Whittier Elementary School’s modernization is taking place amid a transition in D.C. Public Schools (DCPS) leadership, and what will eventually become the start of a new mayoral administration.
For parent and former DCPS employee, Charon P.W. Hines, any future moves made on behalf of District families must build upon what she’s called the foundation built by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and DCPS central office administrators.
“We’ve been very pleased with school leadership, with the instructional delivery of the teachers, communication about upcoming events, check-ins on your child’s progress, and a very active and engaged parent-teacher organization community,” said Hines, a third-generation Washingtonian and mother of a pre-K4 Whittier student.
Hines, director of D.C. Department of Aging and Community Living, previously served as senior advisor to then-DCPS Chancellor Dr. Lewis D. Ferebee. She recently counted among several DCPS parents who attended a meet-and-greet that interim DPCS Chancellor Dr. Kim Jackson hosted for Ward 1 and 4 parents at La Coop Coffee on Kennedy Street in Northwest.
In June, Bowser appointed Jackson as interim DCPS chancellor, not long after Ferebee resigned to take a job in the private sector. By that time, Jackson had 14 years under her belt as an award-winning principal, instructional superintendent, and chief of schools. In DCPS central office, she facilitated the launch of the annual Literacy Institute, Building Blocks curriculum, and other literacy projects.
Speaking in her role as a parent, Hines told The Informer that Jackson has the experience needed to take DCPS to the next level.
“She has a strong background in school leadership, instructional content and delivery,” Hines said. “I’m excited to hear about her vision as…her leadership trajectory is taking her to the top at this point.”
During a school modernization process that has relegated Whittier students, faculty and staff to a nearby modular campus, Hines has leveraged her experience to help parents navigate the transition from the school building to the temporary accommodations. She called it part of her obligation to ensure that her child and others enjoy their neighborhood school.
Hines said that Jackson, if appointed and approved as the next chancellor, can curate that type of environment across all District public schools by sticking to the basics.
“[There’s] parent engagement, attendance, wraparound services for students, also making sure that our students are prepared for college and career, whichever track that they choose is the best fit,” Hines told The Informer. “What I would like to see is of course continuing those successful investments and interventions that Mayor Bowser has worked on throughout her public service career, especially … when we think about modernizing schools, increasing enrollment, engaging more with the labor leaders that make sure DCPS operates on a day-to-day basis.”
A Choice for the Next Mayor, and a Parent’s Stress About Middle School
The next District mayor, to be decided during the Nov. 3 general election, will have the responsibility of appointing the next DCPS chancellor. The mayoral candidates are: Democratic mayoral nominee and Ward 4 D.C. Council member Janeese Lewis George, D.C. Statehood Green Party nominee Robert L. Gross, and independent nominee Dr. Rhonda Hamilton.
At the end of her Oct. 8 meet-and-greet at La Coop Coffee, Jackson said she hadn’t spoken with Lewis George, the presumptive winner in a majority-Democratic city.
“No word yet,” Jackson told The Informer, “but I am here, and I’m going to do everything I need to do for the children of DCPS.”
Amanda Michelle Gomez, communications director for the Lewis George campaign, confirmed just as much.
“The campaign has no news to announce right now, especially as transition has not yet begun,” Gomez said in an email. “What I can say is that Janeese Lewis George will conduct a professional and transparent search to attract the absolute best talent possible to help lead this city and address the challenges we face. We are confident that we will get the best person for the job, based on their experience and approach. Any decision will be rooted in measurable outcomes for our students in all [eight] wards.”
In a statement, Hamilton told The Informer that she’s been working with her Commission on Educational Excellence to develop a comprehensive approach to engage stakeholders in her decision to appoint the next chancellor, if elected.
“Central to this effort is my commitment to ensuring that DCPS educators, students, school personnel, parents, and community leaders have an opportunity to provide meaningful input into the selection process,” Hamilton’s statement read. “I believe their perspectives are essential to identifying the leadership qualities, educational priorities, and institutional reforms necessary to strengthen our public education system.”
Hamilton touted Jackson’s experience, familiarity with DCPS, and focus on chronic absenteeism, improving students’ academic outcomes, and teacher professional development. Even so, she said she would make a decision with transparency and accountability as her North Star, and in collaboration with the community.
“I remain open to her permanent appointment, but my decision will be guided by demonstrated performance, meaningful stakeholder input, and what is in the best interests of DCPS students, families, and educators,” Hamilton said. “Our children and educators deserve more than promises. They deserve educational leadership that delivers measurable results, restores confidence in our schools, and prepares every student and educator for a successful future.”
Gross didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment about Jackson.
Jackson’s Ward 1 and 4 meet-and-greet represents what a DCPS spokesperson calls more of an effort to be front-facing. This event preceded what’s scheduled to be a Ward 7 and 8 meet-and-greet at Grounded: Plant Shop, Cafe, & Wellness Studio on Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue in Southeast; a Ward 2 and 3 meet-and-greet at Bread Furst on Connecticut Avenue in Northwest; and a Ward 6 meet-and-greet at Ebenezers Coffeehouse in Northeast.
Throughout much of the morning of Oct. 8, staff and parents from Barnard Elementary School, Whittier Elementary School, Truesdell Elementary School, Shepherd Elementary School, John Lewis Elementary School, Powell Bilingual Elementary School, and Ida B. Wells Middle School sipped coffee, spoke among one another and engaged in conversation with Jackson.
DCPS’ Community Action Team assisted in this effort, which included provision of language access resources.
A Petworth parent who asked to be identified as Marylin R. expressed her gratitude for what they called a strong pre-K program within walking distance of their home. Marylin made note of the teachers and tight-knit community that’s fostered their child’s academic and socioemotional growth.
“It’s the fact that as we’re walking down the street… [we’re] saying hi to 10 different kids that live in the neighborhood,” Marylin told The Informer. “I think that that’s just magical. You don’t expect that from an urban setting, and to get that here is incredible.”
In the same vein, Marylin acknowledged feeling anxious about the road ahead as their young one stays in the D.C. public school system.
“Not all kids have safe and stable homes, and that makes it challenging because then a lot of people are feeling like they’re questioning, ‘Should we stay in an urban environment?’” Marylin said. “I want to hear where the conversation is going about making our schools better all the way through because I know a lot of parents are feeling good about where they’re sending their kids for primary school, but they lose the confidence as middle school and high schools come up, and that breaks my heart.”
A Father’s Fight for Accountability
Ward 4 father Kisembe Namusyule told The Informer that, as a former parent-teacher association president and local coach, he’s been able to meet many of the neighborhood youth who attend Ida B. Wells Middle School with his daughter.
“A lot of them are well behaved and are doing the best they can,” Namusyule said. “But they’re also struggling with the systemic violence that’s accepted.”
On the morning of Oct. 8, Namusyule and his daughter, a sixth grader, attended the meet-and-greet at La Coop Coffee to speak with Jackson about what Namusyule recounted as an ordeal that started with a football player’s coercion of his daughter and another female student to smell him.
In his account, Namusyule said that, after Namusyule’s daughter walked away, the football player yanked the collar of her hoodie before she broke away and punched him. From that point, as Namusyule recounted, the football player swung at her face with a fist, and his daughter ducked that punch before a teacher standing nearby in the hallway told them “cut it out.”
As Namusyule noted, it was his daughter, not school personnel, who told him about the alleged incident when they later met outside of Ida B. Wells Middle School on Oct. 5. Though she walked away physically unharmed, Namusyule told The Informer that the honor student’s attitude toward school has soured. He went as far as to mention her choice to skip the Oct. 7 football game in which her alleged aggressor was participating, and stay home on Oct. 8.
“The toughest part for her was [that when] a child harms another child, then the expectation is that the child will be disciplined,” Namusyule said. “What has been disheartening to my daughter has been [that] a teacher saw her in danger and did nothing. She’s thinking these are people she can trust. She said the school is basically a system and the school just wants to protect the school.”
On the morning following the alleged incident, Namusyule visited Ida B. Wells Middle School and met with a restorative justice coordinator who, according to him, said “dad, they’re fifth graders for real,” and dismissed his daughter’s experience as “play fighting.” Namusyule also said the coordinator never followed through on her pledge to accompany his daughter to her classes.
A day later, Namusyule submitted a legal grievance to Ida B. Wells principal William B. Lyles III, the D.C. Office of the General Counsel (OGC) and the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. He said he did so upon learning about his rights under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), and while discovering that Ida B. Wells Middle School didn’t have a Title IX coordinator who’s tasked with investigating complaints about gender-based violence.
According to Namusyule, the restorative justice coordinator’s request for a virtual meeting appeared in his inbox at the same time he emailed his legal grievance. Less than an hour later, the restorative justice coordinator emailed a summary of an investigation that Namusyule said didn’t include information about the teacher who saw the incident, the football player’s account of what transpired, nor any avenues for family to view tape recordings and other evidence.
Namusyule told The Informer that, shortly after, while picking up his daughter from her after-school activity, he received a call from Lyles, who was at the football game that the former’s daughter decided against attending.
That’s when Namusyule said he learned, directly from Lyles, that Lyles didn’t read the entirety of his legal grievance.
“I’m like, ‘Yo, can you just agree to just hit me back via email?’” Namusyule said as he spoke about the moment where even his daughter asked Lyles to respond to her father’s correspondence. “I don’t feel safe talking to [him] on the phone. I wanted everything that we talked about to be written so that there’s no ambiguity in this process.”
Namusyule said that, during his time with the interim chancellor on Oct. 8, he showed her, DCPS chief external affairs officer Kera Tyler and OGC attorney Maya Washington printouts of a malfunctioning online Title IX reporting form and a Title IX contact list that still had Jackson-Reed High School identified as Woodrow Wilson High School, and former DCPS principal Loren Brody designated as the contact at Takoma Education Campus.
He said his dialogue with the trio prompted an inquiry for more.
“I gave them my phone to put in their email address, but it would have been the second time their offices would have received this information,” Namusyule told The Informer. “It’s tough to say who is to be trusted when the District government provided a barrier for me to execute my daughter’s right to justice and her entitlement to safety.”
Hours after his meeting with Jackson at La Coop, Namusyule told The Informer that he received an email from DCPS’ Comprehensive Alternative Resolution and Equity (CARE) Team, the body responsible for receiving claims of discrimination, sexual harassment, bullying, or unfair treatment of students, parents, and visitors at public school campuses.
According to correspondence reviewed by The Informer, the CARE Team opened two cases — one involving Title IX violation and another, DCPS’ alleged failure to report the incident locally and districtwide.
“All I can do is monitor the situation and do my best against forces of complacency, forms not being available, directories not being available, and positions not being filled in schools, even though the city is getting federal funds,” Namusyule said.
He lamented what would’ve happened to less resourceful parents in his situation.
“If it wasn’t for me doing my own self education, who was going to win in this process?’ Namusyule asked. “Was I going to be informed of my FERPA or Title IX rights in this process? Is there a person who has a job that is to update government websites specifically to make sure Title IX online reporting forms are valid web pages? It’s either yes or no, that the position is filled or it’s not filled.”
Dr. Jackson Looks to the Future
DCPS central office didn’t immediately respond to request for comment about Namusyule’s allegations.
In speaking more broadly about the middle and high school public school experience, Jackson cited the sixth and ninth grade academies launched under Ferebee as a viable tool for fostering a young person’s transition into the next level of their K-12 education.
“It’s really helpful with attendance and making certain our kids are in a cohort,” Jackson told The Informer. “In the sixth grade space and ninth grade space, it’s a group of teachers they have [that] are all like a support working with them, instead of them moving to the next space and just being on their own there with the cohorts. I love that model, and I hope we continue with that.”
Jackson said, with so much happening outside the school building, curating the ideal academic experience for a young person requires collaboration with other agencies and partners that are experts in tackling the problems that the youth face.
“Every agency in the city is a partner and helpful to us, so we cannot do this work on our own,” Jackson said. “I’m grateful that every agency that I’ve reached out to [has] been supportive. We’re here to service the students from D.C. that are in our schools, but we need the entire city to support us.”
DCPS is in the fourth year of a five-year strategic plan grounded in academic success, school connectivity and preparation for life after high school. The plan, which spans between 2023 and 2028, also prioritizes targeted-base support to ensure academic and social success for Black and Latino students, students receiving special education services, and multilingual learners.
In addition to sixth and ninth grade academies, public school leaders have focused on increased enrollment in career and technical education programs, assessment of after-school programming, increasing the quality of math instruction starting at the pre-K level, and the integration of literacy throughout the entire K-12 learning experience.
This has happened amid a debate about in-school technology use, concerns about the District’s ability to sustain in-school mental health resources, and allegations that DCPS denied a special needs student their school lottery placement. Through it all, Jackson said she stands ready to continue to carry out a long-articulated vision.
“Chancellor Ferebee left us in a good space. We’re going to take that and move forward,” Jackson told The Informer. “We will continue on with our strategic plan. We are going to continue moving forward with our literacy efforts. Math has been a big focus so we will continue to lean into that. And, of course, our early childhood education, providing those supports in that space as well.”
