While much of the council’s focus during this budget season has been on restoring public school teacher positions and the Early Childcare Educator Pay Equity Fund, community members say that cuts to community schools and truancy prevention pose just as great a threat to students and families reeling from the pandemic.
There are currently 37 community schools that serve as in-school resource hubs funded by D.C. Public Schools (DCPS) and the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) for students and families who need health, employment, and housing support, along with other services.
Dominique Moore, a DCPS teacher, counts among those who tout the nationally recognized “whole child, whole school, whole community” approach as instrumental for marginalized families hindered by quality-of-life issues. Though she works at one of 20 DCPS connected schools that wouldn’t be affected by the proposed reductions, Moore expressed solidarity with other public and public charter schools that have relied on OSSE to fund their community schools.
“I can only imagine what those 17 schools will face without those agencies,” said Moore, an eighth grade special education teacher at John Hayden Johnson Middle School in Southeast. “We’re talking about groceries, professional development and job opportunities.”
Since DCPS Connected Schools’ launch in 2021, students at Johnson Middle School have received services provided by D.C. Department of Behavioral Health, Black Nurses Association, D.C. Food Project, Martha’s Table, Black Swan Academy and Sasha Bruce Youthwork.
Those partnerships allowed Johnson Middle School to open a food pantry, expand laundry and mental health offerings, boost arts programming, and provide more extracurricular activities. Students also receive violence prevention and conflict resolution resources, all of which Moore said helps her better fulfill her obligations as a teacher.
On Monday, the first day of Teacher Appreciation Week, Moore counted among those — including D.C. Councilmember Brianne Nadeau (D-Ward 1) and State Board of Education Representative Eboni-Rose Thompson (Ward 7) — who converged on the John A. Wilson Building in Northwest in demand of community schools funding.
Once she took to the podium, Moore decried what she called a lack of investment in long-term, proactive solutions to youth violence.
“To continue to ask us to do more with less is just diabolical,” she told The Informer hours prior to arriving at the Wilson Building. “The mayor’s budget talks about a shared sacrifice but education took all the cuts. No one puts their money where their mouth is; we’re only funding the kids’ oppression.”
Moore said she’d like to see all schools and students have equal access to resources that foster success.
“I just want to see equity in the schools and a fair shot for the babies,” she told The Informer.
Councilmembers Weigh In
After they rallied in front of the Wilson Building, representatives of Latin American Youth Center (LAYC), School Talk DC, Washington Teachers’ Union, EmpowerEd and Mary’s Center spent much of Monday morning engaging council members in discussions about community schools and truancy reduction, the latter of which would be funded through the Office of Victim Services and Justice Grants (OVSJG).
Days earlier, organizers circulated a letter imploring D.C. council members to restore funding to those programs.
On May 3, several advocates emphasized the need for community schools and OVSJG’s truancy reduction resources during an hours-long Committee of the Whole public hearing about D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Fiscal Year 2025 budget proposal.
That proposal includes a $2.5 million cut affecting 17 public and public charter schools receiving community schools funding through OSSE for medical, dental and vision support, food pantries, hygiene pantries and other services made available to students and families. If passed in its current form, Bowser’s budget would also remove $2.19 million that OVSJG uses to fund community organizations that provide truancy reduction services.
D.C. Councilmember Christina Henderson (I-At large), a one-time director of the now defunct Committee on Education, described community schools as a “really good” program that became “very expensive” during previous expansion efforts.
On Monday, Henderson acknowledged that her staffers met with organizers on Monday morning, saying that they relayed feedback similar to what she received in emails from constituents. Whether the council can restore the funds, Henderson noted, depends on D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson’s ability to identify a funding source.
“I haven’t had a conversation with the chairman so we would kind of have to see,” Henderson told The Informer.
While he spoke highly of community schools, Mendelson told The Informer that his commitment, at the moment, centered on reversing Chief Financial Officer Glen Lee’s requirement that the city’s reserve be replenished and fully restoring the Early Childcare Worker Pay Equity Fund.
In regard to truancy prevention, Mendelson, acknowledged the importance of such programs, all while questioning whether OVSJG had been effective in tackling chronic absenteeism.
“Truancy is a critical issue,” he told The Informer. “Not in the obvious issue of education, but in the fact that it’s a strategy for identifying kids who are in danger of falling into the juvenile justice system. It’s a measure … to get services to them so they can get back into the schools.”
Students, Advocates and Service Providers Speak
For some people, like Scott Goldstein, funding cuts to community schools and truancy prevention stand to jeopardize ongoing efforts to help young people and families. .
“Community schools help meet students’ needs so that teachers can focus on teaching and students on learning,” said Goldstein, a former D.C. public school teacher and executive director of EmpowerEd, a nonprofit dedicated to boosting teacher retention.
This budget season, EmpowerEd’s priorities include community schools, school-based behavioral health, flexible scheduling, capital funding for outdoor learning labs, and allocation of funds that provide experiential learning experiences for students.
These focus areas, Goldstein told The Informer, came out of a survey of more than 1,000 District public and public charter school teachers. He said that those programs, and community schools and truancy reduction in particular, enhance students’ academic experience by acknowledging the significance of schools as community hubs.
“There’s no doubt that cutting community schools and truancy reduction [funding] means more poverty, absenteeism and families’ needs not getting met,” Goldstein said. “There will be more hunger without food pantries. People won’t have a safe way to get to school. We’ll see really detrimental effects to health.. our immunization programs, and even basic dental and vision screenings.”
Several speakers on Monday echoed Goldstein’s sentiments.
For instance, Thompson acknowledged Kimball Elementary School in Southeast as a viable DCPS connected school that provided students with food and attendance counseling, and allowed them to wash dirty uniforms and secure new uniforms from a closet on school grounds.
“These things … take away obstacles, barriers, challenges that families face to make sure our little people can show up to school every day,” Thompson said. “No kids should be penalized for their parents’ struggle. Schools that make our communities stronger is what we need to be invested in.”
Mirna (Lupi) Quinteros-Grady, president and CEO of LAYC, also didn’t mince words when she took to the podium, telling supporters and passersby alike that it’s incumbent upon the D.C. Council to reverse the cuts to community schools and truancy prevention funding.
LAYC’s community schools model has been in operation since 2017 while the center, located in Columbia Heights in Northwest, has been providing truancy prevention services since 2018. Schools that LAYC currently serve include Cardozo High School, Coolidge High School, Roosevelt High School, Ida B. Wells Middle School, and MacFarland Middle School, all based in Northwest.
Students and families at those schools, Quinteros-Grady said, consistently received support, even as COVID kept much of the world under siege.
“Our doors never closed during the pandemic. Our staff made sure needs were met,” Quinteros-Grady said. “We’ve done a heavy lift but the cuts go in the opposition direction when we see an increase in mental health issues, crime, homelessness, all of the issues that affect the youth.”
Malik Tate, an eighth grader at Ida B. Wells Middle School, counted among several young people who stood on the steps of the Wilson Building and later spoke to council members.
Shortly before walking through the Wilson Building, he told The Informer that he’s seen substantial progress in his disposition and outlook on life since enrolling in LAYC’s Promoter Pathway Program this academic year.
“I can talk with people from LAYC and they calm me down to let me know it’s okay so I don’t get stressed,” said Malik, 15.
The magic of that program, Malik said, centered on the acknowledgement of his feelings and the challenges that he and other young people have encountered since returning to in-person learning. He credits LAYC with expanding his capacity for extracurricular activities, and even encouraging him to pursue activism like what he participated in on Monday.
“Readjusting to school is a process but I get through it and think about what programs I want to be in,” Malik said, reflecting on what he’s known to be true about life. “I have opportunities and I take them. I don’t want to lose them because you don’t know when it goes away.”