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With COVID-19 cases on the rise and the holiday travel season upon us, the Alexandria School Board on Monday approved a recommendation by Superintendent Gregory Hutchings, Jr. to delay an in-person plan bringing students back to school until January 2021.

Specifically, the move delays bringing back kindergarten through fifth graders with disabilities who receive self-contained Language Arts and Math, which was planned for Nov. 30, and middle schoolers in the citywide special education program in December. No new set dates were presented, and Hutchings told the Board on Monday that he is following the advice of the Alexandria Health Department and does not want to act impulsively.


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There’s been another indecent exposure in Del Ray, this time in an alleyway in the unit block of East Bellefonte Avenue.

The incident occurred at around 6:30 a.m. on Friday, November 20. There was also another incident in the 2200 block of Mount Vernon Avenue at around 6 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 13, according to Del Ray activist Gayle Reuter. The police did not file a report for the Nov. 13 incident, Reuter said, as the officer told the victim who witnessed the exposure to call him if she saw the suspect again.


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The 45th Annual Turkey Trot and Food Drive for ALIVE! started virtually on Saturday, and the nonprofit has set up food collection points all over the city through November 29.

“We have given away 1.1 million pounds of food since the pandemic began,” ALIVE! Executive Director Jennifer Ayers told ALXnow. “The food need continues to grow. The need is still there and we need all the food and financial support we can get to continue to do what we have to do.”


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Felines Chloe and Emmie are bonded for life, and the dynamic duo are looking for a new family through the Animal Welfare League of Alexandria.

“Four-year-old felines Emmie (orange) and Chloe are ready to double your pleasure and double your fun, because this dynamic duo of bonded kitties are looking for their new family…together,” said AWLA spokesperson Gina Hardter. “While their looks couldn’t be more opposite, their purr-sonalities are pretty similar: both girls are sweet, outgoing and go out of their way to get pets from new people.”


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Families received a note from ACPS on Tuesday morning stating that school for students with disabilities in grades 3-5 and who are in the citywide Special Education program would need to stay home.

“Unfortunately, we were not able to return students in the (grades) 3-5 program as part of our targeted date of November 17, as the superintendent has said that all of our plans are contingent upon staffing and building capacity issues,” Terry Werner, the ACPS executive director of specialized instruction told parents in a Zoom call on Wednesday night. “We ran into some issues around staffing and we were not able to staff classes to bring students back from our next phase of students are scheduled to return on 30th.”


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Alexandria’s course toward social justice might be long, but hope remains for a better future. That’s the message behind the Alexandria Choral Society’s (ACS) Refuge project, and if all goes as planned the five-movement piece will be performed live next May by members of the T.C. Williams High School choir.

“There’s a lot of mileage that you have to go on that journey for a better future,” Refuge composer Jonathan Kolm told ALXnow. “There’s an uplifting arc of hope, but one that is tempered by difficult circumstances that we find ourselves in.”


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Scott Shaw equates the COVID-19 experience to a Greek tragedy with a beginning, middle and end. Right now, he says, we’re in the middle and looking forward to the third act — a period of eventual recovery.

Shaw, a partner with Alexandria Restaurant Partners, says that his company is similar to a lot of other restaurant companies looking at an uncertain winter on the horizon.


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