Washington, D.C

DC’s school boundary review could advance equity, advocates say

Published

2 years ago

February 15, 2023

DC’s school boundary review could advance equity, advocates say

McKinley Expertise STEM Campus and its surrounding neighborhood by Ted Eytan licensed beneath Artistic Commons.

This yr, DC will assessment the college boundaries that decide the place college students get a assured seat, and make suggestions on whether or not task insurance policies ought to change primarily based on quite a lot of fairness measures.

The District will have a look at elements akin to overcrowding, the variety of areas for at-risk college students and out-of-boundary college students at extremely sought-after faculties, entry to specialised programming, and whether or not college students can get to their desired faculty safely and affordably. This yr’s evaluation is the primary in a decade and solely the second since 1968; they’re now slated to occur each ten years.

The earlier assessment course of in 2014 was an advanced one, because it needed to take care of dramatic modifications to public training following the closure of over one in 10 DC public faculties — principally in low-income neighborhoods — and the large-scale introduction of constitution faculties. Consultants say the mass closures of under-enrolled faculties disrupted feeder patterns (the trail a pupil takes from elementary to highschool) and provoked anxiousness about unsure faculty assignments.

With this work within the rearview mirror, advocates hope fairness has an opportunity to take a entrance seat.

“We will completely heart fairness because the precedence and have a look at the methods the place when we’ve got a imaginative and prescient of our public faculty system within the metropolis the place each little one is getting completely what they want [and] has the vary of alternatives that we all know each little one deserves,” stated Abigail Smith, the previous DC Deputy Mayor for Schooling, at DC Coverage Middle’s current launch of its report on faculty boundaries. “We will use pupil task insurance policies to assist us get there.”

The DC Coverage Middle report provides perception into advancing fairness within the assessment course of, in addition to methods to make use of faculty boundaries to extend variety, entry to in-demand faculties, and to alleviate overcrowding. Nevertheless, precisely what fairness means and the way to obtain it are difficult questions in a metropolis with a excessive diploma of selection: lower than half of DC’s faculties actually have a assured spot for college students who dwell in a specific space.

Most researchers and advocates agree that boundaries can solely be one a part of the answer to raised serving DC’s college students.

“Now we have to consider fairness in a extremely multifaceted approach as a result of pupil task shouldn’t be going to be the one factor to get us there,” stated Religion Gibson Hubbard, the Chief Technique Officer at PAVE, a DC training advocacy nonprofit.

Boundaries at the moment mirror, perpetuate historic harms

The DC Coverage Middle’s report finds that simply 28% of public faculty college students attend the establishment the place their tackle ensures them entry. The remainder — 72% — use the widespread lottery, by which they’ll apply to constitution or conventional public faculties throughout town.

However boundary participation isn’t unfold equally throughout the District, suggesting that many households really feel like their neighborhood faculty can’t supply an training on par with the remainder of town. A pupil’s chance of doing so is determined by the place they dwell and the way outdated they’re — elementary faculty college students, for instance, are probably to attend their assigned faculty, whereas highschool college students are least more likely to.

In relation to boundary participation, one feeder sample stands out. Jackson-Reed, made up of among the wealthiest and whitest neighborhoods within the metropolis’s higher northwest nook, has boundary participation of 79%, virtually thrice increased than the District’s common. It additionally has the very best stage of personal faculty enrollment. Nearly half of the scholars in Ward 3, which roughly overlaps with the Jackson-Reed feeder sample, attend personal faculty, whereas the citywide common is about 16%.

“Throughout the Jackson-Reed feeder sample, households are likely to have the assets to both select the place they dwell and due to this fact select their by-right faculty or select to attend a non-public faculty,” stated Chelsea Coffin, the Director of the Schooling Coverage Initiative at DC Coverage Institute and one of many report’s authors.

Whereas all households with youngsters in DC have entry to decisions by the lottery system, Coffin provides, they don’t have the identical diploma of management. At Anacostia, Ballou, Dunbar, and Woodson faculties — all positioned within the south and east of town — lower than 20% of scholars attend their by-right faculty.

Boundary participation fee by grade band and feeder sample, faculty yr 2021-22. Source: DC Coverage Middle, used with permission

Schooling inequality maps onto the ways in which different assets are unfairly divided in DC, fairly actually. The town’s faculty boundaries mirror the historic redlining maps used to determine who may get mortgages primarily based on their race within the Thirties. In 2019, an City Institute report discovered that throughout the nation, these strains create divisions not solely primarily based on race but additionally on different elements like student-teacher ratios, funding, and take a look at scores.

DC is among the many nation’s most segregated cities and has dramatic earnings inequality, which tends to be divided alongside racial and geographic strains. White residents, congregated predominantly within the metropolis’s northwest, have a median earnings of $141,650 — thrice increased than that of Black residents, who’re extra concentrated within the southeast.

Adjusting faculty boundaries can have an effect on a few of DC’s inequities, in response to the DC Coverage Middle’s report, and may rebalance college students to handle each under-enrollment and overcrowding. Elementary faculties in Southeast DC specifically are overcrowded regardless of having low boundary participation. However Coffin says that the influence from tweaking these boundaries is restricted in scope, given the bigger points with useful resource distribution throughout town.

“While you transfer boundaries, you might be altering the distribution of scholars, however you’re not increasing the pie or making it sweeter,” stated Coffin.

New boundaries and past

For a method with extra potential, Coffin factors to equitable entry choice, a coverage piloted for the primary time in 2022 at 24 public constitution and DCPS faculties which gave lottery precedence to at-risk college students: these experiencing homelessness, in foster care, receiving authorities advantages, or who’re overage in highschool. Presently, at-risk youngsters are much less doubtless to make use of the lottery. After they do, they’re much less more likely to get into their desired faculty. Lottery choice may give them a extra equitable shot at entering into their desired faculty and likewise increase faculty variety.

Coffin provides that allocating extra assets to by-right faculties is also part of this dialog. Gibson Hubbard agrees that college boundaries are solely a part of the equation, and added that they don’t clear up for programming or curriculum.

“I need to be extra hopeful about pupil task creating fairness however I don’t know if actually assigning college students sure locations or drawing a line will do this. It’s one device in the direction of that however there are at all times going to be individuals who make a selection,” stated Gibson Hubbard. “Now we have a big earnings divide within the metropolis and a few folks can simply make that selection and different folks can’t.”

Pupil demographics in DC’s public faculties, faculty yr 2021-22. Source: DC Coverage Middle, used with permission.

Past rethinking boundaries, this yr’s assessment course of is a chance to consider training holistically and to listen to from communities what meaning for them. Gibson Hubbard, who was a group consultant and studied the boundary assessment course of for her dissertation, stated it is a lesson from the 2014 assessment, which strove for widespread group enter. Smith describes holding lots of of focus teams with group members. This yr’s assessment course of may also prioritize engagement from dad and mom, nonprofits, college students, and residents by interviews, focus teams, and surveys.

Gibson Hubbard factors to early motion pre-Kindergarten, which ensures a baby a spot at their in-boundary faculty, as one thing that got here from group enter in 2014. (DC’s free early training was once by lottery). She provides that specialised programming, akin to Montessori applications, higher psychological well being providers, and language immersion are all issues that may assist faculties higher serve their college students — and may very well be on the desk for this yr’s assessment.

Bettering college students’ potential to get to high school safely is one other main fairness concern, as college students in wards 7 and eight specifically face longer commutes, increased ranges of group violence, and fewer sidewalks and crosswalks.

It’s why Smith encourages a central tenet for guiding the method: “Embrace the precept of centering our most impacted and historically marginalized communities as we interact on this course of.”

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Washington, D.C

Inauguration Day Weather Likely To Be Coldest Since 1985 | Weather.com

Published

3 hours ago

January 17, 2025

Press Room

Inauguration Day Weather Likely To Be Coldest Since 1985 | Weather.com

Fish-eye view of the rotunda in the U.S. Capitol, just prior to the swearing-in ceremony of Ronald Reagan, January 21, 1985. Architect of the Capitol photo courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division — Inauguration of Ronald Reagan, 1985, which had to be moved into the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol due to extreme cold.
(Architect of the Capitol photo courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp; Photographs Division)

The presidential inauguration ceremony will take place on what could be the coldest inauguration day since 1985.
The forecast high for Washington, D.C., is in the upper teens to low 20s.
It is likely that Donald Trump will be inaugurated indoors due to the cold.
The high on Inauguration Day has only been below freezing once since 1985, in 2009.

The 2025 United States Presidential Inauguration is now more likely to be moved indoors due to the coldest weather for an inauguration in 40 years for Washington, D.C., with a high in the upper teens to low 20s.

This will be the first inauguration to be held indoors in 40 years. The record for the coldest January inauguration is currently held by the second inauguration of Ronald Reagan in 1985, when the temperature at noon for the swearing-in ceremony was only 7 degrees, according to the National Weather Service.

The weather for this year’s inauguration is forecast to somewhat mimic that of 1985, which took place on Jan. 21. The high temperature that day was 17 degrees, with sunny skies and afternoon wind chills in the minus 10 to minus 20-degree range. The parade was ultimately canceled, and the swearing-in ceremony had to be held indoors.

The Rotunda is prepared as the inclement weather alternative for each inauguration in the event of inclement weather, according to the Associated Press.

The 2025 Inauguration will be similarly sunny, with wind chills in the lower teens or single digits and winds gusting up to 35 mph in the afternoon. During the ceremony, the temperature will hover in the lower 20s.

Alternate plans are required for the more roughly 250,000 guests ticketed to view the inauguration from around the Capitol grounds and the tens of thousands more expected to be in general admission areas or to line the inaugural parade route from the Capitol to the White House.

Trump said some supporters would be able to watch the ceremony from Washington’s Capital One area on Monday, a day after he plans to hold a rally there. He said he would visit the arena after his swearing-in.

The current forecast high for Inauguration Day is only a couple of degrees above the current record for coldest afternoon high on Jan. 20, though it would break the record for the coldest Inauguration to take place on that date.

Only one other year had a sub-freezing high on inauguration day: Barack Obama’s first inauguration in 2009.

The warmest January Inauguration Day took place in 1981 for Ronald Reagan’s first inauguration, meaning Reagan’s two inaugurations hold the record for the warmest and coldest January Inauguration.

Warmer inaugurations have happened though: Before the 20th Amendment was enacted, Inauguration Day traditionally took place on March 4, which has an average high of 50.2 degrees. Jan. 20 has a cooler average high of 42.9 degrees.

The all-time record high for a U.S. presidential inauguration was set in August 1974 with the Inauguration of Gerald Ford with a high of 83 degrees, though that was a non-traditional inauguration date prompted by the resignation of Richard Nixon.

Here’s a look at some other notable inauguration day weather.

Snowiest Inauguration: William Taft, 1909

On the day of William H. Taft’s 1909 inauguration, nearly 10 inches of snow fell, setting the record for inauguration day. The snow and wind began the day before, with strong winds toppling trees and telephone poles. Trains were stalled and city streets clogged. All activity was brought to a standstill. Sanitation workers shoveled sand and snow through half the night. It took 6,000 men and 500 wagons to clear 58,000 tons of snow and slush from the parade route.

Inauguration of William H. Taft, 1909
(Library of Congress)

Fun fact: Historically speaking, there is approximately a 30% chance of snow on the ground in Washington, D.C., from a previous system for the date Jan. 20.

Worst Inauguration Day Travel: JFK, 1961

On the eve of John F. Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961, 8 inches of snow fell causing the most crippling traffic jam of its time. Hundreds of cars were stranded and abandoned. The president-elect had to cancel dinner plans and, in a struggle to keep other commitments, is reported to have had only 4 hours of sleep. Former President Herbert Hoover was unable to fly into Washington National Airport because of the weather and missed the swearing-in ceremony. By sunrise, the snowfall had ended and the skies cleared but the day remained bitterly cold.

An army of men worked all night to clear Pennsylvania Avenue, and despite the cold, a large crowd turned out for the swearing-in ceremony and inaugural parade. At noon, the temperature was only 22 degrees with the wind blowing from the northwest at 19 mph making it feel like the temperature was just 7 degrees.

Fatal Inaugurations: William Henry Harrison, 1841, and Franklin Pierce, 1853

The weather has caused two inaugurations to have fatal implications, and the most historically significant fatality was that of William Henry Harrison in 1841. Harrison decided to brave the elements and deliver the longest inauguration speech ever, an oration lasting an hour, and 40 minutes.

It was a cloudy, cold and blustery day, and the National Weather Service has estimated the temperature at noon to be approximately 48 degrees.

Harrison, who wore neither hat nor overcoat, also rode a horse to and from the Capitol ceremony. He subsequently caught a cold that developed into pneumonia. Harrison died a month later.

Inauguration of President Franklin Pierce, 1853
(Library of Congress)

The second inauguration with a fatal effect was that of Franklin Pierce in 1853. The morning of the inauguration, there was heavy snow that continued until about half an hour before the ceremony. Skies looked to be brightening by noon, but the snow resumed shortly after Pierce took the oath of office.

The heavy snow dispersed much of the crowd and ruined plans for the parade. Abigail Fillmore, first lady to the outgoing President Millard Fillmore, sat on the cold, wet, exposed platform during Pierce’s swearing-in ceremony. She caught a cold that developed into pneumonia and died at the end of the month.

Rainiest Inauguration: Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1937

The first inauguration to be held on Jan. 20 – Franklin D. Roosevelt’s second inauguration in 1937 – also set the record for the heaviest rain on inauguration day. The day was cold and rainy, with sleet and freezing rain in the morning. Between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., a period that includes the swearing-in ceremony, nearly three-quarters of an inch of rain fell.

Inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1937
(Library of Congress)

Roosevelt insisted on riding back to the White House in an open car with half an inch of water on the floor. Total rainfall for the day was 1.77 inches, which remains the rainfall record for Jan. 20.

First Outdoor Oath: James Monroe, 1817

The first seven inauguration ceremonies from 1789 to 1813 were conducted indoors, making James Monroe’s 1817 inauguration the first that was held outdoors in the weather. Luckily, it was warm and sunny that day, with an estimated temperature at noon of 50 degrees.

Sara Tonks is a content meteorologist with weather.com and has a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from Georgia Tech in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences along with a master’s degree from Unity Environmental University in Marine Science.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Washington, D.C

The Southern Group launches federal presence with TSG Advocates in Washington, D.C.

Published

11 hours ago

January 17, 2025

Press Room

The Southern Group launches federal presence with TSG Advocates in Washington, D.C.

A new chapter begins as The Southern Group takes its trusted advocacy model to the heart of the nation’s capital and launches TSG Advocates, a new federal lobbying practice.

With a deep-rooted presence across the Southeast, The Southern Group is now making its mark in Washington, D.C. The firm’s latest expansion, led by seasoned political experts Daniel Diaz-Balart and Chase Kroll, brings a dedicated federal lobbying arm. TSG Advocates combines its subject-matter expertise with a broad national network to offer a unique, relationship-driven approach to federal advocacy.

This move marks the next step in a 25-year journey for The Southern Group, as it transitions from its Florida roots to becoming a national influence network.

Diaz-Balart and Kroll are two distinguished government-relations professionals with a wealth of experience spanning foreign affairs, political strategy and policy advocacy. Their combined expertise in industries like defense, energy, health care, tax and financial services positions TSG Advocates to stand out as a trusted advocate for businesses navigating the complex federal landscape.

“Businesses will need strong representation in D.C. to take advantage of unprecedented opportunities in the coming years,” said Diaz-Balart, founding member of TSG Advocates. “With TSG Advocates’ connections in Florida and on the ground in Washington, D.C., I can’t think of a firm better positioned to help clients capture those opportunities.”

TSG Advocates’ launch is part of The Southern Group’s strategy to broaden its footprint at the federal level. With many prominent Florida leaders stepping into key roles in the new administration, the firm is poised to leverage its robust network and longstanding relationships in Florida to influence policy at the national stage.

“We’re building our federal practice with an eye on success over the next century, not just the next administration,” said TSG Senior Managing Partner for Growth, Rachel Cone. “Having well-connected leaders like Daniel and Chase at the helm in D.C. ensures we’re positioned to deliver high-level results for our clients over the long-term.”

Diaz-Balart’s career has spanned foreign policy, defense contracting, and governmental affairs, all while leading his own legal practice in south Florida. With years of experience advocating for foreign governments like Taiwan and the Dominican Republic, Daniel has played a critical role in policy strategy across multiple sectors, including space exploration, defense, and more.

“Daniel is an effective and knowledgeable advocate who couples his approach with an infectious optimism,” said U.S. Rep. Carlos Giménez of Florida. “He stands out for his professionalism and is a true pleasure to work with.”

Kroll, an accomplished political strategist with more than 14 years of experience in federal policy and international relations, also joins TSG Advocates. With a background in digital media, communications and traditional lobbying, Kroll’s expertise lies in crafting effective, multifaceted campaigns that combine strategic political insight with innovative outreach tactics.

“Chase is an exceptional advocate and strategist, bridging the gap between policy goals and legislative realities,” said Norm Coleman, former U.S. Senator from Minnesota, Chair of the Congressional Leadership Fund Super PAC, and Senior Counsel at Hogan Lovells. “Chase’s knowledge of Washington, his knack for building bipartisan relationships, and his commitment to delivering client results make him a tremendous asset to TSG Advocates.”

His lobbying experience on behalf of defense contractors, municipal clients, and foreign governments — including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia — further strengthens TSG Advocates’ capabilities.

TSG Advocates will continue to grow in the coming months, adding to the firm’s federal influence. The firm plans to hire additional subject-matter experts in emerging industries such as artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency.

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Washington, D.C

Pickup plunges into icy Potomac after crash on Arlington Memorial Bridge

Published

19 hours ago

January 16, 2025

Press Room

Pickup plunges into icy Potomac after crash on Arlington Memorial Bridge

A pickup truck plunged into the icy Potomac River after a collision with another vehicle on the outbound lanes of the Arlington Memorial Bridge, D.C. Fire and EMS said.

The white pickup crashed through the railing just before 7 p.m. on a snowy evening. It’s submerged in the water.

The Metropolitan Police Department Harbor Unit is at the scene.

One person was removed from the truck and is receiving advanced life support on the shore.

Two people from the other car involved in the collision suffered minor injuries.

Traffic came to a stop on the bridge, which has been closed. U.S. Park Police is diverting traffic.

Drivers are asked to avoid the Arlington Memorial Bridge, Rock Creek Parkway and Ohio Drive.

Stay with News4 and NBCWashington.com for more on this developing story.

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