Longtime Alexandria City Public Schools administrator Alexander Duncan III was formally announced last night as the new executive principal of Alexandria City High School.
Duncan, the ACHS Minnie Howard Campus administrator, will replace ACHS Executive Principal Beter Balas, who announced his departure last month.
A longtime ACPS educator and a principal from Chesterfield County Public Schools are the finalists for the executive principal position at Alexandria City High School.
Alexander Duncan III, the Minnie Howard Campus administrator, and Marcia Rice, principal at Meadowbrook High School, answered a variety of questions Monday night in a Zoom meet-and-greet moderated by former ACHS principal John Porter.
Tonight, residents can meet the two candidates for the executive principal position at Alexandria City High School.
The candidates, whose identities aren’t yet public, will meet with community stakeholders at the Minnie Howard campus and on Zoom from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.
The 17-year-old male suspect facing murder charges in last year’s fatal stabbing of 18-year-old Luis Mejia Hernandez was implicated by damning evidence police found on his phone, according to evidence presented Monday.
Monday’s bench trial will continue into today for the defense to present their case, and a speedy verdict on second degree murder and murder by mob charges is expected from Judge James C. Clark. The suspect faces between five-to-40 years in prison for the second degree murder charge and five-to-40 years for the murder by mob, or lynching, charge.
It’s a day of happiness in Alexandria, as more than 900 Alexandria City High School seniors graduated this morning at George Mason University’s EagleBank Arena.
Perhaps student speaker Lenhle Vilakati put it best when she said: “Today we finally break apart and become our own people. Today we finally have to go off into bigger things and be amazing.”
Amid a crime surge, Alexandria Police Chief Don Hayes said Monday night that the police force is seeing a “plethora” of guns out on the streets.
Alexandria’s gun-related crime jumped 100% in 2022 over 2021, and Hayes says that overall crime is up 27% for the year.
Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) said long lines to get into Alexandria City High School (ACHS) are part of the growing pains as the system adjusts to new security measures.
Earlier this year, ACPS approved new security measures including metal detectors and handheld wand devices. The security measures were in response to several security issues at the school in recent years. Earlier this year, a teacher at ACHS’ Minnie Howard Campus seized a handgun from a student.
Alexandria City High School (ACHS) Principal Peter Balas announced that, after graduation in June, he’s heading north to become the new principal at Arlington’s Wakefield High School.
Balas, who has been with Alexandria City Public Schools for 22 years, took over at then-T.C. Williams High School in 2017. Since then, Balas has navigated the school through Covid, the “One T.C.” decision, the school renaming and issues around violence in the school.
After years in development, a new agreement was released between Alexandria City Public Schools and the Alexandria Police Department to provide school resource officers (SROs) at the city’s high school and middle schools.
The new memorandum of understanding between ACPS and APD has been a long time coming. SROs were defunded by the City Council in last year’s budget, and Alexandria City Public Schools spent the first few months of the 2021-2022 school year without the officers in its high school and middle schools. The officers were returned after ACPS pleaded with Council for their return in the wake of multiple incidents with weapons in schools.
Good Friday morning, Alexandria!
More gunfire was reported near the Braddock Road Metro station yesterday afternoon, prompting the Alexandria Police Department to tweet that it’s “determined” to solve recent crime issues.
(Updated 11:10 a.m.) After the death of Alexandria City High School student Yonathan Isaí Vasquez Méndez earlier this week, friends and family are raising funds to help cover funeral expenses and other costs.
While no cause of death has been officially announced, scanner traffic at the time indicated first responders were administering Narcan and later that day, the City of Alexandria issued a warning about fentanyl-laced drugs after “two recent suspected drug overdoses involving school-aged youth,” the Alexandria Times first reported.
