Schools

Federal Court Rules in Favor of APS in Drawn-Out Education Dispute

By Jo DeVoe

(Updated at 2:50 p.m.) A multi-year legal battle between a family and Arlington Public Schools over the appropriateness of their child’s special education support ended this summer with a decision in APS’s favor, handed down by federal court.

While the avenues for dispute resolution dead-end there for the family, the decision provides an insight into how fraught the special education system can be. What is supposed to be a collaborative effort among schools and parents can turn into a grueling legal process if the parents and the school system disagree over aspects of the child’s disability or which setting best meets their needs.

In this case, the parents sued APS, requesting it pay for tuition at a private day school that — according to them — would be better for their child than Williamsburg Middle School. The federal court decision said APS did not have to pay the cost of tuition.

The court also overturned a lower ruling by a state officer who said the school system should reimburse the parents for a private evaluation they obtained. A psychologist found their child exhibited disabilities that APS did not find in their evaluation.

This case reveals how some decisions favor schools partially because parents make procedural missteps before they realize that every step of the process could become evidence in a hearing later on, special education lawyer Juliet Hiznay tells ARLnow.

She said both the hearing officer and the federal decision were well-reasoned, and that the parents made a couple of common errors.

“A lot of parents get caught up in sort of what I call traps for the unwary: not preserving their claims, not communicating them during meetings, not getting them on the record,” she said.

That the case reached federal court is also exceedingly rare, because the special education legal system is set up to have these issues resolved in meetings and mediation sessions, she said. The parents sued after an administrative process with an independent hearing officer did not go in their favor.

“There is a risk associated with doing this. There’s an emotional toll, and practical price to pay: School districts don’t like being sued, so the relationship gets destroyed when you sue a school division,” she said. “And many parents are afraid, and some of them have more than one child, and they don’t want to risk any kind of retaliation by the school district.”

One family’s experience

The boy at the center of the lawsuit is currently attending a private school in Sterling, Virginia, according to federal court documents. The home school is Nottingham Elementary School, which he attended from kindergarten through fourth grade.

While at Nottingham, his parents and school officials noticed he struggled academically and socially. During an assessment in the first grade, he “presented with difficulty in a number of different areas” including reading, writing and math, attention and organization and making friends, according to a lawsuit filed on behalf of the parents.

He was given an Individualized Education Plan (IEP), a document outlining the services the school will provide, under the category of “specific learning disability.” But by fourth grade, he “still continued to struggle greatly,” per the lawsuit.

According to Virginia Department of Education data, APS has been providing services to steadily more children with presumed or diagnosed specific learning disabilities in the last four years.

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JUST IN: APS Announces Universal Mask Mandate for Return to School

By Jo DeVoe

Arlington Public Schools will require universal masking at the start of the school year, regardless of vaccination status, according to an email to families this morning.

The order applies to all students, staff and visitors inside APS buildings and on school buses, Superintendent Francisco Durán said in the announcement. Masks will not be required when eating or during outside recess, P.E. class, athletics and other outdoor activities.

The new school year begins Monday, Aug. 30.

“Universal masks are part of a layered approach to help our schools stay open and safe, and to ensure all students can safely return to our buildings, especially when physical distancing is not possible at all times and not all our students are eligible yet for vaccinations,” Durán wrote.

APS’s new mandate mirrors the rules for in-person summer school. It comes amid a rise in COVID-19 cases in Arlington County, fueled by the more contagious Delta variant. The announcement comes on the heels of similar universal mask mandates announced this week by Fairfax County and Montgomery County public schools.

This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its mask guidance to recommend that even vaccinated people wear masks in indoor, public settings where prevalence of the virus is elevated.

“Universal masking for the start of the school year aligns with the latest CDC guidance, and the recommendations of local and state public health authorities, to help ensure all students can safely return to school buildings,” Durán said.

Citing CDC guidance, Durán said a student who is within three to six feet of an infected student will not be considered a close contact as long as both students are wearing masks and the school takes other precautions.

“We will continue to regularly review our masking practices and other health and safety measures to keep them in line with national, state and local health recommendations,” Durán said. “As guidance changes, we will keep the community informed of any changes to our practices.”

Durán encouraged families to vaccinate children ages 12 and older.

“The most effective tool for protecting our school community and preventing the spread of COVID-19 is vaccination,” he said. “We look forward to welcoming students back to school for in-person learning, five days per week.”

Divide Over School-Issued Devices Remains After Year of Online Learning

By Anuj Khemka
Arlington Public Schools students learning on their devices while in person during the pandemic (via APS/Twitter)

Seven years after the initial rollout of Arlington Public Schools’ digital learning initiative, and after a year of heavier use due to distance-learning, opinions on tech in schools remain divided.

For today’s students and parents, virtual learning during the pandemic only highlighted the benefits of and exacerbated the drawbacks to iPads and laptops. Parents say their kids struggle to focus, navigate programs and engage with the material. Students tell ARLnow that the devices can make their learning easier, more efficient and more interesting, but some have also outsmarted controls to watch TV and play games.

“They help you out. You can just search up anything you need there,” said Liam, a rising seventh-grader in APS. He added that it’s easier to stay on top of work and grades online using Canvas, the division’s learning management system, saying “you can see if you have any missing assignments, and if you’re doing well in school or not.”

Views appear to remain as entrenched as they were in 2019, when North Carolina State University studied tech use and support for devices in APS. At the time, 55% of parents supported the initiative, compared to the 85% of teachers and 75% of students who said devices improved the learning experience.

Through its initial rollout, APS aimed to give each 2nd-12th grade student a tablet or laptop for school use by 2017. From 2017 up until the pandemic, APS provided iPads to all students between third and eighth grade and MacBook Airs to high school students.

Today, the school system uses approximately 34,000 student devices, including both individual devices and shared computers, according to an APS spokesperson. This includes all K-2 students, who were given iPads during the pandemic to facilitate virtual learning when schools were closed. This year, K-2 students will continue to have access to individual devices.

Most students will be in-person this fall, using their devices in the classroom setting. About 890 will be learning fully at a distance, due to the pandemic and personal preference. That preference is set to eventually give rise to a full-time, APS-run virtual learning academy for those who want the flexibility provided by learning at home on their own time.

Over the last year, iPads and MacBooks were how students interacted with teachers and classmates and completed assignments via Microsoft Teams and Google Workspace apps, along with apps such as Dreambox, which offers interactive math lessons and games, and Seesaw, which is like the digital equivalent of a homework folder that both teachers and parents can access.

“Our kids are using their iPads for content delivery, for collaboration, and for writing, reading, and simulation. Creatively, they’re also doing activities and learning through research and creating projects,” Arlington Traditional School instructional technology coordinator Marie Hone said.

Rising fourth-grader Spencer suggests that without iPads, virtual learning would have been more difficult.

“We were able to have calls with our teacher and meet together for school, unlike the year before that,” he said.

Pre-pandemic, high schoolers Anthony Doll and Wyatt Shoelson say that they used their MacBooks in just about every class.

“MacBooks make it easier to keep everything in one place. Typing everything out and going on websites for classes is easier. It’s better to do it electronically than on paper,” Doll said. “My high school experience would be a lot more disorganized without MacBooks.”

Still, concerns remain. Rising second-grader Cecilia Leonard tells ARLnow that the approximately three hours she spent on her iPad throughout the school day hurt her eyes. Experts say that kids who spend too much time on screens may experience eye fatigue and sleep problems.

Middle and elementary school students also tell stories of classmates circumventing device restrictions to play video games and stream videos.

“There are these websites that are pretty much educational, but there’s also a non-educational twist to them, and you can play games on them. We also figured out you can watch Hulu on certain websites,” Spencer said.

And parents? Some have been critical of the program since 2014, when they said it was put in the budget with little public input. After watching their kids learn online for a full year, some parents are not convinced they help. Whether during Arlington School Board meetings or on online forums, some parents continue to be concerned about whether iPads and MacBooks help students or hurt them.

“Devices are not the answer to teach kids. Many kids craved paper and were denied. The iPad was a wonderful connection device but difficult for production and navigation of several tabs for middle school kids,” said parent Kelly Alexis, who manages the Facebook group Arlington Education Matters, where much discussion over iPads and laptops has taken place.

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APS Encourages More Parents to Enroll As It Prepares for Full-Time In-Person School

By Jo DeVoe

With one month to go before school starts, parents are being urged to enroll their kids in some Arlington public schools amid a continued drop in enrollment.

Screenshots and emails provided to ARLnow indicate some elementary schools, including Discovery and Jamestown, need just a few more kindergarteners before they can officially get one more kindergarten class. The correspondences say the extra class would reduce class sizes and keep teachers at the school they were teaching at last year.

“If you have a rising Kindergartener, please register your child ASAP!” one woman wrote on Nextdoor. “I heard through the grapevine that [Discovery is] 3 kids shy of a third class… which means they may have to let an amazing teacher and assistant go! Help spread the word to any new families in the neighborhood!”

An email to Jamestown families pleaded with families to “pretty, pretty please” register their children as soon as possible, as the elementary only needs 10 more students to add a fourth class.

School starts on Monday, Aug. 30 for most students. The vast majority will be in-person five days a week, though APS is offering a full-distance model this year for families still unsure about returning to school amid the pandemic, as cases rise and as the state recommends all students wear masks at the elementary level.

The encouragement to enroll comes on the heels of new enrollment numbers APS released earlier this month, showing a continued drop in APS students since the start of the pandemic. The new data indicates so far, there are 26,052 students registered for the fall. Of those, 891 will be full-time distance learning, and 25,161 students will be in-person full-time. In June of this year, there were 26,502 students enrolled, and in June 2020, 28,142 students were enrolled.

APS attributed the drop last year due to the pandemic, when many families decided to wait a year, homeschool their kids or switch to private and parochial schools. Since then, officials have said the schools should prepare for enrollment to bounce back.

Enrollment numbers will be made official in October. Lower summer numbers and encouragement to register are both annual phenomena, APS spokesman Frank Bellavia said.

“Every year at this time, we encourage families to register as there are always families new to the area, rising kindergarten students, military and embassy families,” he said. “We typically see a large bump in registrations in August and even September.”

Two years ago, Ashlawn Elementary School was slightly below projections and then saw 49 students register on the Friday before school started, he said.

As for the emphasis on class sizes, that’s because APS had to increase class sizes at all levels due to budgetary decisions made earlier this year.

Enrollment is also fluid within APS’s two programs, in-person and fully virtual.

“The total enrollment in the Virtual Learning Program has decreased by more than 300 students since June, when we announced that virtual families can transition to in-person school at any time,” spokeswoman Catherine Ashby said.

Bellavia said teachers at schools that lose classes due to lower enrollment won’t lose jobs, but will instead be transferred to where they’re needed.

“We are committed to retaining the excellent teachers that we have, and look for opportunities in their current school or to re-assign teachers to school where enrollment requires additional teachers,” he said.

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Gov. Ralph Northam Visits Barcroft Elementary

By Jo DeVoe
1/5

Gov. Ralph Northam and Virginia Secretary of Education Atif Qarni visited Barcroft Elementary School today (Monday) to get a glimpse of summer learning opportunities in Arlington Public Schools.

The visit is part of a tour of Virginia schools offering summer learning to select students in most need of academic support after a year of virtual learning. In Arlington, more than 4,600 students are enrolled in summer learning, of whom nearly 3,500 are attending in person.

“It’s been amazing… seeing kids happy to be in the classroom, seeing teachers and staff so enthusiastic,” Northam said. “Our future is in good hands.”

At Barcroft (625 S. Wakefield Street), 100 students are enrolled in summer learning, which is focused on strengthening math and reading skills, said Catherine Ashby, a spokeswoman for APS. The school system has an additional 480 elementary students participating in a new program, available for those who initially qualified for summer school but were deemed unable to participate.

Initially, APS had expanded eligibility requirements for summer school to reach more students. Citing teacher shortages, however, it later contracted eligibility. This summer, 850 teachers and staff are providing instruction to certain students with disabilities and who are learning English, as well as some regular-education students with failing grades or who need a core class to graduate high school.

Inside the classroom, students and teachers wore masks. The governor is preparing to release new mask guidelines this week in light of rising cases of the coronavirus. The new guidance will replace the executive order governing mask wearing, which is set to expire on Sunday (July 25).

As cases climb and the more contagious Delta variant spreads, and with most children unable to receive the vaccine, the American College of Pediatrics — of which Northam is a member — recently recommended that all kids should wear masks while indoors. Northam said the new state rules will likely be aligned with recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“We will definitely have guidelines before the weekend,” he said.

Virginia is reporting about 250 to 300 new cases per day, due in part to the rise of the Delta variant. Northam said he encouraged parents to vaccinate their children 12 years old and older with the Pfizer shot. About 35% of eligible children in the Commonwealth have received their first dose, he said.

Still, state officials said they want children attending school in person.

“We have had a lot of unfinished learning,” Qarni said. “We do know the best place to learn is in person.”

APS officials have pledged that the school system will be fully in-person this fall. For the first four weeks of school, APS will be focused on social-emotional learning and academic assessments, Ashby said, as it tries to make up for lost learning last school year.

At Barcroft, Northam also saw a new literacy program at work.

Principal Judy Apostolico-Buck tells ARLnow the school formally implemented the program — which focuses on teaching the mechanics of reading — last year. This approach, called structured literacy, will be implemented across elementary schools in Arlington this fall to improve reading proficiency rates.

“We need something that guarantees literacy proficiency for all students,” she said. “It’s been a big shift, but the research unequivocally shows that this is what we need to do.”

School Board Approves Relocating SROs Off APS Grounds

By Jo DeVoe
Arlington School Board Chair Monique O’Grady during the June 24 meeting (via Arlington Public Schools)

The Arlington School Board voted during its meeting last night (Thursday) to remove School Resource Officers (SROs) from school buildings.

As part of the vote, SROs — a unit of sworn officers within the Arlington County Police Department — will be moved off-site and will still provide services like driving and substance abuse education, as well as law enforcement support on an as-needed basis.

Officers will get a new title to reflect their new role, such as “youth resource officers,” Superintendent Francisco Durán told the board.

He told the board his recommendation to retain the relationship but relocate the officers is grounded in recommendations made by an APS workgroup that was convened last year to examine the role of SROs after the Arlington branch of the NAACP called for their removal. The local NAACP cited disparities in juvenile arrests in Arlington, in the wake of the death of George Floyd at the hands of police and the conversation nationwide about race and policing.

“I want to thank my colleagues for their support for moving this piece of historic leadership forward,” Board Chair Monique O’Grady said during the meeting.

Board Vice-Chair Barbara Kanninen commended O’Grady for her work bringing this to fruition.

“I especially want to make clear to the community that this was a priority for you as chair,” she said. “This was the one item, other than dealing with the pandemic, that you committed to, argued strongly for, and now we’re here.”

Over the next two months, Arlington Public Schools will be hammering out a new Memorandum of Understanding with the Arlington County Police Department to prepare for the start of school this fall, said APS Chief of Staff Brian Stockton.

“The last one took nine months this time we’re going to try and speed it up,” he said.

The decision comes nearly two months after a School Resource Officer helped to secure Wakefield High School in response to a call from a staff member, who alleged a student was making threats and had what was described as a bulletproof vest.

Funding for SROs, a total of $3 million, comes from Arlington County and is a gift to APS, Stockton said.

Some speakers argued for reinvesting the $3 million in mental health services.

Among them was rising Washington-Liberty High School junior Benjamin Portner, who told board members about his experience with SROs in elementary school and how still today, he carries “a great deal of nervousness when they pass me in the hall or even when they try to speak friendly manner.”

“Having them on and off-campus is a constant reminder to these students, and really all students, that the potential for violence remains in schools,” he said.

Board Member Cristina Diaz-Torres said she agreed with his sentiments and those of other speakers who asked for the $3 million to be reinvested in mental health services, but concluded that it is not a possibility at this time.

“[The vote] is a step forward, but it is certainly not the end of the journey: There is so much more that needs to be done,” she said. “We need to do to beef up the mental health resources for our students, so we can ensure that any student in crisis has the resources they need and they never have to interact with an SRO or the criminal-legal system at all.”

APS is the second district in the region to remove SROs from schools.

Arlington Kids Among Magnet School’s Newest Class, But Future Remains Uncertain

By Anuj Khemka
Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology (courtesy of Sean Nguyen)

Months after parents and students wondered if rising freshmen in Arlington could attend Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, the results are in.

The Class of 2025 will include Arlington kids, although the exact number is not known.

The results, released Wednesday, cap a turbulent admissions cycle. Fairfax County Public Schools made significant changes to the school admissions criteria — among them scrapping a standardized test and written teacher recommendation — which parents protested and challenged with two lawsuits.

The changes resulted in the school’s “most diverse class in recent history.”

Thomas Jefferson, nicknamed “TJ,” is a STEM-focused magnet school open to students from Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun and Prince William counties who meet certain academic requirements to get in. US News ranks it as the number one public high school in the United States.

While Arlington annually sends students to the school, the relationship is not a steady one. When facing a budget deficit, Arlington Public Schools sometimes suggests cutting funding. That happened earlier this year, when Superintendent Francisco Durán’s proposed budget for the 2021-22 school year, which had a $42 million gap, put TJ funding on the chopping block.

In response, some Arlington parents and students mobilized to advocate for funding tuition. Then-sophomore Lauren Fisher was among four parents and students to speak at a School Board hearing on March 23.

“If I were to sum up TJ in a few words, it would be an animated community of nerds,” Fisher said. “The students there are incredibly enthusiastic and encouraging, and this energy is contagious. I’ve never felt more encouraged to try or learn new things regardless of how nerdy they might be.”

When the School Board released its amended budget in early April, TJ was no longer among the next school year’s cuts, though the reason for the reversal was not clear.

Still, Arlington students’ access to the magnet school could end in a future budget cycle. Director of Secondary Education Tyrone Byrd tells ARLnow that in difficult budget situations, funding for the magnet school would be among the first of proposed cuts.

“Our commitment is to APS kids and APS buildings, that’s our first priority,” Byrd said. “As far as I know, there’s no purposeful movement toward removing TJ from our options to kids, but when it gets tight, we have to start looking for avenues to correct that.”

Former TJ parent Jennifer Atkin, who remains involved in the Arlington-TJ community, recalled a similar effort two years ago when then-Superintendent Patrick Murphy suggested cutting transportation funding.

“I believe one of the values that Arlington and the School Board profess is equity and access, and I think there’s a feeling amongst parents that in order for them to make good on that they really need to continue the relationship that they have with TJ,” Atkin said. “If you cut off access to this public education opportunity, what you’re really doing is cutting off access to [specialized] programs to the people who are middle and lower-income within Arlington, which runs counter to this idea that you’re promoting equity and access.”

Atkin suggests that the magnet school remains a target for budget cuts because the Arlington-TJ community is relatively small, and tuition cuts would anger fewer people than cuts to other programs. Byrd disputes that theory, saying that the county considers these cuts because the APS prioritizes its own resources first and foremost.

Should access to her school be in danger next year, senior Alexandra Fall said she is prepared to pick up where she left off in April, writing to board members and motivating peers to take action.

“I would try to get people involved,” Fall said. “I know that the community of Arlington kids at TJ is very strong because they ride the buses together and they’ve all come from a similar place.”

Fall and Atkin said they doubt the struggle to keep Arlington students at TJ will ever reach a resolution.

“The problem is with every election cycle, the composition of the school board changes,” Atkin said. “Even if this school board were to say, ‘We’re going to stop proposing cuts to TJ,’ it doesn’t mean that the next school board will operate the same way. That’s the nature of politics.”

Photo courtesy of Sean Nguyen

APS Unveils Panels Honoring Key Figures in School Desegregation

By Jo DeVoe
1/7

A new installation outside Dorothy Hamm Middle School tells the story of the four students who integrated the building, formerly Stratford Junior High School, six decades ago.

Four free-standing panels and a wall-mounted panel, connected by a trail, depict Gloria Thompson, Ronald Deskins, Lance Newman and Michael Jones — the four students who desegregated the building on Feb. 2, 1959 — as well as Dorothy Hamm, the new school’s namesake and prominent civil rights activist in Arlington, and Barbara Johns, who at 16 led a student strike for equal education at a high school in Farmville, Virginia.

During a dedication ceremony for the new Stratford Commemorative Trail on Friday, several speakers said the installation equally inspires children to achieve greatness and charges Arlington Public Schools to continue making history.

“Rest assured that every child will leave this school knowing the civil rights history that happened here, understanding that while four students did begin the desegregation process in 1959, many others were denied that opportunity, and it came later,” school Principal Ellen Smith said. “Our students must know that as citizens of our school, our county, our state and our nation, they have the responsibility to speak up, to say something and make good trouble, as [former Rep.] John Lewis so aptly stated.”

The panels challenge those who walk the trail to take action and remind middle schoolers can make a difference at their age, she added.

In 2016, the school was designated a local historic district and APS convened a committee to find a way to honor its history. Soon after, APS embarked on a process to convert the school at 4100 Vacation Lane from a building housing the H-B Woodlawn and Stratford programs to a neighborhood middle school. It was renamed for Hamm and reopened to students in 2019. Final touches were finished during the 2020-21 school year.

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APS School Board Considers Limiting Role of School Resource Officers

By Jo DeVoe

A number of changes could be coming soon to the police department’s School Resource Officers unit that serves Arlington Public Schools.

On Thursday, June 24, the School Board is slated to consider reforms proposed by Superintendent Francisco Durán. Among them, Durán recommends stationing SROs near schools — but not within them — and shifting some responsibilities they handle onto school staff. As of now, he is not recommending changing the number of sworn officers assigned to schools.

“The decision to relocate SROs… is not to diminish the longstanding partnership that we have with ACPD but instead to focus on increasing student supports by effectively utilizing the support structures we have in place,” Durán said during a School Board meeting on Thursday. “The nonenforcement support duties performed by SROs in schools will be something we should focus on having APS staff provide.”

Such changes would require revisions to APS’s Memorandum of Understanding with ACPD. The superintendent said APS is discussing new locations for the officers with the county.

“I want to thank [SROs] for the work they have done,” he said. “They have played an important role in keeping our schools safe and I believe they will continue to do that.”

The recommendations come a few weeks after a School Resource Officer secured Wakefield High School in response to a call from a staff member, who alleged a student was making verbal threats and had what was described as a bulletproof vest.

SROs received renewed attention a few years ago after a rise in school shootings. But the Arlington branch of the NAACP called for their removal, citing disparities in juvenile arrests in Arlington, after the death of George Floyd at the hands of police prompted a national conversation about race and policing. An APS workgroup was subsequently formed and received a wave of community input.

Durán said his changes are grounded in the recommendations from this workgroup.

APS Chief of Staff Brian Stockton said members were evenly split: one third supported SROs in schools, another third did not, and the remaining third had no strong opinions. The final recommendations were backed by a surprising amount of consensus, he said.

“We were shocked that when we presented those recommendations, we didn’t have one person who pushed back,” he said, although there was some disagreement over the difference between relocating School Resources Officers and “getting them out of schools.”

Board members congratulated the group for its efforts and many welcomed the recommendations, including Chair Monique O’Grady.

“One of the things I heard from the community members was that they didn’t want to dishonor the police throughout this process. I think they walked away with respect for the officers who have chosen to try and be supportive of students the way they can be,” she said. “I do think it’s time — where we are in this nation and the concerns we see across the country — that we think differently [about SROs]. I think that that was a lot of what we heard from students as well.”

Board Member Cristina Diaz-Torres said in an ideal world, every ACPD officer would be trained in how to deal more effectively with youth, but until then, these changes mark a good intermediate step.

“It’s no secret that I believe police don’t belong in schools,” she said. “I think there is an excellent educational role they can play when called upon… but it’s important that it is not a consistent presence — it is finite and limited in scope and use.”

She added that the change will not solve discipline discrepancies in Arlington.

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Mary Kadera Captures Democratic School Board Endorsement

By Jo DeVoe

Mary Kadera has received the endorsement of the Arlington County Democratic Committee, following a caucus that was conducted online for the first time.

Kadera, the vice president of the Arlington County Council of PTAs, will now advance to the Nov. 2 general election to determine who will fill a seat currently held by School Board Chair Monique O’Grady. The chair announced in January that she will not seek re-election.

(School Board races are officially nonpartisan and parties can only endorse candidates, not nominate them as in a primary.)

“I am honored and humbled by voters’ faith in me to act in the best interest of all APS students, families, and staff,” Kadera said in a statement. “If elected to the School Board in November, I will work hard to rebuild relationships among APS leadership, the School Board, and the community as our schools fully reopen and we support our students’ academic, emotional, and social needs. I will work hard to earn the trust of communities of color as an ally in the fight for equity and justice.”

Due to the pandemic, Arlington Dems conducted voting online for the first time, although in-person voting was also an option. From last Monday, May 17, through Sunday, 6,207 ballots were cast for two Democratic school board candidates, Kadera and her opponent, attorney Miranda Turner. Kadera received 3,836 votes (~62%) and Turner got 2,368 votes (~38%).

The turnout set a local record, “exceeding the county caucus record of 5,972 votes, set in the 2017 School Board caucus,” the party noted in a press release.

“We congratulate Mary, and thank Miranda Turner for her willingness to step up to serve our community at this challenging time,” Arlington Dems School Board Endorsement Caucus Director Alexandra Zins said. We also thank outgoing School Board Member Monique O’Grady for her distinguished service.”

Turner tweeted out her response to the results last night (Monday).

More on Kadera, from the press release:

The current vice president of the Arlington County Council of PTAs and a mother of two middle school-aged children, Kadera has more than 25 years experience in pre-K through 12 education. She has served in a variety of roles, including as a middle school and high school teacher. Kadera also was the vice president for education at PBS, where she managed PBS’s portfolio of national digital education services and coordinated the educational initiatives of PBS and its local member stations. Currently an education non-profit leader, Kadera also led the McKinley Elementary School PTA for two years (2018-2020), where she stewarded her community through a challenging school move. During the pandemic, she organized volunteers to provide groceries, books and school supplies to families in need across Arlington.

Online voting was funded by a $59,000 grant from the nonprofit National Cybersecurity Center, which raises cyber awareness in the public and private sectors. Arlington Dems partnered with Democracy Live, which leadership described as the largest provider of mobile and cloud-based voting technologies in the U.S.

“We are pleased with the performance of the Democracy Live platform and grateful to the NCC for helping us to provide a safe voting option under the continuing pandemic conditions,” ACDC Chair Jill Caiazzo said.

Kadera will now face Mike Webb in the general election in the fall. Webb, a perennial candidate with a colorful history, filed paperwork for run for School Board, according to the county elections office.

Local Democratic leaders are urging Arlingtonians to vote in the upcoming June 8 primary election for local and statewide offices. Early voting has already started and is open until June 5 at three locations. On June 8, people can vote at their normal polling location.

The primary includes contests for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, the House of Delegates and the Arlington County Board. The winners will receive the Democratic nomination for the general election on Nov. 2.

For the County Board race, voters can choose whether to nominate Democratic incumbent Takis Karantonis or challenger Chanda Choun in a bid against independent Mike Cantwell.

“Virginia has the most competitive governor’s race in the country this year, and the Democratic majority in our state legislature also hangs in the balance. Virginia Democrats must rise — once again — to the challenge,” Caiazzo said.

Facing Blowback From New Summer School Restrictions, APS Apologizes to Teachers

By Jo DeVoe

Arlington Public Schools is apologizing for how it handled the news that it would have to restrict summer school eligibility. 

At first, the school system expanded summer school eligibility to students with disabilities, English learners, and those struggling to achieve passing grades. That was until it turned out that there are not enough teachers to support them. 

Last Monday, APS told parents and teachers that “despite having offered financial incentives to teachers to teach summer school, there are fewer applicants than the number of students who are eligible for summer instruction at the elementary level, making it impossible for APS to offer summer strengthening support to all eligible elementary students.”

Teachers and parents decried the news, which dropped last Monday. Teachers said it sounded like they were being blamed for the reduction in eligible students. Arlington Parents for Education, a group that has pressed for a faster reopening, said APS “pulled the rug out” from under parents banking on summer school to help their kids recover from learning loss. 

Bridget Loft, the assistant superintendent for teaching and learning, apologized for the first sentence of her communication during a town hall on summer school last night (Monday). The sentence was also removed from the original announcement. 

“It was poorly worded and did not accurately represent the fact that our teachers have worked tirelessly to support our students throughout this school year,” she said. 

One teacher who spoke with ARLnow said a similar retraction was sent to teachers but noted that the apology was not shared with the larger community. 

“In a time when every teacher is truly learning how to do something new daily, it was seen as if teachers were thrown under the bus,” the teacher said. 

APS offered a $1,000 bonus for certified teachers and a $500 bonus for support staff to attract more personnel to participate in the summer program. But after a challenging year, that incentive did not produce the response APS was hoping for.

“I did not hear from a single teacher who said that the $1,000 was enough to sway those who were uninterested in summer school off the sidelines,” the teacher said. “For those who were going to do it anyway, it was a nice perk.”

This is a phenomenon happening across the nation. Education Week reports that throughout the U.S., school districts face staffing shortages because teachers have worked nonstop during the pandemic and need a break. 

“Summer school staffing always seems like challenge and the pandemic makes it much worse,” the APS teacher said. “The best word to describe most teachers is ‘done’ for this year. Most want to start fresh in the fall.”

Loft repeated those sentiments during the town hall. 

“Most of our teachers have given their all,” she said. “I would be loath to say it’s burnout: They are human they need time to rest and recharge.”

More than 5,000 elementary-level students were identified as potentially eligible for summer school this year, but APS only has enough staff to enroll some 1,900 students, Loft said. Now, the school system is drumming up supplemental materials and at-home lessons for about 3,000 previously identified students.

In a normal year, between 2,000 and 2,500 elementary-age students are identified for summer school. 

APS has hired 175 summer school teachers for the elementary level and is still hashing out eligibility and staffing at the middle and high school levels, staff said. 

So what will summer school actually look like? 

The elementary students who are still eligible will be in-person or online five days a week, for four hours a day, during the month of July. They include rising kindergarteners in APS’s Pre-K program, certain students with disabilities, English-language learning students, and those with the lowest levels of English proficiency. 

The rest will have access to self-guided lessons taught by state-certified teachers and supplemental programs through their electronic devices, Loft said. 

As for the middle and high school level, Director of Secondary Education Tyrone Byrd projects having enough staff.   

“Right now, we’re envisioning we’ll be able to support students who sign up,” he said. 

Image via Arlington Public Schools

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