District of Columbia
D.C. students need academic support, diverse connections for economic mobility
Region offers array of resources for families in need of assistance
Education is the blueprint of good economic mobility.
But when students aren’t set up with the proper resources to secure a quality education, it’s often low-income families that suffer the most, For Love of Children (FLOC) Executive Director LaToya Clark said. Children from low-income families on average grow up to earn $25,600 annually, according to Opportunity Insights.
D.C. families need better economic mobility, and experts say that starts with kids getting an education and breaking generational poverty cycles. Students without a high school diploma earn $738 per week on average, while those who graduated high school earn roughly $930 per week, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Contrarily, those with bachelor’s degrees earn about $1,543 per week.
Students from low-income backgrounds have fewer financial advantages on their paths to securing an education, and hardships faced by public schools make it difficult for them to catch up, Clark said.
From local financial and educational assistance programs to strengthening diversity among educators, here are a few ways researchers and advocates are fighting for better economic mobility in D.C. schools.
Student assistance programs
For many students, falling behind academically is because of circumstances outside of their control, Clark said.
She said teacher shortages, large classrooms and scarce funding can lead to an educational environment not fully equipped to set students on the right path. A one-dimensional education can then hinder future professional opportunities and give students limited economic mobility.
That’s where local organizations like FLOC come in –– to fill in the academic and social gaps often left open by schools.
Clark said FLOC has multiple services that give underserved students a more individualized academic experience. For the Neighborhood Tutoring Program, students are assessed at the grade level at which they’re performing, not what grade they are in. They’re then matched with a volunteer –– ranging from college students to retirees –– who follows a curriculum that matches the student’s performance level.
There’s also the Pathways Forward Program, an afterschool opportunity for D.C. youth in 7th to 12th grades designed to increase high school graduation rates. The program supports those at risk of academic failure to find a successful way forward, and those in 10th to 12th grades to prepare for graduation or transition to postsecondary programs. Both Neighborhood Tutoring and Pathways Forward are free.
“Everything we offer is designed to close achievement gaps, help our students boost their confidence and ensure young people have the skills and support that they need to succeed in schools and beyond,” Clark said.
And that design is working for students. Clark recalled a young girl who was the oldest of six who felt a need to help her mom take care of her siblings. She was falling behind in school until she found FLOC. The girl credited her ability to go to college and find a professional job to FLOC’s individualized and accessible approach to education.
FLOC is a reliable resource for D.C. youth to get academic help, but there are numerous other organizations working to close educational gaps and improve the future economic mobility of students.
Minds Matter D.C. helps underserved students find accessible pathways to prepare for and succeed in college. The organization offers mentoring, SAT prep, access to summer enrichment programs and guidance through the college application and financial aid process.
The work Minds Matter does addresses a disproportionate statistic: While roughly 89% of students from “well-off” families attend college, only 51% of students from low-income families do so, according to a report published by Brookings. Minds Matter reported that 100% of its students attended a four-year college or university.
The D.C. Schools Project, a program of the Center for Social Justice, offers academic help and English-language tutoring for low-income and immigrant families. Each semester, roughly 60 tutors assist about 100 students, their families, and other D.C. immigrants.
D.C. CAP Scholars has a mission to connect youth with financial and academic opportunities that will help them succeed in college. Registration is now open for the organization’s Ward 7 & 8 scholarship, a $12,000 annual scholarship for students who attended high school in those D.C. wards. Those areas encompass communities such as Congress Heights, Deanwood and Anacostia, which are some of the city’s poorest areas.
RISE offers tutoring and college mentoring to underserved populations. Its primary focus is on opportunity academies, including the three in D.C.: Ballou STAY, Luke C. Moore and Garnet-Patterson STAY. These academies are “second chance” schools for students who didn’t complete high school on a traditional timeline.
RISE Executive Director Ricardo Cooper said the organization offers real-time tutors for students in these academies through its Keep Up Tutoring program. RISE also provides summer literacy “bootcamps” and college prep for underserved students.
As a native Washingtonian, Cooper said he wishes opportunities like RISE were available to him as a kid. That’s why it’s so special for him to lead the organization and help D.C. youth rise above the academic and economic barriers he used to face.
“We know that going to college and getting a degree makes you more money,” Cooper said. “Being able to have these programs to support youth in school, to make sure that they feel confident once they graduate high school, to go to college, to feel confident in completing their coursework and just understanding the material is important to raise that poverty line.”
While these programs are crucial to many students’ success, Matthew Shirrell, associate professor of educational leadership at George Washington University, said there are many fundamental solutions to supporting kids that schools should recognize.
Diverse learning opportunities
Shirrell’s research has identified a key link to the positive relationships between teachers and students: diversity.
“Having a more diverse teaching workforce would certainly benefit all students, because it’s like their teachers having access to a library with a whole bunch of different perspectives,” Shirrell said.
He said teachers have a continuously growing list of responsibilities not just academically, but in dealing with social and emotional issues that students bring to school. By having a diverse team of educators in each school, teachers are better equipped to connect with students to turn potential barriers into new pathways.
But achieving this is about more than championing diversity –– it’s a way for students to secure better futures and stay out of the criminal justice system, Shirrell said.
Shirrell pointed to the idea of “exclusionary discipline.” In his research, Shirrell found that Black and LatinX students were significantly less likely to be suspended from school when they had teachers who shared their racial or ethnic background.
Teachers of different backgrounds than their students tend to rely on harsh disciplinary action, when in reality the situation could come down to cultural misunderstandings or misconceptions, Shirrell said.
In the long run, this disciplinary bias can disproportionately impact underserved communities. Shirrell said relentless discipline can lead to the students making poor decisions outside of school and potentially ending up in the criminal justice system.
At such a formative age, students need the support, understanding and guidance that only a diverse population of educators can bring.
“You really can’t get that from a book,” Shirrell said. “The best way to learn that is from working alongside somebody who you know is doing things differently than you. There’s tremendous value to having a diverse workforce, whether that be racial, linguistic or economic.”
Securing an education from open-minded teachers is especially important in underserved pockets of D.C., such as Wards 7 and 8. D.C. youth can experience completely different lives and opportunities just by living around the block. Diverse educators can help fill social gaps, but having students from different economic backgrounds share a classroom pushes them to see different points of views and develop their critical thinking skills, Shirrell said.
Luckily, that sentiment rings true in D.C., a city with high social capital –– or the likelihood of low-income people and high-income people becoming friends or crossing paths. About 50% of the friends of low-income people have high incomes, and low-income people are only 4.7% less likely to friend high-income people they meet, according to Opportunity Insights.
Though there’s never one simple solution in growing economic mobility for students and their families, Cooper, the RISE executive director, said having educators who embody multiple perspectives –– as well as ensure students are aware of the financial and academic support programs available to them –– are strong ways to set a child on a brighter financial and professional path.
“There are a lot of factors that also go along with [improving economic mobility], but chances are better once students feel confident in who they are, confident in what they can do and go to college and excel,” Cooper said.
This article is part of a national initiative exploring how geography, policy, and local conditions influence access to opportunity. Find more stories at economicopportunitylab.com.
District of Columbia
GLAA releases ratings for 18 candidates running for D.C. mayor, Council, AG
Mayoral contender Janeese Lewis Geroge among those receiving highest score
D.C. mayoral candidate Janeese Lewis George, a Democrat, is among just four candidates to receive the highest rating score of +10 from GLAA D.C. who are competing in the city’s June 16 primary election.
GLAA, formally known as the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance of Washington, has rated candidates for public office in D.C. since the 1970s. It rated 18 of the 36 candidates on this year’s primary ballot for mayor, D.C. Council, and D.C. attorney general based on its policy of only rating candidates who return a GLAA questionnaire asking for their positions on a wide range of issues, most of which are not LGBTQ-specific.
Among the candidates who did not return the questionnaire and thus did not receive a rating, according to GLAA, was Democratic mayoral contender Kenyan McDuffie, who along with Lewis George, is considered by political observers to be one of the two leading mayoral candidates running in the Democratic primary.
Lewis George and McDuffie, who each have long records of support for the LGBTQ community, are among a total of eight candidates running for mayor on the June 16 primary ballot: seven Democrats and one Statehood Green Party candidate. In addition to Lewis George, GLAA rated just two other mayoral candidates. Rini Sampath, a Democrat who self identifies as queer, received a +6.5 rating, and Ernest E. Johnson, also a Democrat, received a +4.5 rating
Under the GLAA rating system, candidate ratings range from a +10, the highest score, to a -10, the lowest possible score. In its ratings for the June 16 primary, the lowest score issued was +4.5. GLAA said in a statement that each of the 18 candidates it rated expressed strong support for LGBTQ-related issues in their questionnaire responses, indicating that the overall rating scores reflect the candidates’ positions on mostly non-LGBTQ-specific issues.
The three other candidates who received a +10 GLAA rating are each running as Democrats for the Ward 1 D.C. Council seat. They include gay candidate Miguel Trindade Deramo; Aparna Raj, who identifies as bisexual; and LGBTQ ally Rashida Brown. The only other Ward 1 candidate rated by GLAA is LGBTQ ally Terry Lynch, who received a +5.5 rating.
Ward 5 D.C. Councilmember Zachary Parker, the Council’s only gay member who is facing two opponents in the Democratic primary, received a +7 GLAA rating. The two challengers did not return the questionnaire and were not rated.
“In seven out of 10 of our priorities, every candidate indicated agreement,” GLAA said in its statement to the Washington Blade in referring to the candidates it rated. “Total consensus on core issues signals that whomever is elected to Council and mayor, we should expect to hold our elected officials accountable to our goals of protecting home rule, resisting federal overreach, advancing transgender healthcare rights, and eliminating chronic homelessness in the District,” the statement says.
“While candidates agree on the basics, they distinguish themselves in the depth and creativity in their responses, and their record on the issues,” according to the statement, which adds that candidates’ full questionnaire responses and ratings can be accessed on the GLAA website, www.glaa.org.
Like past election years, GLAA does not rate candidates running for the D.C. Congressional Delegate seat or the so-called “shadow” U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate seats.
With the exception of one question asking about transgender rights, none of the other nine of the 10 questionnaire questions are LGBTQ-specific. But most of the questions mention that LGBTQ people are impacted by the issues being raised, such as affordable housing, federal government intrusion into D.C. home rule, and access to healthcare and public benefits for low-income residents.
One of the questions asks candidates if they support decriminalization of sex work in D.C. among consenting adults, which GLAA supports. Lewis George is among the candidates who said they do not support sex work decriminalization at this time. The other two mayoral candidates that GLAA rated, Sampath and Johnson, said they support sex work decriminalization.
In the race for D.C. attorney general, GLAA issued a rating for just one of the three candidates running: Republican challenger Manuel Rivera, who received a +4.5 rating. Incumbent Democrat Brian Schwalb and Democratic challenger J.P. Szymkowicz were not rated because they didn’t return the questionnaire.
D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson (D), who is running unopposed in the primary, received a +6.5 rating. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, who is facing three Democratic challengers in the primary and who is a longtime LGBTQ ally, received a +6.5 rating.
In the special election to fill the at-large D.C. Council seat vacated by the resignation of then-Independent Councilmember McDuffie to enable him to run for mayor as a Democrat, GLAA has rated two of the three Independent candidates competing for the seat. Elissa Silverman received a +5.75 rating, and Doni Crawford received a +5.6 rating.
Finally, in the At-Large D.C. Council race GLAA issued ratings for five of the 11 candidates running in the primary, each of whom are Democrats. Oye Owolewa received a +9; Lisa Raymond, +7.5; Dwight Davis, +6.5; Dyana N.M. Forester, +6; and Fred Hill, +6.6.
The full list of GLAA-rated candidates and their detailed questionnaire responses can be accessed at www.glaa.org.
District of Columbia
Anti-LGBTQ violence prevention efforts highlighted at D.C. community fair
Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs organized May 8 event
Detailed advice on how LGBTQ people can avoid, defend themselves against, and prevent themselves and loved ones from becoming victims of violence, with a focus on domestic and intimate partner violence, was presented at a May 8 LGBTQIA+ Safety in Numbers Community Fair.
The event, organized by the D.C. Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, included five workshop sessions and information tables set up by 14 LGBTQ-supportive organizations and D.C. government agencies or agency divisions, including the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department’s LGBT Liaison Unit and the D.C. LGBTQ+ Community Center.
Also playing a lead role in organizing the event was the D.C. LGBTQIA+ Violence Prevention and Response Team, or VPART, a coalition of D.C. officials and leaders of community-based organizations that work with the Office of LGBTQ Affairs.
The event was held in meeting space in the building where the Office of LGBTQ Affairs is located at 899 N. Capitol St., N.E.
The workshop topics included de-escalation training on healthy relationships, bystander intervention, self-defense training, violence prevention grants, and suicide prevention.
“This will be a public safety and violence prevention event where community partners will educate attendees on various methods of violence intervention and trauma-informed practices,” according to a statement released by the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs prior to the start of the event.
The statement adds, “We will have live demos, interactive games, and workshops focused on strategies for self-defense, protecting vulnerable communities, increasing access to mental health resources, providing tools for recognizing domestic violence/intimate partner violence signs in intimate relationships, and assistance for substance abuse.”
Sonya Joseph, associate director of engagement for the Office of LGBTQ Affairs, told the Washington Blade that studies have shown rates of domestic or intimate partner violence are higher in the LGBTQ community than in the community at large.
“Domestic violence and intimate partner violence are two very big prevalent issues in the LGBTQ community,” she said, adding that some of the workshops at the event would be providing “training on healthy relationships and how to recognize and prevent intimate partner violence and the signs of it.”
About 35 to 40 people attended the workshop sessions.
Experts specializing in violence impacting the LGBTQ community have said domestic violence refers to violence among people in domestic relationships that can include spouses but also siblings, parents, cousins, and other relatives. Intimate partner violence, according to the experts, refers to violence perpetuated by a partner in a romantic or dating relationship.
These D.C. based organizations or agencies that participated in the LGBTQIA+ Safety in Numbers event, and which can be contacted for assistance, include:
• Defend Yourself
• DC LGBTQ+ Community Center
• American Foundation for Suicide Prevention
• Joseph’s House
• Us Helping Us, People into Living, Inc.
• MCSR (formerly known as Men Can Stop Rape)
• MPD LGBT Liaison Unit
• Volunteer Legal Advocates
• DC SAFE
• Destination Tomorrow
• D.C. Office of Victims Services and Justice Grants
• Life Enhancement Services
• ONYX Therapy Group
• U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C.
District of Columbia
Maren Morris to headline Capital Pride Concert
Grammy award-winning singer/songwriter came out as bisexual in 2024
Capital Pride Alliance, the group that organizes D.C.’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, announced on May 7 that nationally acclaimed singer-songwriter Maren Morris, who identifies as bisexual, will be the headline performer at this year’s Capital Pride Concert scheduled for June 21.
The concert takes place as part of the annual Capital Pride Festival held on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., usually between 3rd Street near the U.S. Capitol and 9th Street.
“Morris, known for her genre-blending sound and outspoken support of LGBTQ+ rights, will be joined by a standout lineup, including acclaimed queer rapper Leikeli47, pop icon Lisa Lisa, Juno-nominated producer and DJ from the ‘Heated Rivalry’ soundtrack, Harrison, and ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 18 winner Myki Meeks,” according to a statement released by Capital Pride.
“In a moment when LGBTQ+ people are being challenged across the country, the Capital Pride Concert is a space where our community is fully seen and heard,” Ryan Bos, the Capital Pride Alliance CEO and president, said in the statement. “Bringing Maren Morris to the stage reflects this year’s theme: Exist, Resist, Have the Audacity,” Bos said.
The statement notes that the concert takes place as part of the annual D.C. Pride Festival, which is open to the public free of charge, with tickets available for purchase for specific areas listed as the Capital Stage Pit Zone and the VIP Concert Zone.
It says the festival takes place from 12 –10 p.m. and points out that in addition to the music performed by multiple other performers on several stages, festival attendees “can explore hundreds of exhibitors, community organizations, and artisans, along with multiple food courts and beverage gardens throughout the festival footprint.”
Information on the Capital Pride Alliance website shows that the festival takes place one day after the annual Capital Pride Parade, scheduled for June 20 and which is expected to travel from 14th and T Streets, N.W., to Pennsylvania Ave., N.W., where it is expected to end at 9th Street.
The statement adds that following the stage performances during the June 21 festival, which are expected to conclude around 8 p.m., “the celebration will continue with the Capitol Sunset Dance Party, closing out the evening against the backdrop of the U.S. Capitol.”
The online publication Today, which is part of the NBC “Today” television show, reported that Morris came out as bisexual in a 2024 during Pride. It reports Morris “shared several images of herself holding a Pride flag to mark the occasion, writing, ‘Happy to be the B in LGBTQ+’”
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