt that we will be seeking community input throughout that process.”

At the meeting, School Board Chair Karl Frisch (Providence) acknowledged that there are still “lots of decisions” to make but called the site acquisition “a great first step in ensuring that this western high school comes to fruition.”

Though it’s in Herndon, the project’s benefits could ripple across the county, school board members said, adding capacity and freeing up the additional $281 million needed to build a new school for other projects.

“This was a great opportunity, and I’m glad that we were able to exercise the flexibility to achieve this,” Mason District Representative Ricardy Anderson said. “… [I’m] really looking forward to the relief to the western part of the division so we can start to take off some of the other overcrowding issues that we have elsewhere.”