Noah Lyles, the world champion sprinter and Olympic bronze medalist can add another trophy to his collection, as he and his speedster brother Josephus Lyles have been chosen for induction into the 2022 ACPS Athletic Hall of Fame.
“Noah Lyles is a world record holder, world champion, bronze medal winner and a great ambassador for our city,” Aly Khan Johnson, chair of the ACPS Athletic Hall of Fame Advisory Committee Meeting, told the School Board last Thursday night (May 19).
Two Alexandria City Public Schools have switched to virtual classes due to widespread power outages around the city after a storm Sunday night.
Alexandria City High School’s King Street campus (ACHS) and Charles Barrett Elementary School have both switched to asynchronous virtual learning, meaning classes are being switched to online rather than in-person.
It was criticized by many for taking too long, but now Alexandria City Public Schools is winning awards for the renaming of Alexandria City High School and Naomi L. Brooks Elementary School.
On Friday (May 5), ACPS announced that it was awarded the Silver Prize in the National School Boards Association Magna Awards program for The Identity Project campaign, as well as a 2021 Gold Medallion Award from the National School Public Relations Association.
Alexandria’s annual budget process wrapped up this week with a $839.2 million fiscal year 2023 budget approval and special tax relief for car owners.
Meanwhile, an uptick in opioid overdoses among children has Alexandria City Public Schools considering adding Narcan to schools and city officials issuing warnings about counterfeit Percocet.
(Updated at 1:45 p.m.) The Alexandria City Council unanimously adopted City Manager Jim Parajon’s $839.2 million fiscal year 2023 budget on Wednesday night (May 4), and despite giving all city employees raises, Mayor Justin Wilson says inflation will likely mean more raises in future budgets.
“We’re staring into a significant inflationary environment that pinches our employees very hard, just like it pinches everyone hard,” Wilson said. “We’re going to have to continue to have this conversation every year about how we make sure we invest in the level of compensation and benefits required to not only attract but retain the best and the brightest in the city.”
Alexandria City Public Schools will likely soon begin carrying Nalaxone, or Narcan, as an emergency medication to be given to students if they are overdosing on opiates.
If approved by the School Board on May 5 (Thursday), school nurses or anyone “acting on behalf of the School Board who has completed a training program may possess and administer naloxone or other opioid antagonist for overdose reversal,” according to a staff report.
“Extremely problematic,” “inappropriate,” and “disrespectful” was how Superintendent Gregory Hutchings, Jr. said School Board members handled edits of his plan to create a School Law Enforcement Advisory Group.
In a March 9 email, Hutchings scolded a majority of School Board Members — Michelle Rief, Ashley Simpson-Baird, Adbel Elnoubi, Kelly Carmichael Booz and Chris Harris — for editing his SLEP proposal. He said that such “behind the scenes” operations raised transparency issues by violating the Virginia Freedom Of Information Act.
The Alexandria School Board gave its blessing to Superintendent Gregory Hutchings, Jr. on Thursday night (April 21) to form an advisory group to make recommendations on the controversial school resource officer program within Alexandria City Public Schools.
The 16-person school law enforcement partnership (SLEP) advisory group will be made up of students, ACPS administrators, Alexandria Police and members of the community. The group will evaluate the partnership between ACPS and police for the school resource officer program, and also on school safety initiatives, and deliver a report in December.
All Alexandria City High School (ACHS) campuses have gone into a “secure the building” status while the Alexandria Police Department (APD) investigates a threat to the school.
According to a release from ACPS:
(Updated at 11:15 p.m.) Just as the spring weather blooms, Covid cases are on the rise in Alexandria.
As of Monday (April 11), the number of reported Covid cases in Alexandria reached 30,566, and the seven-day average of cases is 40.9 — nearly double what it was at this point last month. There have also been 415 cases so far this month, putting Alexandria on track to eclipse the number of 593 reported cases in March and reach the 1,227 cases reported in February.
Soon after allegations of a sexual assault surfaced at Alexandria High School’s Minnie Howard Campus, a parent filed a Freedom Of Information Act request to find out more. Two weeks after filing her request, the parent was told that it could be fulfilled, but it would cost $84,300.
On March 21, Devon Runyan Wells, a parent of five ACPS students, requested all email communications over the last two years regarding Title IX complaints and investigations between Superintendent Gregory Hutchings, Jr., School Board Members and staff. Wells also asked for any emails that contained the words rape, harassment, assault, sexual abuse, weapon, police, law enforcement, gang and gang violence.
