The Washington Times
Chavez-Bruce’s new facility
By Mark Lerner
Monday, December 7, 2009

There are 57 public charter schools serving about 38 percent of the school-age population in the nation's capital, but many of them don't have the opportunity to boast a new state-of-the-art facility.

A multimillion-dollar renovation of a dilapidated school building on Kenyon Street in Northwest Washington is the result of the hard work and cooperation of the D.C. government, Forrester Construction Co., Bank of America, a public charter school and nonprofit advocates.

The ribbon-cutting ceremony on Oct. 30 to formally open the Chavez-Bruce Preparatory Public Charter School was attended by D.C. councilman Jim Graham of Ward 1, where the school is located, and Al Lord, president of the Board of Trustees of Cesar Chavez Public Charter Schools and CEO of Sallie Mae Inc. Also represented was Bank of America, which provided the school with a loan to renovate the building, and Forrester Construction Co., which carried out the renovation. Representatives of Building Hope, a nonprofit founded by Sallie Mae to help charter schools overcome the facility obstacles that keep them from expanding and serving more students, and Friends of Choice in Urban Schools, which advocates for charter schools to be able to acquire surplus school buildings, were also there, as were members of the mayor's office and the D.C. Office of the State Superintendent of Education.

The new Bruce school building owes its name to Blanche Kelso Bruce, who sat in the U.S. Senate for Mississippi and was the first black to serve a full term in the Senate. But over many years, the site fell into a state of disrepair and lay largely derelict. Indeed, the last time a D.C. school occupied the entire building was 1973, and the external and internal structures required a total overhaul.

But before the Chavez-Bruce Preparatory Public Charter School - the D.C. charter school network to which Chavez-Bruce belongs is named for the late civil rights activist Cesar Chavez - could move in, there were obstacles to overcome.

Charter schools are public schools that operate outside the usual education bureaucracy. The academic successes and exponential growth of charters - from 22 schools on 29 campuses in 2004 to 57 schools on 99 campuses projected this year - and the increased levels of innovation (prep schools, technology schools, etc.) makes them "a model for the country," D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton has said.

Buying or leasing former schoolhouses has not been easy, however.

The D.C. government agreed to turn over the ground lease to Chavez-Bruce Prep in return for the school renovating the building. Building Hope was able to use its experience in renovating buildings for public charter schools to help the builders and contractors complete the project on time. In particular, Pepco ensured the school's power was running smoothly by open day. Timely delivery occurred despite the late discovery of extensive mold in the walls that had to be removed. Cooperation and teamwork won the day, said S. Joseph Bruno, president of Building Hope.

Students at the school regard their new premises as a big step up: Many spoke about what an improvement it was for them compared to the buildings the school had occupied previously. In fact, the school first opened in 2007 at the YMCA at 1325 W St. and remained there for its first year before moving again to nearby 16th Street and Park Road in Northwest. This is not unusual. Many D.C. public charter schools, which do not receive a school building when they open their doors, often inhabit temporary accommodations, sometimes in converted retail, office or warehouse space or church annexes and basements.

At the Anthony Bowen YMCA, the school shared a floor with the Y's city administrators and had to abandon classrooms every day at 4:15 p.m., earlier than they would have liked. A few rooms on the top floor served as a homework center. Later, on 16th Street, the school had 150 students enrolled and simply became too large for the small space the school occupied there.

The Cesar-Chavez Public Charter Schools, of which Chavez-Bruce Prep is a part, specialize in public policy and can now provide the quality school building the 240 students at the Bruce campus deserve. Fittingly for a school whose historical associations include Bruce and Chavez, 82 percent of the school's students are black and 17 percent are Latino.

Chavez-Bruce Prep aims to provide a nurturing, safe learning environment, where every student is expected to meet rigorous academic and character standards. Operating an extended school day and school year, with a focus on preparing the school's largely economically disadvantaged students for college, the campus ranked third highest in the District for gains on the DC-CAS standardized test: a 25 percent gain in reading and a 27 percent gain in math - the second-highest gains in math and the third-highest in reading - for all secondary schools in the District.

The Washington Post
District to increase police at charter schools
By Michael Birnbaum
Tuesday, December 1, 2009

D.C. officials have decided to give charter schools the same police protection as regular D.C. public schools after a two-month-long spate of violence near a charter school in Northeast Washington.

Educators and some officials had complained that the absence of regularly posted police officers at charter schools was putting students at risk. At Friendship Collegiate Academy in Northeast, at least eight students have been assaulted or robbed after class since September, and several large fights have broken out in front of the school. The violence quieted last month, although it didn't disappear, after police increased staffing in the area during dismissal time.

The change, announced last week by Deputy Mayor for Education Victor Reinoso, will take effect next month, and details will be worked out in the next few weeks. The District has roughly 100 school resource officers, who are stationed in D.C. Public Schools according to the greatest need. Those assessments will be extended to charter schools, which enroll 38 percent of the city's public school students.

D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said last month that the city doesn't have enough police officers to staff every school. It is not clear whether the ranks of school resource officers will be bolstered for the policy change.

Charter-school advocates praised the move.

"We're very pleased about that news, and the schools are, too," said Ariana Quiñones-Miranda, director of outreach for Friends of Choice in Urban Schools, a charter advocacy organization in the District.

But at least one council member cautioned that there might be a gap between rhetoric and reality.

"The proof is in the pudding. They actually have to make the officers available," said Phil Mendelson (D-At Large), who oversees the council's Committee on Public Safety and the Judiciary. He questioned why changes aren't being made immediately.

The principal of Friendship Collegiate Academy said she will be happy once police are in place.

"I'm a little skeptical," Peggy Pendergrass said. "It's exciting to hear, and I'll be even more excited when someone actually comes."

One reason she said she is cautious: Even after months of complaints, the police presence is still spotty. On the Monday before Thanksgiving, no police were present during dismissal, she said.

The Washington Post
An unequal equation at D.C. schools
The city is finally taking steps to provide more police protection for charter campuses.
Editorial
Friday, November 27, 2009

THE DISTRICT'S charter school movement started in 1996 with 160 students in two schools. Today, there are nearly 28,000 students in 57 schools on 99 campuses. That's nearly 38 percent of the public school population, and so it's long past time that the city government stops treating charters like an unwanted stepchild.

The latest evidence of the disparity experienced by charter students is the decision not to assign specially trained D.C. police officers to charter schools. The illogic of this policy was revealed last month when Post columnist Colbert I. King detailed the travails of Friendship Collegiate Academy.

Gang members who loiter outside the school victimize students as they enter and leave the school in Northeast Washington. School officials believe that security resource officers would help manage the tensions of a high-crime neighborhood and the clash that inevitably occurs between a school that tries to build character and the realities of street life. The officers do more than react to situations; they develop insights into school and neighborhood dynamics that have proved to be useful in forestalling problems.

Yet, for reasons hard to discern, charters were never included in the calculus that police officials use to determine which schools get the officers. There is a limit to police resources, and Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier needs, as she recently told The Post, to put officers where crime is occurring.

It makes no sense, though, to make a false distinction between charters and traditional schools: Both are publicly funded, and both should get protection for their students.

It's encouraging, then, to hear Victor Reinoso, deputy mayor for education, report that a decision has been made to change the policy. He told us that officials met Monday and agreed to develop a plan to be implemented at the resumption of the school year in January that would allow officers to be assigned to charter schools. Allocation of resources will be based on need as defined by crime and other data.

Details need to be worked out, including whether charters -- which are fiercely protective of their independence -- can opt out. We also hope this prompts the city to look at other areas where charters are slighted (proper facilities come to mind). Nonetheless, it's a good sign that the city government is starting to take more seriously its responsibilities to public school students in the charter schools.

Principal Peggy Pendergrass heard it from a teacher who rushed in with the news: Three gang members were trying to force their way into Friendship Collegiate Academy, one more example of the violence that had plagued the high school in the weeks since classes started.

Her dean of security was at the door, wrestling with them as they tried to push into the building. After a struggle, the men gave up and retreated. By the time Pendergrass got to the walkway in front of the charter school in Northeast Washington, police were making arrests. But she wondered why charter schools, which enroll more than 38 percent of public school students in the city, don't get regular protection like that at traditional public schools, where about 100 officers walk the halls full time.

Charter advocates and legislators are asking themselves that question after a stretch of weeks at Friendship Collegiate in which at least eight students were assaulted or robbed after class, including one incident that sent a boy to a hospital, and several large melees broke out involving punching, kicking, and threats of gun violence. Boys and girls have gotten caught up in the problems. The same October week the school blocked the three gang members, it had to dismiss classes early one day after anonymous threats about shootings.

Violence diminished this month after police bolstered their afternoon presence in the area. But for the school -- which, at 1,232 students, is the largest charter school and the second-largest high school in the city -- that only deepens puzzlement over why police aren't routinely posted to charters in the first place.

Police officers in the schools, known as school resource officers, "know the streets and know the kids," Pendergrass said, although she acknowledged that they're not a panacea. Still, she said, the officers could do a lot to derail problems before they start.

She has a backer on the D.C. Council.

"You put the Metropolitan police officers on the street, and they're reacting to violence," said Phil Mendelson (D-At Large), who oversees the police department. "You put the school resource officers in the school, and they are reducing the likelihood of violence," although he added that the officers aren't an answer for everything, pointing to the violence that occurs at traditional public schools.

"It's clearly a serious problem. In my view, a public school is entitled to public safety protection, regardless of whether it is a DCPS public school or a public charter school," he said.

Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said in an interview that police respond to crime wherever it happens.

At least four officers now patrol the area near Friendship Collegiate by foot and bike every afternoon at dismissal time, and an officer checks in by phone daily. But there aren't enough police officers to permanently staff every school, she said.

"I think it's important for students to have positive interactions with police officers," Lanier said. But "I have to put officers where crime is occurring."

Lanier said she was not certain whether data showed that more crime was occurring in and around D.C. public schools than charter schools.

Deputy Mayor for Education Victor Reinoso said in an e-mail that his office is "currently considering this issue."

The violence has borne heavily on the minds of Friendship Collegiate's students.

"That boy got down on his two knees and begged me not to go to school here," said Linda Fisher, the mother of a freshman who was beaten by about two dozen men in September.

For a while, she juggled her shifts as a security guard so she could pick him up every day, contending with the traffic of other parents who jam the curb at dismissal time, worried about their children.

Those dismissals can be tense. The school's security guards fan out along the block, one posted about every 30 feet. They whisper to each other on earpiece walkie-talkies.

Mixed with friendly greetings to their khaki-and-polo-shirt-clad students are admonishments to keep moving. Police officers cruise back and forth on the street and the sidewalk.

Police and gang experts say problems are particularly acute near Friendship Collegiate because the school lies at the intersection of several neighborhoods.

The Minnesota Avenue transit hub across the street, with almost a dozen bus lines and an Orange Line station, makes the area even more of a mixing place, meaning that conflicts between gangs and neighborhoods that might take place on home turf at other times of day spill over there, gang experts said.

There are also conflicts between schools -- several are nearby -- and within school populations, although parents and teachers at Friendship Collegiate said their hallways are quiet. Some of the young people who loiter at the transit hub are former Friendship Collegiate students who were expelled.

The gangs will "watch these kids, see who's hanging out with who. They'll ask what neighborhood they're from. Then they'll come the next morning and jump them," said Bridget Miller, who consults with D.C. schools as part of the Youth Gang Task Force.

But she wasn't sure that adding police would solve the problem, calling school resource officers a deterrent, not a solution. School leaders would do better to reach out more aggressively to the gang members, she said, adding that some Friendship Collegiate students were involved in gangs.

"Instead of getting them together to find out what's going on, to squash it, they're not doing anything," she said. "Unless you meet the problem head on, it's still going to be there."

Students said that even if the hallways of their school are safe, worries about out-of-school troubles sometimes cross into class time.

"I love this school. I shouldn't have to go anywhere else," said Mychal Sheow, a freshman who was assaulted a block from the school in mid-September. The possibility of getting assaulted is on his mind "all the time," he said.

Other students see violence as inevitable.

"I haven't been jumped here -- yet," said Juwan Savoy, the freshman class president, who has stopped taking the train and doesn't travel alone. "I say yet because I don't know what's going to happen."

The Washington Informer
Former DCPS School Gets Facelift for Charter Schools
By Norma Porter
Thursday, November 19, 2009

District Mayor Adrian Fenty, along with community members and students gathered at the newly renovated Draper Elementary School, the new home of Achievement Preparatory Academy and the National Collegiate Preparatory Public Charter High School, to celebrate during a ribbon cutting ceremony on Fri., Nov. 13.

“I know this campus and over the past couple of years I have come here to check on it. The main reason I was here was because the facilities were in disrepair. The reason that the Chancellor decided to consolidate this school with another one is because the enrollment had declined and we weren’t putting the right resources and energy into this school,” Fenty said.

“But, I am excited to be here today because I really see what you’re doing here in these two fantastic schools and it’s really a model for us,” he said.

D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee decided to close Draper and Birney Elementary Schools in Southeast and Webb Elementary School in Northeast due to low enrollment in June 2009. Students from Draper moved to Ferebee-Hope Elementary School in Southeast.

“Draper was closed because of the under enrollment, there were only 84 students in the Pre-K through sixth grade program,” Jennifer Calloway, a spokesperson for the school system, said. “Ferebee-Hope went through some dramatic renovations and we felt that we would be able to offer richer programs and better facilities for the former Draper students.”

Achievement Preparatory and National Collegiate, like many public charter schools in the District, faced facility challenges. The founders of both schools struggled to find a building that they could afford.
Achievement Preparatory, a middle school that starts in the fourth grade, operated within the Draper Elementary School for its first year, but was under pressure to find a permanent home. National Collegiate, which has a focus on international education, struggled this summer to recruit students without an actual building.

“We had our meetings in Busboys and Poets and eventually rented a small office space on 12th Street in Northeast,” Regina L. Rodriguez, co-founder of National Collegiate Preparatory, said. “It was difficult to recruit students and convince parents to send their children to our school without a building and an existing student body.”

Both charter schools moved into the Draper building the beginning of the school year through the Charter School Incubator Initiative (CSII), a private-public partnership between the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE), the U.S. Department of Education and Building Hope.

The CSII, which started in 2006, was created to help charter schools tackle facility issues by providing charter schools with expert real estate advice and below market loans. Building Hope, a nonprofit organization established by the Sallie Mae Foundation, helped Achievement Preparatory and National Collegiate obtain low interest loans.

The CSII, which has helped six other charter schools in the District secure facilities, invested $6 million to renovate the Draper building for the two schools. The school now has a new science lab, adequate bathroom facilities and an elevator to accommodate handicap students.

D.C. Public Charter School Board Chair Tom Nida said that he frequently conducts meetings for charter school applicants. In most instances, the applicants are concerned about finding and financing their own facility.

“I see the success of this incubator initiative. What you have is this old building that was almost falling apart and look at it today,” Nida said. “You have two schools here, not one and that’s important because neither one of these schools could afford to be here by themselves.”

Shantelle Wright, founder and head of school of Achievement Preparatory said that she can focus on creating a great learning environment for her “scholars” now that the facilities dilemma is behind her.

“Being in this facility and being a part of the incubator initiative has alleviated so many of the facility struggles [for me] that so many of my co-school leaders struggle with,” Wright said. “This has allowed us to focus on creating a strong school culture that is focused on academic rigor and closing the achievement gap in education.”

The Current
Charter School Cures Northwest Eyesore
Wednesday, November 18, 2009

It isn’t every day that a public charter school transforms a neighborhood eyesore into a beacon of hope in the community. But that is what Chavez-Bruce Preparatory Public Charter School has done at 770 Kenyon St. in Columbia Heights.

A few days ago, a large crowd celebrated at the newly renovated campus. The attendees included Ward 1 Council member Jim Graham; Albert Lord, president of the board of trustees for Cesar Chavez Public Charter Schools and chief executive officer of Sallie Mae Inc.; Tom Nida and Josephine Baker from the D.C. Public Charter School Board; Bill Couper, president of Bank of America (project lender); and representatives from the Office of the State Superintendent of Education and Friends of Choice in Urban Schools (advocates for charters’ access to unused public school buildings).

The multimillion-dollar renovation was completed on time and on budget, ready for the 2009-10 school year. Students spoke at the ceremony, favorably comparing the shiny, new, well-resourced facility with the old facility the school occupied at 16th Street and Park Road and the YMCA on W Street, which Chavez Prep occupied in its first year.

Named for Blanche Kelso Bruce, the first African-American to hold a full term of office in the U.S. Senate, the Kenyon Street building had fallen into disrepair and lay largely derelict for the 34 years since a school last occupied the whole building. The building has been transformed from an uninhabitable shell to a warm and inviting space.

Both the mayor’s office and Council member Graham were instrumental in recommending and supporting the D.C. government’s entering into a 30-year ground lease of the facility to the Bruce School. This would not have been possible without a team effort led by the commitment by Forrester Construction and its subcontractors — who worked extra hours to make it happen — and Pepco’s assistance to bring permanent power to the site.

Building Hope, a D.C. nonprofit established by Sallie Mae to help charter schools with their facilities challenges, worked closely with Forrester and Pepco to ensure the project was delivered on time and on budget.

Chavez-Bruce Preparatory Public Charter School recorded the second-highest gains in math and the third-highest gains in reading for all secondary schools in the District. Some 82 percent of the school’s students are African- American; 17 percent are Latino; and 80 percent are economically disadvantaged. With their commitment to social justice, Cesar Chavez and Blanche Bruce would be proud to lend their names to the new school.

Joe Bruno
President, Building Hope

The Current
LETTER: Give charter schools fair shot at buildings
Wednesday, November 18, 2009

I have followed your coverage of the city’s bizarre process for selling off unused buildings, including your Oct. 7 editorial about the former Stevens Elementary School, and would like to weigh in myself.

I am a parent of one of the 25,000 students who attend public charter schools in D.C., and I find the mayor’s actions on surplus city property to be very disturbing.

My son’s school spent precious resources applying unsuccessfully for one city property after another in what appears to be a rigged process. The city announces a “competition” for an empty school building and gives charter schools the chance to apply. They then declare all the charter applications nonviable on the flimsiest basis with no opportunity for applicants to address concerns or deficiencies in their applications.

I understand that the mayor’s future rests on the success of the D.C. Public Schools, which has lost enrollment at the expense of D.C. charter schools. I wish him and D.C. Public Schools great suc- cess.

I would like to see all schools improve and not try to gain ground at the expense of others. However, if the mayor cannot build more transparency into the bidding process and give schools a fair chance at school buildings, we have to wonder whether he feels the same way.

Steven Glazerman
Shaw

The Washington Examiner
LETTER: Charter schools already attract top-notch teachers
By Robert Cane
Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Re: "Importing teachers in the District of Columbia," Nov. 10

Barbara Hollingsworth correctly says that urban school districts need to empower schools to hire high quality teachers. However, D.C. public charter schools - which educate 38 percent of the District's public school children - already have that freedom, and use it to the lasting benefit of their nearly 28,000 students.

While some commentators focus on public charter schools' ability to fire underperforming teachers, a balanced debate would also highlight their flexibility to attract and retain teachers who provide high-quality instruction. For example, two-thirds of teachers at Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter School have worked there for three years or more, despite the fact that the school is only eight years old and has added one grade level each year that it has been open. The ability to hire and reward high-quality educators has helped make TMA the highest-performing nonselective high school in D.C.

Robert Cane
Executive director
Friends of Choice in Urban Schools

Rugby Team Teaches More Than Sport

The New York Times
November 23, 2008

To the Editor:

Re "The Unlikely Scrum," Nov. 15: District of Columbia residents can be proud of Hyde Leadership Public Charter School's establishment of what is believed to be the nation's first all-African-American high school rugby team. This imported sport teaches lessons for life to children from some of the District's most vulnerable communities.

Public charter schools like Hyde educate more than one in three of the District's students. Nonselective, publicly financed and independently run, these schools foster partnership among parents, teachers and students. These schools' independence creates an environment in which parents can be more involved, teachers are free to innovate and students are provided the structure they need to learn.

Economically disadvantaged students in public charter secondary schools are twice as likely to score advanced or proficient on math and reading tests as students in traditional D.C. public schools.

Robert Cane
Washington

The writer is the executive director of Friends of Choice in Urban Schools.