I'm calling Gordon to this hearing.

This is a public hearing of the committee as a whole of the Council of the District of Columbia.

I'm Phil Mendelssohn, Chair of the Council and Chair of the Committee as a whole.

Today is Wednesday, April 22nd, 2026.

The time is 1022 in the morning.

I apologize for our starting late, and I do not have a good excuse.

Excuse me, fiscal year 2027 proposed budgets for District of Columbia Public Schools and District of Columbia Public Charter School Board.

The um this is the first of a number of hearings with the committee whole is having on the mayor's proposed budget.

The mayor submitted her proposed budget for fiscal year 2027 last week, April 14th, together with her proposed budget for fiscal year 2027, our proposed revisions to the current year fiscal year 2026 budget, a budget support act, which makes a number of changes to the law in support of the budget.

There are also several other documents like the federal portion budget request act that uh the mayor submitted.

The committee as a whole will have a hearing on all of these documents on May 13th.

The hearing today is public witnesses, and we will turn to government witnesses at a separate hearing.

Uh we have a hearing tomorrow at uh a budget hearing tomorrow at um presumably at 9 a.m.

on the University of District of Columbia, the Deputy Mayor for Education, the State Board of Education, the District of Columbia State Athletics Commission, and we have a hearing on Friday where we will hear the government witnesses with regard to the public charter school board and DCPS.

Just the public charter school board.

I'm sorry, I misspoke.

Just the public charter school board.

Um I do not have in front of me when we'll hear the government witnesses.

Uh next Friday.

Um, May 1st is when we will hear the um government witnesses for DCPS.

Sorry, that's not better organized.

Uh so I'm gonna call witnesses uh until I fill up that table or I have filled up the page.

We have 99 witnesses, I believe, who registered.

Eric Goulet, who is Ward 3 representative on the DC State Board of Education.

Yeah, that's yeah.

Amanda Delabar, who's principal at Tubman Elementary School.

Uh Carolina Bitto.

Principal of Oyster Adams.

Oh, it's Katrina Owens, who's executive director of DC Scores.

Danielle Robinette, who's senior policy attorney, children's law center.

I'm aware that Russ Williams was present.

You have to leave by 1030.

You're witness number 10.

So we'll get there.

Um let's start with.

Although, hold on a second.

Uh I didn't say.

Uh so we'll begin with uh Principal Delabar.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelssohn, Council members and staff.

My name is Amanda Delabar.

I've served as the principal of Tubman Elementary for the past 13 years.

I began my career with DCPS as an assistant principal at Columbia Heights Education Campus in 2009 after teaching and coaching in Texas.

It's been an honor to go professionally within the system, and I'm very proud to serve our students, families, and school community.

Having spent many years in DCPS, I've experienced a wide range of budget cycles and have learned to be very flexible while still achieving the mission and vision of our school.

Although we experienced a decline in projected enrollment last year that resulted in a budget reduction, the budget was workable for the number of students, and Tubman has been able to continue to meet the needs of our kids and our families.

We were able to continue our co-teaching model.

We started two years ago.

All students in grades one through five, and most of our self-contained classrooms have two certified teachers all day.

The model strengthens instructional support and improves IEP case management.

Last year, Tubman saw a four percentage point increase in ELA proficiency and an 8.8 percentage increase in math proficiency, due in part to the co-teaching model and to the wraparound services we're able to provide.

We serve a very high needs community and we're deeply committed to ensuring that families feel welcome, engaged, and supported.

To do this effectively, Tubman operates as both a community school and a DCPS connected school.

We're grateful to receive community school grants with MCIP and Mary Center, which allow us to provide comprehensive wraparound services for our families and meet with parents monthly to gather feedback and ensure we're responsive to the needs of our community.

Some of our services include a clothing closet, weekly food distribution, monthly parent workshops on topics such as stress management and positive discipline.

We supply all required school materials for students, including backpacks and guarantee every student a seat and at least one after school enrichment program.

We join the DCPS Connected School Initiative to be part of a network of schools engaged in this work together.

Connected school managers meet monthly to discuss partnership opportunities and share best practices for truly being a hub in the community.

In addition to meeting the needs of families, the DCPS Connected School model helps us meet the needs of educators.

Using connected schools funding, we partnered with Georgetown University to support educator well-being.

We hold our teachers to high expectations and ensure they're trained in trauma-informed practices, but it's equally important that we support their well-being so they can continue to support our students effectively.

I'm incredibly proud of our students and educators and grateful to our engaged and supportive local school advisory team.

We're excited to move into our newly modernized school building next year.

Thank you for your continued support of public education in the district.

Our budget allows us to provide the necessary supports to nurture the hearts and minds of our students so they can chief at high levels and grow into individuals who are empowered to question, challenge, and change the world.

Thank you for your time, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you.

I may have some questions.

Buenos días.

Chairman Mendelssohn, Council members and staff.

My name is Carolina Burrito, and I am honored to serve as the principal of Oyster Adams Bilingual School and to be here with my colleagues.

My testimony is going to focus on the incredible academic growth that happens as a result of investing in highly qualified educators who care deeply for our young people and share the mission of uplifting the gift of bioliteracy.

We don't know each other yet.

I formerly served as a principal of a Title I school in Massachusetts, where I led a historic dual language school as well.

And as part of that work, my team and I studied strong established dual language programs in DC, including Bruce Monroe and Oyster Addams.

And I had the privilege of learning from former OA principal Maida Cruz.

When the Oyster Addams Principalship opened, DCPS generously offered the opportunity to move back to my childhood home, and today my own kids are proud Oyster Adam Tigers.

So at Oyster Adams, our personnel budget is presently right-sized for our model and our students.

Being fully staffed in the linguistic inclusion model is remarkably challenging and something that we in DC should be very proud of.

As a dual language school, we receive supplemental funding from Central, but most of our resources in the budget come through the English language development weight in the UPSFF.

So during our LSAT meetings this winter, we reviewed enrollment projections and discussed some strategies to actually attract more students from across the city as our model was built to serve recent Spanish-speaking immigrants.

Our budget reflects our commitment to students who are the furthest from opportunity, and I am incredibly proud to share the gains our students achieved last school year.

Our middle school English language learners saw gains of 15.5 percentage points on DC Cape math assessments and a gain of 12.1 percentage points on ELA.

Our economically disadvantaged students grew by 19 percentage points in ELA, and these achievements stem from a deliberate and unified effort to strengthen tier one by setting high expectations in every classroom.

We've engaged interventionists in specialized tier two PD to also accelerate our student growth.

And our teachers are some of the most talented educators I've ever had the privilege to work with.

In particular, because of DCPS's commitment to international educators, almost one-third of our faculty at Oyster Adams has at one point participated in the Visa sponsorship program.

And this has enabled us to attract talented teachers from Latin America and Spain and all over the world.

And this level of commitment to global citizenship and building world-class bilingual programming is unique and makes me very proud to serve in DC.

I also want to recognize a couple of incredible leaders at Central, Catarina Burrito, no relation, Juliet Steadman, and Eric Bethel.

Their incredible commitment to expanding dual language education, their expertise, and their high quality professional development for leaders and teachers have strengthened our work and impact.

In closing, continued support for dual language programs, talent pipelines, and budgets that make them visible will allow us to expand opportunity and ensure that students across the district benefit from the academic excellence we're seeing at Oyster Adams.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ms.

Owens.

Good morning, Chairman.

My name is Katrina Owens.

I'm the executive director at DC Scores.

I am a DC resident, a DCPS parent at Oyster Adams, and have been working with DC Scores on staff and before that as a DCPS teacher and DC Scores coach since 2002.

For over 30 years, DC Scores has served young people in the district through our soccer poetry and service learning programming.

We've been working in partnership with DCPS since our founding, and today we serve 3,500 poet athletes across 68 DC public and public charter schools.

2500 of those kids are DCPS students.

Young people participate in our program in their school buildings with DC Scores coaches who are almost all recruited from staff already in the building.

This year we will train, support, and celebrate over 300 teachers and school day staff who support our poet athletes during the out-of-school time hours.

We are uniquely positioned to support DCPS's strategic plan with a focus on middle school OST.

Most DC Scores poet athletes who join our program in first grade stay with us through eighth grade, allowing us to have an outsized impact in the middle school space.

In addition to our unique partnership with the Washington Spirit and DC United, it has resulted in more kids, especially girls, staying in sports longer than the national average.

Because programming follows the DCPS feeder pattern, kids form their identity and choose to be with scores from first through eighth grade, and then we pass them to their coaches and teachers in high school.

We want to thank the mayor for the continued investment in OST and education in the FY27 budget, and we ask you to protect the funding for OST out of school time in the budget.

DCPS's budget also includes $8 million in enhancement for on-site after school programs.

We encourage the council to require schools to partner with or subgrant a community-based OST programs, just as the DME does.

This helps ensure public dollars reach experienced providers who are best positioned to deliver high quality enrichment after school, as DC Scores has done for over 30 years, working in direct collaboration with our school partners and principals.

Results in high quality programming that meets the unique needs of kids, families, and schools.

We look forward to continuing to deepen our partnership with DCPS.

The demand for DC scores programming continues.

We have 20 schools on our wait list.

We are ready to serve more students but lack the increased funding to do so.

To demonstrate the power of our partnership with DC Public Schools, I want to end with a poem from Whitlock Elementary School.

It's entitled, What DC Means to Me.

DC is my home where dreams love to roam, a city of voices where no one's alone.

We work hard together, believe and achieve.

We see a rainbow of people so bright and so free, who shine with pride and spread unity.

From the go-go beats to the cherry trees that glow, wings, fries, and mumbo sauce that put on a show.

My hope for DC is peace in the air, real leaders who are for the people who serve with love and care.

This city's my story, my roots, my song forever DC, where my heart belongs.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ms.

Robinette.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson and staff.

My name is Danielle Robinette, and I'm a senior policy attorney with Children's Law Center.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony regarding the mayor's proposed budgets for DCPS and the charter schools.

We are glad to see that despite the challenging budget landscape, the mayor's proposed budget for K-12 public education was largely protected from cuts.

However, the proposed budget also provides two opportunities to examine how the district allocates funding across and within the education sector.

First, changes to the allocation of facility costs highlight a lack of parity between DCPS and the charter schools.

The proposed shift of DCPS's fixed costs to DGS allows DCPS to increase spending on personnel costs while still cutting their overall operating budget.

While this move may provide some level of efficiency, it also raises concerns about equitable funding across the traditional and charter sectors within DC's system of public education.

Moving these costs by moving these costs to DGS, they become exempt from application of the UPSFF, the district's primary mechanism for shaping education investments.

As more of DCPS's budget is funded outside the formula, parity between DCPS and the charter sector is undermined.

As such, decisions regarding funding outside the formula require the council to wrestle with what fairness means in the school finance context and what precedent will be set for future budgets.

Additionally, the proposed FY27 budget highlights a lack of sufficient detail in the public-facing documents regarding the utilization of special education funding.

For example, the DCPS budget includes a 21.3 million dollar increase in personnel costs for school special education.

However, there's also a cut of 9.2 million and 70.3 FTEs from the Office of Teaching and Learning, which includes the division of specialized instruction.

The public budget documents do not indicate how the cut from teaching and learning is distributed across its divisions or whether any part thereof comes from special education.

We urge the committee to use next week's hearing with the government witnesses to clarify how these and other special education investments will better meet the needs of students with disabilities.

Moreover, the proposed budget declines to add a level five special education add-on as recommended by both a DME funding adequacy report and Aussie's UPSFF working group.

The proposed level five add-on would make a significant difference for schools that serve students with the highest support needs.

Notably, it would provide more reliable and sustainable funding for St.

Coletta, which in turn would prevent the recurring budget shortfall that this committee must address year after year.

We recognize the constraints of the current budget, and we appreciate that the mayor and the council have consistently demonstrated a strong commitment to funding K-12 public education.

The district surpasses every state in per pupil education expenditures.

However, DC's nation leading investments have not yet yielded nation-leading academic outcomes.

Adequate and equitable funding is a necessary precursor to a strong public school system.

But money alone will not close opportunity gaps.

The district must ensure that investments in education are reaching students and meeting their needs.

As such, we encourage the committee to conduct regular and rigorous oversight of education spending throughout the year, not just during budget season.

Such oversight should monitor the impact of current education investments and identify where implementation issues may undermine program efficacy and or academic outcomes.

Thank you for this opportunity to testify.

I welcome any questions.

And if I remember, I will ask the chancellor next week about the um the increase of 21.3 million and the decrease of 9.2 million.

Thank you.

Thank you each of you for your testimony.

Just a couple things.

Let me ask the two principles.

Tubman?

Um we had a slight increase.

And Oyster Adams?

The same.

Are you looking to have to reduce any FTEs at your school?

Tubman?

We will have some reduction in positions, but it's because they're being converted to other positions.

So for example, an administrative officer who's being promoted to a dean.

So there's technically some reductions, but overall number of personnel will stay the same.

I think we actually increase by one.

Okay.

And I'm interested in the net.

Likewise, we had an opportunity to increase by one.

Okay.

So that all sounds good for your two schools.

Let me ask Principal Brito the um how has the federal immigration enforcement affected your enrollment?

And or maybe I'll say attendance, either.

Great questions.

It has affected our attendance during seasons in which we're most aware of ICE in our neighborhoods.

And in order to mitigate that effort, we've had parents organize like underground carpools to get kids to school.

And so in order to prevent a landslide uh absenteeism rate, we've had to organize as a community to make sure our kids get to school safely.

In terms of enrollment, although our numbers are healthy, who is enrolling at Oyster Adams has changed significantly as a result of federal policy.

I am here.

My mission was built to serve students for whom bilingual school is an opportunity to attain English.

And right now, as a result of immigrant communities fleeing the city, that is increasingly less and less who we serve, especially because of the neighborhood that we are in.

So while our numbers look healthy, the who in the heart of the mission is severely compromised by the presence of federal incursion in our city.

Thank you for that.

Is Tubman seeing any effect here?

Yes, we have significant effects in our attendance, families scared to come to school for sometimes weeks at a time, definitely days in a row.

Um, and we are losing families on a weekly basis, um, especially around December, it felt like on a daily basis of families going back to South and Central America and leaving the city.

Your enrollment for next year is projected to go down.

It's projected to increase from the reduction in the swing space to 41.

And what is it right now?

We're at like 383.

But I think we were funded at 350.

Yeah.

I'm saying yeah, because I remember you it was a substantial reduction in the projection, and you exceeded that projection.

Yes.

Substantially.

Did you get extra dollars for exceeding the projection?

Um we had some budget assistance, but um we didn't get additional funding like when they fund in like October.

Um for either of you, um have you lost educators who were not able to transition from the H1B visas to the green card program?

Um I currently have two educators that are just stuck in the process.

Um, they haven't been denied, but we applied last year for their renewal, and it's just stuck.

Um, and they will have to leave the country, one of them at the end of June and one July 1st.

And what about Oyster Adams?

We haven't lost anyone because of the termination of the green card program.

However, when we're speaking to candidates and they know that it's a short six years at most, it is a disincentive for some.

And it also makes us a bit nervous that over the years we're gonna lose people that we invest a lot of time in developing.

However, we've been upfront with candidates as they've come forward that like we don't have this program available to you right now.

And so this is for my understanding going to be a short term at most six years, which is what we can hold.

Um, however, if someday DC chooses to re-engage in the green card process, I think it would be of great benefit to retaining extraordinary talent from around the world.

So, Principal Delabar, I I didn't follow completely.

Um they leaving because the process of renewing a visa is so difficult, or because they can't uh the CPS is not helping with green cards.

I'm sorry, they're stuck in renewal, like they're stuck in the renewal process.

And you don't see that getting resolved before June.

I'm losing hope every day.

Uh maybe we can remember to ask the chancellor about it next week.

Um let me see.

Tubman, you are both a community school and a connected school?

We are.

Aren't those duplicate programs?

Um no.

So we work very hard to make sure that they have separate streams of work and separate streams of engagement to make sure that we're maximizing the funding.

So, for example, community schools funds, our clothing closet, our food program, some of our school supplies, connected schools is focused a lot on our family engagement and also on our staff members' well-being.

And your funding for this is coming from Aussie grants, DCPS?

So the community schools comes from Aussie grants and our partners are MCIP and Mary Center, and the connected schools is through DCPS.

The community schools provides more funding.

The connected schools is $25,000.

The community schools is more than that.

Can you how much more?

I don't know.

I'd have to look it up and get it back to you.

Okay.

Um it's a substantial amount because it funds uh community schools coordinator plus all of those things, the food, the backpack.

So it's it's over a hundred thousand.

I'm actually looking at some questions here.

Um I don't think I have any other questions, but I do want to say this before any of you get up.

Um I'm very troubled that the budget that we have proposed for FY27 comes with a financial plan that is a mess.

That's I'm troubled over the financial plan.

That's where I'm going.

So you all know that the mayor increased her proposals to increase the UPSFF by close to three percent.

We all think that's a good idea.

I don't think the council is gonna change that, not at all.

Um but the financial plan is a four-year, basically a four-year budget, and I think the public generally doesn't pay attention to it.

And the council hasn't paid as much attention to it in the past as uh we need to this year.

And I don't know that we're gonna be able to fix it.

And why am I bringing this up?

Because, for example, the sowens, you talked about out-of-school time.

So I believe there's a slight reduction in out of school time for FY27.

There's a significant reduction to out-of-school time after FY27 in the financial plan.

I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I'm gonna say 10 million, 18 million.

I mean, it's significant.

The UPSFF in the financial plan after fiscal year 27 is to go down.

Now, that's what the mayor put in the financial plan for the current year, and nobody wants to see a reduction in the UPSF.

So it's quite likely that the UPSFF will not reduce in FY28.

But because the financial plan calls for a reduction and the financial plan is balanced, it means that the struggle we're going through this year, we will go through next year.

That is, there will be a lot of cuts in order to maintain other programs.

And this is I'll call it a structural imbalance that we've got to address.

And uh so I I raised this with colleagues yesterday, and I'm going to raise it over and over again that we've got to we the council have got to make a decision whether we're just going to approach FY27 the way we did FY26, which is well just we'll deal with a single year, or whether we're going to try to tackle this financial plan.

So it doesn't make sense that out of school time be reduced.

That affects every one of you, and it doesn't make sense that the UPSFF would be reduced.

So just so you know that the issues that were the challenges that we're confronting are greater than just the fiscal year 27 budget.

And there was not a question in that.

Thank you, each of you, for your testimony.

Uh I'm going to turn to the next group.

Anusha Imran who's with the DC Policy Center.

Uh Ariel Johnson, who is executive director of the DC Charter School Alliance.

Gabriela Silva.

Michael and Ms.

Silva's senior program manager with PAVE.

Michael Rodriguez, who is chief executive officer at St.

Coletta.

He's online.

Russ Williams, who is executive director.

He's online.

I mean he's an easy person.

Sorry.

Simon Rodberg, who is executive director of Lee Montessori.

Online.

And I think I'll stop right there.

Can you give me one second?

I have to make TBA couples.

I think we're trying to enable something.

And it might involve you, Ms.

Johnson.

Schools first.

Chapters.

Great.

Actually, I'll put them right back there.

Ms.

Johnson, you're first.

You're up.

Good morning, Chairman.

Uh and team.

My name is Ariel Johnson.

I'm the executive director of the Lee Seach Higher School Alliance and award 5 resident.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify on the FY27 budget.

This year marks an important milestone, the 30th anniversary of public charter schools in the district.

Today, charter schools serve nearly 48,000 students and are fully integrated and essential part of DC's public education system.

Our schools reflect the diversity of the city and provide a wide range of options from adult education and alternative pathways for overage underaccredited to language immersion, arts, and nationally recognized special education programs like St.

Coletta's.

Consider social justice public charter school.

They opened during the pandemic, struggled to find a permanent facility and experience some academic challenges.

However, under the dedicated leadership of Myron Long, they reset their academics to outperform many of their peers in math and ELA and have built a strong culture and community.

Yet under this proposal, they would not receive approximately 200,000 dollars that comparable DCPS schools will receive.

That means difficult decisions about staffing, programming, and student supports, just as they are gaining momentum.

And while smaller schools will feel this most acutely, every charter LEA will be forced to make trade-offs that impact students.

The facilities picture makes this even more challenging.

The proposal freezes the charter facilities allotment through FY30 while increasing DCPS's capital funding budget by 72 million.

At the same time, schools are facing rising costs.

Utility expenses alone have increased by about 20% in the past year.

This forces schools to shift dollars from the classroom simply to keep their buildings running.

DC has long been a national leader in public education and charter school quality, but increasingly we are shifting from collaboration to defending basic funding equity year after year.

This moment calls for a reset.

As the district looks toward future leadership, we have an opportunity to recommit to a public education system that treats all students fairly.

That starts with upholding the integrity of the UPSF and ensuring equitable funding across sectors.

At its core, this is about values.

Funding decisions reflect who we prioritize.

We urge the council to fully fund the UPSFF, restore critical resources, and ensure that all public school students, regardless of sector, are valued equally.

Please don't send the message that our students are worthless.

Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you, Ms.

Jones.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson and committee staff.

My name is Gabriela Silva, and I'm the senior program manager at PAI of Parents Amplifying Voices in Education.

Last year, PAIF Parent Leaders voted to prioritize academics above all else.

Thanks in large part to sustained parent advocacy.

DC has seen tremendous gains, including the nation's fastest academic recovery and top rankings in a recent national survey of parents' perspective on education.

But with proficiency rates at just 37.6% in literacy and 26.4% in math.

We know that we have a long way to go to make sure all of our students can thrive.

To continue building on the progress we've made, we need to concentrate on what we know works to drive student achievement.

Today you'll hear from pay of parent leaders about two key investments that have been proven to help our students succeed high impact tutoring and educator professional development.

Research shows that HIT is one of the most effective ways to improve student achievement, and the data on DC's initiative prove it makes a difference for our students and our schools.

Students receiving HIT through City Schools Collaborative received an additional or an equivalent of 59 additional instructional days in math, and 92% of lower achieving students who received HIT achieved $138% of expected growth in math and $133% of expected growth in reading.

Students participating in DC's HIT initiative also improved their attendance by an average of about 7% on their scheduled tutoring days.

For the second year in a row, DC ranked first among states in access to tutoring on 50 CAN's State of Educational Opportunity in America report.

However, we know that our current level of access is not sufficient to reach all the students who could benefit from HIT.

DC also ranks number one in unmet demand for tutoring, as well as in parent support for free tutoring for students who are not yet at grade level.

The data is clear.

We're grateful to see that the mayor's proposed FY27 budget includes $3 million for HIT, and we're asking the council to maintain the investment so DC can continue providing this critical academic support.

In addition to supporting academic achievement through tutoring, we need to make sure our students receive the best possible instruction in their classroom.

That's achieved through ongoing professional development for educators and instruct for educators and instructional best practices, such as the science of reading.

DC has already made significant strides in improving instruction through educator PD.

The DCPS reading clinic provides structured literacy training for teachers in addition to tutoring students and has helped dramatically improve instruction and outcomes for students, especially those furthest from grade level.

We know it works to support teachers in providing high quality evidence-based instruction, and we already have programs that are doing this work and have seen results.

What we need now is the funding to implement the recommendations of the early literacy and math task forces and expand the programs that are making a difference so that all teachers across both DCPS and charter sector have access to ongoing PDs so they can provide the best possible instruction for students.

Pay of parent leaders have students in both DCPS and DC public charter schools.

They were concerned to learn that in the FY27 proposed budget, charter schools were receiving approximately 2,000 less per student than their peers at DCPS.

Parents want to know that wherever their children go to school, they have the resources to thrive.

This requires equitable funding across sectors and closing the gaps between the DCPS and DC public charter schools.

Even in a difficult budget year, we have to keep investing in the future of DC, our kids.

We need to prioritize what we know works, especially in educator professional development.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I hope I can count on your leadership.

Thank you, Ms.

Silva.

Um, Mr.

Rodriguez, who is online.

Yes, good morning.

Uh my name is Mike Rodericks, and I've testified many times on behalf of St.

Coletta Special Education Public Charter School.

St.

Coletta's funding gap has been publicly acknowledged by the DME, the Council, the DME's 2023 Anequacy Study, the UPS FF working group, the DC Public Charter School Board, and the DC Charter School Alliance.

I am here to deliver a truth bomb.

As I have warned for the past five years, the DME's refusal to provide a durable and flexible funding mechanism that meets our students' needs has resulted in a full-blown crisis.

The chickens have come home to roost.

In FY27, we expect to enroll 21 additional students who will require full-time one-to-one support.

Wages and benefits for those 21 dedicated aids will total 1.3 million dollars.

Needed expansion of therapy and specialized services will cost an additional approximately 275,000.

So the total added cost for those 21 students is 1.6 million dollars.

Knowing the DME has delayed implementing level 5 funding, we worked with the Public Charter School Board and the Charter School Alliance on a bridge proposal, adjusting the special education school weight from 1.17 to 1.9 would have generated $2.7 million for St.

Coletta.

We are requesting that same $2.7 million in supplemental funding for FY27.

1.6 million would cover the immediate costs of these additional 21 students.

The remaining 1.1 million, which is less than the 1.2 million provided by the council last year would prevent further cuts that would directly impact our ability to provide the legally mandated services that DC is required to deliver.

So how did we get here again?

When St.

Coletta agreed to relocate to DC 20 years ago, there was a clear understanding.

UPS FF funding was insufficient and supplemental funding would fill the gap.

The district honored that agreement for 11 years, then eliminated it.

Since then, DC has knowingly failed to meet its legal obligation to adequately resource our students.

This is not a matter of debate.

The DME's own adequacy study identified the need for a responsive funding model called level 5 to scale with students requiring one-to-one support.

That recommendation has been consistently reinforced, and yet it has not been implemented.

Each year the gap persists.

It compounds, and it makes the problem more expensive and more disruptive to solve.

All 250 of our students live with severe and multiple disabilities.

91.6 are black or brown.

58% are at risk and or economically disadvantaged.

Their needs are consistent, their needs are documented, and their needs are not optional.

At current funding levels, the district would force us to decide which legally required services students will go without.

And that is not a position that the law allows you to create.

This is not simply a request for funding.

It's a report of a dumpster flyer, one that was totally foreseeable and preventable.

It's also a reminder of your responsibility and your authority as legislators.

You have the power to fix this and you have the obligation.

History will judge whether you do.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Rodriguez.

Russ Williams.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson and staff.

My name is Russ Williams.

And I serve as CEO of Center City Public Charter Schools.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

Over the past few years, Center City Public Charter School has been among the highest performing LEA networks in the city, while also driving strong growth in student achievement.

We continue to innovate.

We also continue to innovate, as evidenced by the recent opening of the makerspace at Center City PCS in Ward 5.

This is DC's first maker space serving DC public charter and public school students.

We believe that all DC students in Washington, D.C.

deserve access to a space like this.

A space with creative and STEAM labs where children receive early exposure to career and life skills like carpentry through a woodworking lab, fashion design through a textiles lab, audio engineering and production through a recording studio on site, video engineering and production via a green room plus video production and editing space.

Chemistry experiments through a fully equipped chemistry lab and artificial intelligence coding and VR through a fully equipped coding lab.

There is no other place like this in DC, and it was built with a goal of equitably serving the entire city.

There is no other place like this in DC, and it was built with a goal of equitably serving the entire city, much like the FY27 budget should be built equitably for all district students and families.

To further bring this point home, just yesterday on April 21st, we hosted a half dozen leaders from the DCPS Office of Teaching and Learning to both help them see the space in person and for them to brainstorm ways that DCPS students can also start utilizing the makerspace in furtherance of their education goals.

Despite this belief on our part that a space like this should benefit all district residents, the FY27 budget is currently drafted, seeks to create inequities in how DC public charters are funded relative to our peers at DC public schools.

This is patently inequitable, and it creates an uneven playing field for many district residents.

You have the numbers around the budget and equities thanks to the good work of the DC Charter Alliance.

I've included some of the inequitable funding data below as an appendix to my testimony.

I appreciate your time, your partnership, and continues support of students and educators and maker spaces in the district.

Urge the council to equitably fund all charter and public schools by funneling as much of the budgeted funds for schools, all schools through the UPSF and not through outside budgeting gimmicks and tricks.

Normally I would be happy to answer questions, but as I noted, I have to run to an appointment I can't miss.

And I know after you visited that you have a ton of questions for me about the makerspace, but I'll do with staff in terms of and do it those offline.

So thank you for your time today.

Appreciate you.

Yes, I did visit the maker space, and it was impressive.

Although I do question some of the uh guests on that uh podcast.

Students?

No, there wasn't the students, it was the adult.

He was the adult.

Um thank you.

Um Rodberg.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelssohn and colleagues.

I'm Simon Rodberg, Executive Director of Lee Montessori Public Charter Schools, serving 578 students in wards 5 and ward 8.

I'm also a ward four resident and a public charter school parent.

I'm at this budget hearing because I'm in the middle of working on Lee Montessori's budget for next year.

Our fiscal year starts July 1st, and this is the season when I have to look hard at what we can can and cannot do for our kids and our staff.

Here's my number one priority: pay our educators better.

Our teachers and staff are extraordinary, and they are passionate about what they do.

One of my proudest statistics is that our teacher retention is above the city average, especially for our most effective educators.

But as I look at our budget in the context of the mayor's proposed budget, the stress is clear.

I can't raise compensation enough to keep up with inflation.

I can't close the gap with what DCPS pays.

And I can't promise our educators that their caring and commitment are recognized the way they deserve.

Yes, we are grateful for the mayor's proposed 2.55% UPS FF increase in a genuinely difficult budget environment.

But other aspects of the proposed budget reduce what we can do for our staff and students.

That includes the lack of a facilities increase, the lack of comparable funding for what DGS will cover for DCPS, and the lack of teacher compensation funds to match DCPS's impact bonuses.

We can't increase teacher pay enough if we don't get these other funds.

I'm not complaining about DCPS teachers getting bonuses.

I'm saying that our teachers work just as hard for the same DC kids.

And right now, our math doesn't add up.

In so many ways, we are succeeding as a school.

In addition to our high teacher retention, our test scores are up.

Our attendance is high.

We're growing LEA.

Families are choosing us and staying at higher rates.

But successful schools need adequate funding.

We can't sustain what's working if we can't sustain the people doing the work.

The charter facilities allotment needs to keep pace with costs.

All public school funding needs needs to flow through the formula.

And if we want charter schools to keep serving half of DC's students well, to keep our teachers, grow our programs, and be strong partners in the city, then we need the funding to make that possible.

After I testify, I'm going to go back out into the halls of my school and thank our teachers for their incredible work with our incredible kids.

I want to be able to look them in the eye and say that we are doing everything we can to support them, and that our city has their backs.

One of our school's core values is equity.

And I believe that our kids and teachers deserve equitable funding for their public charter school.

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to answering any questions you may have.

Thank you, Mr.

Rodberg.

Let's see, I have two questions.

I shouldn't ask any questions because there are another 89 witnesses.

One question, Mr.

Rodriguez.

Yes.

How disruptive is this funding process for you?

And let me explain what I mean.

So the mayor, the mayor is not fully funding.

In her proposed budget is not fully funding St.

Coletta, either by funding the Level 5 weight or by just providing a supplement for St.

Coletta.

And I get the harm.

The Council each year has been putting money in the budget for St.

Coletta.

I don't know that we put in 100 percent of the need, but it sounds like the 1.2 million we put in for this year came close.

So this year you're going through what you went through last year.

That is the mayor is not funding, you have to come testify.

You have to make the case.

But for this year you got the money, and I believe the same thing happened the year before and the year before that.

So because the council is filling in the gap, because the council is making you whole or relatively whole, uh, how disruptive is this process for you?

Um that's a great question.

Just uh uh a quick correction, first of all.

Uh the funding, the generous funding by the council over the past three years, each year has roughly um uh covered 50 percent of the wound, if you will.

So we have had to make a consistent series of cuts in our um, first of all in our support services, and then in critical uh school staffing as well.

So while, you know, we've we've been kept afloat, uh the funding has not made us whole.

Uh secondly, this is extremely disruptive.

I've got to go in front of two boards next month with presenting what, three different budgets, an austerity budget if we don't get anything, a uh a budget which entails significant cuts if we get anything less than the 2.7 million, and no clarity going forward.

Um we do a good job of sheltering the staff from this issue.

We don't walk around and say we don't have enough money, so we can't do this or that.

We're ingenious and we're inventive.

But we've been systemically, in plain terms, financially bled out and choked out for nine years now.

There's a limit to the math mathing, and the math doesn't math anymore.

The 21 students who will be enrolled next year will require one to ones.

That's a massive spike.

Since I've been here, the number has been five or six students a year in terms of an increase.

Now it's jumped to 21.

Level 5 funding is an elastic system.

When our one-to-ones go up, we get the appropriate funding.

When they go down, we get less funding.

And that's fine.

We're only looking for what we need to provide our students what what what is enshrined in law, a free and appropriate public education.

Uh this is extremely disruptive for us.

And it's it's no way to treat an organization which is a jewel of the district.

Uh I hope that addresses your question.

If not, I'm happy to take another stab at it.

No, it does address the question.

I don't know that I asking you once and your answering it once is enough.

I think it needs to be heard over and over again, but it's helpful that you put that on the record.

And I agree with you, it's no way to treat a jewel.

Um I have one other question, but not for you, Mr.

Rodriguez, for Ms.

Johnson.

Um, this wasn't part of the testimony, but I'm remembering that we, uh the we is me is having conversations with the Chief Financial Officer about cash flow and liquidity.

The um I may say a little bit more about this so that you understand the issue.

Um the CFO is concerned that uh the cash balances that we have are going to decline.

Uh I think he's overly concerned, but I'll put that aside for the moment.

And um we have we we are our major taxes come in at two points in the year.

In April, when we get income tax and property tax, property taxes due to the end of March.

And then in September, when we get second half property tax payments.

So in between, in fact, right before those peaks are troughs.

Uh August is maybe the worst, which is to say that uh all the income that we've got in March, April has diminished, and uh we have much less cash available.

Uh looking at liquidity, uh there's been discussion about several several things we can do.

One is um mitigating um the lump sum payment to the char the um I may go there in a second.

Mitigating the lump sum payment to the retirement board.

We give them their annual payment in October rather than spreading it out throughout the year.

The uh another proposal is to uh spread out the payments to WAMATA.

I think we pay them quarterly and to spread that out through the year.

Maybe we pay them once in the fall.

Um, but we also do the advance to both DCPS and the charters, which we do in July or August, right when we get to the TROF.

So we're looking at or talking about changing that advance.

Um I'm not going to do anything without further conversation with you, but I thought I would put it out here and get your reaction if you have any reaction.

I know we we reduced it this year.

I think it was a third, like 36 percent.

We reduced it to like 30 percent of the annual allotment to the charters.

And I know there were a few charter schools that struggled.

Um just speak to what I need to know as we look at this.

Uh when you talk about a uh shifting the advance, uh how do you mean?

Because so what we often find is at this time of year, uh schools are especially our smaller schools, they don't have the resources in April and May.

So we we need, and to Simon's point, they're starting to create their budgets now for next year.

Those schools are supposed to often open earlier, so they need that money July 1st.

Um if we move those resources around and they can't, they don't know what they're gonna have at the first, they can't hire their teachers and they can't sustain come in earlier to work.

Um so I do worry a little bit if as they've already planned their quarter funding out for each year, that if we start moving things around now, they are they're already too far down the pipeline in their budgeting to be able to shift.

But what is your proposal?

Well, I don't know that I have a proposal because I think this is just all in discussion right now.

The um I mean, one idea would be to make an advanced payment as we do now, but of a lesser amount, maybe then make more of it in September when we've got more cash, because August is the trough.

Yeah.

Um the uh reducing it from I think it's 30 percent to maybe a little bit less.

That that could be an approach.

Another approach would maybe work something out with individual LEAs so that those that could cushion it, uh, we could spread it out.

It's just a a problem for that uh advanced payment.

Um the um the budget also has an advanced payment for TCPS.

I don't think DCPS takes full advantage of that for other reasons, um, which have to do with problems with the C O CFO.

Um I there isn't a proposal.

There's uh like here here's the problem, and can the advanced payment be part of the solution?

I just I do worry about the smaller schools if that reduction comes at the beginning of the year.

Even if they were to be right sided later, they've already started the year.

So if it comes in October or December, they can't then go back and hire teachers or like bring in support.

They've already started.

I would just have to, I mean, I think we have to look at what our smallest LEAs.

I think the bigger ones will be able to figure it out, but I'm thinking about the schools that were testifying up here right now, they would have a hard time.

Um, I'm putting it out there uh as I said, I'm not doing anything without further discussion with you.

Thanks.

So uh there's a I doubt we the um some of this we're gonna address in some legislation we have before us right now.

This would not be addressed in that.

Um there's a bill that the CFO introduced or I introduced on behalf of the CFO, and it deals with the retirement board payment.

And I don't remember the name of the bill.

It's got a long title.

We had a hearing on it three weeks ago.

Um that actually doesn't speak to the charter school or the advance payment.

It speaks to retirement board.

We might add to it um changes to um WOMATA, and we might add to it a change in the property tax.

So that's another approach would be instead of having the property tax come in twice a year to have it come in quarterly.

We're just trying to look at how we can deal with cash flow.

Thank you for that.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank you, each of you uh and those of you who are online.

And I'm gonna try to move a little bit faster.

Uh Neville Waters, board chair of Center City Public Charter School.

Laura Maestis, Chief Executive Officer of DC Prep.

Scott Goldstein, Executive Director in PowerEd.

Ebony Rose Thompson.

Who is the Ward 7 representative on the DC State Board of Education?

Amy Helms, head of school, DC Scholars.

Laura Fuchs, President of Washington Teachers Union.

I didn't hear that.

What?

She can't be in two places at once.

Ashley Wilson.

Jessica Giles, Executive Director, Center for Strong Public Schools Action Fund.

Ibrahim Bannister.

Kathy Riley, Executive Director of Senior High Alliance of Parents, Principals, and Educators.

Pamela McKinney.

Emmanuel Cogillo.

Neil Swansiger.

Christina Hughes.

Keith Harris.

Oh wait, in person.

Alessandra Pinna.

Impact director of the literacy lab.

I'm going to stop right there.

So I'm going to do the in-person folks first.

Ebony Rose Thompson.

All right.

Well, it's still morning.

Good morning.

You mean it's still morning.

Of course it's morning.

We started late, but good morning.

Uh Chairperson Mendelson and members of the council.

I do want to thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My name is Ebony Rose Thompson.

I do uh represent Ward 7 on the State Board of Education.

Um, but I would say most importantly uh for this testimony, I'm someone who grew up in Ward 7 and went to DC schools when we had hard budgets.

Um, and that's actually where I want to start.

Um this is being called the grow budget.

Um, but I would like to raise that growth isn't just something you name, uh, that growth is something you invest in.

And in the tough budget year, growth growth requires us to be honest about what matters most and to make choices that ref reflect that.

If we're serious about outcomes in the city, I think we have to start with one truth.

If students are not in school, nothing else works, nothing else matters.

Not the tutoring, not the curriculum, not the pathways, nothing.

Our truancy remains very high, especially in our high schools, and we've invested millions into attendance efforts, and the results have been mixed.

Coordination across agencies is still fragmented.

Attendance is retired is tied to academic recovery, and attendance is a tie to public safety.

But this budget does not present a clear unified strategy to address it.

I believe there's a gap in the budget.

We see tutoring, we see career pathways, um, and we see a modest increase in school funding.

Um, but attendance is not naturally a byproduct of those things.

Without a coordinated approach, we are not on stable ground.

This proposed budget uh is also a minuscule increase to years past.

Um we're not keeping place with inflation, which means uh students are gonna excuse me, schools and students will still face real constraints.

We should be looking at strategies that already work.

We know one of those solutions uh is community schools, which brings all of that together.

Strong attendance strategies include case management, include family supports, cross-agency coordination, and community partnerships.

As I outlined in my written testimony, this budget reduces investment in the very systems that support community schools, and it is a disconnect.

We need to fix.

Second, um, I think we all agree uh that students need multiple pathways to success, college, career, technical, um, but pathways only matter if students can't access them.

Again, that starts with attendance.

Without strong attendance systems and supports, these opportunities remain out of reach for too many students.

I will close here with my last 20 seconds.

I believe growth is about choices.

Right now, we are choosing to maintain, not transform.

And our young people are telling us what they need.

They need to feel safe, they need to feel supported, they need to feel like school is worth showing up for.

If we build a system that does that, everything else follows.

Thank you.

Uh thank you, Ms.

Thompson.

Keith Harris.

Good morning, uh Chair Mendelssohn and uh staff members.

Uh, my name is Keith Harris.

I currently serve as vice chair and treasurer for the Board of Trustees at DC Scholars Public Charter Schools, which is a PK through eighth grade charter school in Ward 7, currently serving 530 DC public school students.

And uh thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

Um I have served on the board of DC Scholars for the past three years, and during that time I have observed what a great public education looks like.

Our students, 96% of whom are African American, and 72% of whom are classified as at risk, show up every day ready to learn because our school shows up for them.

Over the past three years, commitments to teacher development, to data-driven instruction, and high impact tutoring has turned DC scholars into one of the most improved schools in the city and one of the top five schools in Ward 7.

Our school is proof of what is possible when students have access to high quality public education.

Uh DC's families have real choices that ensure that access for all students, and charter schools are central to maintaining that promise of that access.

Under the mayor's current budget proposal, that promise is now at jeopardy of being compromised.

DC scholars, like every charter school, must cover every utility bill, every maintenance cost, every building repair out of the same per pupil dollars meant for classroom instruction.

DCPS does not face that trade-off.

And because of the mayor's budget proposal, that gap is now growing.

That gap is particularly acute for single-site LEAs like DC Scholars.

DC uses the UPSS FF formula to ensure that every public school student receives equal funding.

That's the promise.

But this year's budget breaks that promise in two critical ways.

First, the mayor is proposing to route almost $60 million in DCPS fixed cost utilities and building expenses through the Department of General Services outside of the formula entirely.

Charter schools receive zero of that money yet face the same exact costs.

Annually, DC Scholar spends approximately 430,000 on fixed costs, which include utilities and telecommunications, and every dollar of that flows to DCPS outside of the UPSFF is a dollar charter schools don't get.

Second, the disparate levels of facilities funding is quite frankly alarming.

In fiscal year 2026, charter schools received approximately 187 million dollars for facilities, while DCPS received approximately $560 million, a gap of $373 million, despite the fact that both systems serve roughly the same number of students.

At DC Scholars, we are planning for critical budget upgrades, a new playground, a new HVAC system, roof repairs, just to maintain adequate facilities.

I'm asking the council to do three things.

Number one, ensure all education funding flows equitably through the UPS FF formula with no large all-formula set asides.

Number two, to maintain the 3.1 annual charters facility allotment increase, and then number three, to preserve full funding for school nurses, mental health clinicians, and safe passage programs.

These are not just extras, they are the foundation our students depend on.

Charter school students are DC public school students.

They deserve the same investment as every other child in the city.

I urge you to ensure that this budget lives up to that promise.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Harris.

I had to check my watch and make sure we're still morning.

Good morning.

Oh, we're not even close to afternoon.

I know, I know.

Good morning, Councilman Nelson and members of the staff.

My name is Ursula Ware.

Um I'm a student at the community college preparatory academy in Ward 8.

But most importantly, I'm a mother of two little boys who attend KIP public schools, charter schools.

And my purpose here today is just the support of the parents when it comes to uh the support uh that the students and that the faculty and staff get from our city.

I'm here today to say that the school matters and the supports matter for the simple fact is that these children they are our futures and that they need the adequate utensils and materials needed to be successful in the school's day and just overall year.

With the continued support, they have a chance to excel and live to their full potential.

The commitment shown to the students at the KIP Shaw campus shines through the students.

I see this every time I either I'm picking my children up from school, dropping them off, or just attending any PTA events.

And as a parent, the proper supports are needed to ensure students come to school to attend school and are educated in a safe environment.

My job is as a mother of leaders, is to support the teachers, the faculty, and the families, just like mine, so that their children don't fall between the cracks like I did.

I'm attending this meeting to gain a deeper understanding to what exactly the city needs as far as support when it comes to parents.

I do know what my job and my goals are in regards to as a support and leader when it comes to this, the students and the teacher, I mean the students and teachers and parents, but as far as what it is from the city council members, what it is that you guys need from us parents in order for the schools to get the proper supports that they need.

I'm advocating for my children and all the children that attend DC public schools that have parents that aren't able to be here to support today.

And I'm going to leave this last 20 seconds and say thank you for your time and thank you for having me here today.

And I will take any questions if you have them.

Uh thank you.

So I'm gonna let the three of you go and then go to the virtual members.

But let me just say um uh Ms.

Ware.

Uh I think just parent participation, like coming to the hearing.

Um that that would be my answer to you.

Uh and Ms.

Thompson, you make a good point about we have to do more to address attendance and community schools is definitely on our list.

Don't know if we're gonna find the funding for it given all the other challenges we have.

But uh it just makes sense that the services that are provided are really important to schools, especially those with high at-risk populations.

So can I just note um it's zeroed out like completely?

Is what?

Uh the Aussie, the Aussie competitive grant.

Yeah, it's uh zeroed out, I know.

Is zeroed out completely.

Um I know it's a tough budget year.

I know everybody's checking the couch cushions for money.

Um, but there's got to be something between nothing, like nothing.

Um, especially when we say that like attendance and safety are priorities for us, and this is something that we know works.

Those cuts will be felt most deeply between wards one, five, seven, and eight, um, because those are the schools that money goes to, and it is across sectors, um, which is why I'm focusing on the Aussie in particular and not uh DCPS's connected by itself.

I would love to see both fully funded.

Um, and I don't think they should be pitted against one another.

But I do want to be very clear that we will be saying this investment across sectors in the wards with the most kids with the most need is where this is going to be most felt.

I can't argue with you, but there is some private sector funding available for community schools.

That's not to say we shouldn't try to fund it.

And within the education cluster, this is competing with the child care subsidy, which needs I don't know, 20, 30 million dollars.

I think community schools is hundreds of thousands of dollars, which is not much, but it also the need for like the child care subsidy is much, much greater.

And the ECE pay equity.

Um which is sixty million dollars.

Just saying there's a lot of competition here for not enough dollars.

And then looking over at Mr.

Harris, I agree with you on policy that charter sector should not be I'll put it differently.

DCPS should not be funded outside the UPSFF, especially when some people like to just talk and forever site that we pay for education on appropriate basis.

Not so it's definitely on the list.

Thank you all.

So you three are excused if you want to be in.

I'm gonna work through the uh online list.

Neville Waters, you're next.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelssohn.

Good morning.

Uh good morning to the members of the committee.

My name is Neville Waters.

I serve as the board chair for Center City Public Charter Schools, and thank you for the opportunity to allow me to share my testimony today.

I'm an advocate of the need to provide education for general knowledge, critical thinking, and valuable skills that will help students navigate through the educational system and on to career development.

While my current commitment is to Center City PCS, I've been engaged in education almost since birth.

My grandmother was a principal.

Her son, my father, was an elementary school teacher, and his wife, my mother, worked in the district's adult education career department.

I earned my bachelor's degree, uh, I might say with honors in education, and I became a classroom teacher at the ripe old age of 22.

Uh however, the most impactful memory I cherish I made after I transitioned to a career in broadcasting.

I continued substitute teaching and occasionally would be assigned a subject with which I was less familiar.

But yet, as a struggling DJ, I could use the money.

So I was delighted to get a long-term substitute position, even though it was not in my area of expertise, which was history.

Rather, it was in biology.

Well, my challenge was reading and staying ahead of the kids.

I figured I could fake it until I make it, or they would hire a full-time teacher, whichever came first.

As it turned out, I taught over three months, uh, which was about the max I could handle.

Well, several years later, I was at a fast food restaurant, and the attendant asked me if I was Mr.

Waters, to which I replied affirmatively.

And the young lady taking my order exclaimed, I can't believe it.

You were my eighth grade biology teacher, and you so inspired me that I decided to pursue a career in medicine.

I'm now a pre-med major at the University of Wisconsin.

I never thought I would ever see you again just to say thanks.

I cannot describe how incredible I felt to receive that acknowledgement from a student who, frankly, I didn't recognize, but whose life I had impacted in such a powerful way.

To me, it was an example of what education means at its core, inspiring young people to find their path in life.

Today, I implore you to consider what is fair to our kids and encourage you to consider how important it is for our students in our schools to receive the necessary support to feel safe and supported.

Please do not treat them as less than when you can budget funds for our schools through the uniform per-pupil student funding formula to ensure transparent and equitable treatment.

We're proud at Center City that we've been able to open the first maker space, and I would echo what our CEO Russ Williams testified earlier that our DC students deserve to have access to a place like this with creative labs that feature woodworking, fashion design, audio and video engineering and production, a recording studio and a fully equipped chemistry lab.

There's not another space like it in DC, and it was built with the idea of serving the entire city equitably, just as this FY27 budget should be built equitably for all district students and families.

Thank you for your time and your partnership and your continued support of our schools and educators.

I urge the council to maintain funding on all charter and public schools fairly via the uniform per pupil student funding formula.

Thank you, Mr.

Waters.

I agree with you, which is not to say that we'll be able to find the money, but we certainly are going to try.

You are on the commemorative works committee, correct?

That is correct, sir.

Yes, it's nice to see you.

And I think there's a vacancy there that I have to fill.

That is correct, sir.

Yes.

So thank you for your service there.

Well, thank you for the acknowledgement.

I'm my head is blowing up.

Well.

All right, control it.

Uh, let me turn to the next witness.

So, Laura Mayestis.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson, members of the council and staff.

I apologize that I am off screen.

My video does not seem to be working.

My name is Laura Myestis, and I'm the CEO of DC Prep, a public charter school network serving students and families in wards five, seven, and eight.

I'm very grateful that Mayor Bowser has proposed a 2.55% increase to the uniform for student funding formula.

Continued investment in public education is essential to the future of our city.

I also understand that this is a very difficult budget year.

The district faces real revenue constraints and the council must make hard choices.

While, however, I am concerned that the proposed budget does not fund students equitably across sectors.

While the UPSFF is increasing, it is increasing off a base that does not fully account for the true cost of educating students in DC public schools, district and charter or sorry, uh DCPS schools.

Approximately $96 million in DCPS related costs, including facilities maintenance, impact bonuses, and early stages, are funded outside of the formula.

If those dollars were included in the UPSFF, it would translate to roughly $2,000 more per student.

But that's not all.

Beyond those $96 million in ongoing costs, DC invests significantly more in DCPS school buildings compared to the funding that charter schools receive for facilities.

DC Prep is currently planning to renovate our original Edgewood Middle campus, and we are working hard to create a beautiful functional building for our students while making our limited dollars stretch.

When I look at the capital projects that are included in the proposed budget, I see that the renovations for nearby Ward 5 DCPS buildings will cost two to three times as much per student compared to our renovation budget.

It's a simple fact that DCPS students are being funded at a much higher level than charter students.

And that just doesn't make sense.

Students in charter schools and DCPS schools are all public school students.

They deserve equal investment from their city.

The current approach, moving costs out of the DCPS budget to manage rising expenses due to contractual obligations, may help balance the district's books in the short term, but it creates growing structural inequity between sectors.

And as you rightly pointed out earlier in this oversight hearing, the conditions are right for this to continue in coming years.

Over time, that inequity will compound, putting charter schools at an increasing disadvantage.

I'm not here as a charter advocate.

I'm here as someone who believes that all children should have access to strong schools.

And year after year, many of DC's strongest schools are charter schools.

That's particularly true for DC's most vulnerable children.

Every year, more than half of the bold schools and identified by Empower K-12 for excellence and serving at risk students or charter schools.

Underinvesting in charter schools, just because we're charter schools makes children worse off.

At DC Prep, we are financially stable and committed to investing in our staff and our students.

But like many organizations, we face rising costs.

For example, like employers around the country, we are seeing significant increases and health care expenses alongside the typical pressures of inflation and step increases for staff.

Even with the proposed UPSFF increase, we are having to make real trade-offs.

We're not able to increase our salary scales this year despite wanting to continue to invest in and retain great educators.

If funding were equitable, we could do more for our students and for our staff.

Charter schools serve nearly half of DC's public school students.

When we underfund charter students, we are underinvesting in a significant portion of our city's children.

So my ask is simple.

Please ensure that all public education is funded, um, funding is allocated through the UPSFF and that all students, regardless of whether they attend a DCPS or charter school, are funded equitably.

Thank you for your time and for your leadership.

Um we appreciate your commitment to DC students.

Uh thank you, Ms.

Mayestus.

Uh Scott Goldstein.

Good morning.

We appreciate that in tough budget year, school budgets remain stable.

Still, with this budget's dramatic cuts to the safety net education will be hurt, and DCPS can and must do more.

First, DCPS must reassert its leadership in promoting the successful community schools model.

DCPS has been increasingly pushing the cost of connected schools managers onto school budgets.

A real equity strategy does not say we use this really effective model for the highest needs schools if they can find their own money for it.

An equity strategy proactively works with the schools most in need of the approach, fosters understanding of the program, prioritizes central funding for it, and works with leaders and educators to implement it well.

Likewise, knowing that our highest need schools struggle with the most with substitute teachers and educator absences, an equity focused central office would cover permanent substitutes for those schools as a routine part of budget formulation, train those permanent substitutes to do other critical work like family engagement or co-teaching support when they aren't needed as lead teachers, substitutes, and allow the daily substitute approach to add on top of it.

If DCPS continues to refuse this approach, we're asking the council to yet again make shifts within the DCPS budget to make this happen.

Especially at a time when the federal government is divesting from this critical work, we need DCPS to lead in supporting schools.

Second, while the administration has robustly supported high impact tutoring, which we think is valuable, they have divested from experiential learning.

While over a decade ago, DCPS promised study abroad for all students and got national attention for its ambitious goal.

The program has since been repeatedly downsized.

At a time when the world is shrinking and increasingly scary for so many of our students, this program should be a top priority for expansion.

Research and personal experience should inform DCPS leaders that these kind of experiences are not less valuable than tutoring, math, English, science, or social studies.

In fact, they increase attendance and engagement along with academic motivation dramatically.

We ask for 500,000 to increase the DCPS study abroad program given its demand is currently 10 times availability.

I can see education leaders, council members, and staff writing it off right now as not directly academic and thus a luxury in a tight budget time, while simultaneously puzzling about how to solve the attendance crisis.

That shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the inputs that create your desired outcomes.

Third, as the federal threats continue to pile up and endanger schools, we ask DCPS to invest in international educators and multilingual students.

We should be reducing MLL ratios to support, provide additional support the population needs right now and increasing our investments in international educators who understand the experiences of our students and families and serve as lifelines for incredible educators for so many DCPS students.

Finally, we have surveyed educators to understand what they think could reasonably be cut from the DCPS budget.

With the recent national scandal surrounding IREDI, showing a devastating lack of results in 13 years, and the national class action lawsuit over their selling of student data.

This is an easy cut, which could be replaced by redirecting 500,000 towards a personalized professional growth fund for educator development.

And the other half split between experiential learning, ensuring equitable high impact tutoring and more adaptive assessments.

Educators send us resounding testimony that this program isn't working or being used as they intended and favored this shift, which is attached to my testimony in an email I sent earlier today.

I'll just say briefly, we have uh additional recommendations about PCSB, including around the Aspire framework and ways for them to work with you on an educator retention fund given their concerns about impact bonuses.

We will continue to look for other savings that promote the necessary revenue raising to ensure this budget is responsive to our educators.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Colsteen.

Amy Helms.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson.

My name is Amy Helms, and I'm the head of school at DC Scholars Public Charter School in Ward 7, and I am also a Ward 7 resident.

DC Scholars is a single-site school serving 532 students in grades pre-K through 3.

Approximately 70% of our students are considered at risk, and the majority live east of the river.

In November, the chairman invited DC scholars to testify at the standout schools beating the odds hearing.

And then I shared that the district's investments in students and educators had allowed DC scholars to reduce chronic absenteeism by about 30%, allowed us to strengthen teacher development, expand out-of-school time opportunities, and accelerate academic growth.

As a result, DC Scholars has seen meaningful progress in literacy and math outcomes in school year 24-25.

We saw a nine-point increase in the students achieving level four in ELA and a 13% increase in math.

Particularly notable was the number of students who are historically underserved who are achieving these gains.

This progress has required additional investments in high impact tutoring, teacher development, and enrichment opportunities.

We're grateful that the mayor's proposed budget increases increase includes a 2.55% increase in the uniform per people funding formula.

However, has as been noted by several of my other colleagues, significant education funding continues to be allocated outside of the UPSFF.

Under the current proposal, DC scholars are funded at approximately $2,000 less per student than their DCPS peers, a difference of roughly $1 million next year alone for our school.

This funding gap means difficult trade-offs.

It affects our ability to expand high-impact tutoring for students who are below grade level.

It limits investments in teacher training aligned to the science of reading, which Aussie is requiring for kindergarten teachers, and which we are working to scale across grades K through three.

And it constrains enrichment opportunities that keep students engaged and connected to school, including athletics, robotics, arts, and academic clubs.

Facilities and equities compound these challenges.

While many DCPS schools benefit from recent modernization and investments, charter schools like DC scholars much operate with less.

This summer we're planning on modernization, and over the next several years, we anticipate significant capital needs simply to maintain a safe and functional environment for students, including HVAC and roof repair.

Students attending public charter schools are public school students, and they deserve equitable access to the resources necessary to succeed.

I respectfully ask the council to take two actions.

One, ensure that education funding flows equitably through the UPSFF without large off-formula set asides that create disparities between the sectors, and to maintain the 3.1% annual income-term capital need.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Holmes.

Has Laura refused to train us.

She was a current person.

Yeah, she's here, she's making upstairs.

Ashley Wilson.

Good morning.

My name is Ashley Wilson, and I am a leader at DC Prep's Edgewood Middle Campus, located in Ward 5.

I have been a part of this community for 14 years, and I continue to come back to DC Prep just because I've seen the way that it changes lives and the way that we allow all students access to quality education.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I would like to share about a student on my caseload that has made tremendous growth since the start of the year.

This student went from not recognizing letters and sounds to making full sentences and showing tremendous growth on our school-wide assessments.

As the academic specialist, I was able to work with a team of stakeholders such as special education teachers as well as dedicated aides to help this student grow academically and emotionally.

Without full funding, charter schools like mine would struggle to provide special education students with the full team of supports that they need to reach their full potential.

It truly takes a team of people to work together to support the whole child in our community.

I am asking that the education flow through the UPSFF so that there are no large offs formula set asides that disadvantage charter schools like DC Prep.

I am also asking for an increase in special education funding so that students with the most complex learning needs have the resources that they require, like my student and I referenced earlier.

I am asking that you make sure that all funding flows through the UPSFF because students like mine are truly counting on you.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Jessica Giles.

She was here.

I'm here.

Yes, great.

Great.

Greetings, Chairman Mendelssohn, members of staff of the DC Council's Committee of the Whole.

My name is Jessica Giles.

I'm a War 7 resident and executive director of the Washington, DC office of the Center for Strong Public Schools Action Fund.

At CSPS, we believe three things.

All students can achieve academically, all students deserve the resources they need to succeed, and all students can graduate and earn a degree or credential.

Those beliefs drives our commitment to ensuring DC has strong public schools, schools that are accountable, equitably funded, and innovative to support student success.

With a thriving two-sector public education system, the UPSFF is thoughtfully designed with equity in mind, as it rightfully has student-centered funding and new need-based waste.

However, the formula is undermined when the mayor transfers $96 million of operation dollars outside of the formula.

By transferring funds outside of the formula, the mayor denies charter school students access comparable funding for similar services.

She then compounds that inequity by flat funding the charter facilities allowance.

DC Democratic Voters understands this is unfair, which is why 63% of them believe that equal funding across sectors should happen.

We urge the committee of the whole to ensure that all funds flow through the formula so that both sectors have the funds necessary to educate their students.

In addition, we recommend the committee of the whole make transparent to DC taxpayers in every budget exactly how much funding is flowing through the formula and how much funding is not.

Without, secondly, without accountability for results, more money alone won't close the gap we we're currently seeing in academic achievement and reading and math.

While it is true, DC is heading into leaner times, it is critical that progress is critical that progress does not take a nosedive due to a lack of commitment investment.

We are concerned that the mayor's FY27 proposed budget fails to scale the science of reading, despite overwhelming evidence that teachers benefit from structured literacy training.

It also contains no funding for evidence-based math reforms, despite only 15% of DC high school students being proficient in math.

These are not nice to have line items in our budget.

It is central to the success of our students to be able to compete here and across the country.

We applaud continued investments in high impact tutoring.

And but that is not enough.

And reading, we urge the committee of the whole to protect funding for the DC Clean Reading Clinic, fully fund the implementation of the early education task force recommendations and math.

We are as committee of the whole to fully fund the implementation of the math task force recommendations, including $300,000 for a capital math leader exchange.

Enrollment cliffs.

We urge the committee of the whole to really dig into these issues, ask important questions of DCPS and public charter school boards, the public charter school board about this.

In conclusion, we ask that you fund both sectors fairly and to invest in what works.

Thank you for allowing me to testify.

Thank you, Ms.

Giles.

And I don't have a copy of your statement if you want to provide that.

It should come through.

It's already in there.

All right.

I understand you just sent it, so pretend we've got it.

Oh, thank you.

Oh, let me go back.

Um Laura Fuchs.

All right, thank you.

If charters want equal funding, then they need to be subject to equal transparency.

Anyways, and maybe unionization.

The key asked that the Washington Teachers Union is making regarding the DCPS budgets are one to ensure that the dedicated line item funding for the green card processing of H1B visa holders is maintained, and honestly, probably increased to 300,000.

That DCPS follows the W2 contract at school level around accessing of W 2 educators and does not purposefully cause additional teacher turnover and chaos by violating our rights.

Three, that the DC council find additional major test contracts and AI and zero them out.

Four DCPS be required to invest more heavily in more quickly processing contract grievances and ending the backlog that causes the W2 contract to go unenforced due to the cases taking three plus years to process, thereby costing the district millions of wasted dollars and undue harm.

Five, that DCPS home and hospital instruction program be fully funded and not turned into essentially virtual learning with existing teachers to ensure that students have a right to a robust education during the school day.

Six examine costly what or sorry closely what is going on with early childhood education in the budget.

A lot of changes are being made, and it is unclear why or what their effects will be.

And seven, that real accountability measures be added through the budget process that would put DCPS leaders' paychecks in jeopardy should they continue to refuse to follow the laws passed by the DC council.

I'm gonna go through them a little more in depth, but there's obviously a lot.

For H1B visa holders, um, I did send this morning a table that gets at kind of how many people have already been kind of gone through the program from 2018 and 2019 hirees to the 2020 and 2021 hirees who are the ones who need it now.

And there's about 68 of them, probably a little lower because some of them have left at this point, but that were hired on H1Bs through DCPS.

You'll then see kind of the future programming 2026.

We only have 15 H1B holders that we can find verified through this visa process, so there might be more as the year goes on, but probably not.

Um, so we know this is kind of a limited program, and we want to maintain the educators that have stuck with DCPS despite the harm that they're causing.

We know they refuse to spend it, but we also know we're getting a new mayor, and we think that that new mayor should be signaled that they need to start this program back up again.

Then when it comes to the next piece, um DCPS is expected to follow the contract when it comes to kind of eliminating positions inside of the schools in any normal district.

If you lost your job in the school simply due to financial cuts at the school level, you would still be employed by the district.

That's not how it works here.

If you don't find a job within 60 days, you're gone.

And it's really chaotic and harmful to our schools.

Now we get we're gonna try to win that back in our contract, but we do have rights here, and DCPS is ignoring them, and that's causing more chaos.

We win these cases and we win millions of dollars.

There's no reason for it, it causes a lot of undue harm.

Um, and so DCPS should just follow the law.

We're trying to encourage them to do so, but they don't like to.

Um, so maybe the council telling them to would be good, and I'll stop.

Uh, thank you, Ms.

Hughes.

I may have some questions for you.

Um we're printing out your statement, so once I get it, I'll come back and ask you some questions.

We're printing out your statement, so once I get it, I'll come back and ask you some questions.

So let me continue with the witnesses.

Ibrahim Bannister.

Yes.

Please present.

Good morning, Chairman Mendelson and members of the committee.

Thank you again for allowing me to testify today.

My name is Ibrahim Bannister Jr., and as you may remember, I am a first-year eighth grade ELA SPED teacher at DC Prep Anacostia, serving the Ward A community in Southeast Washington, DC.

Like my colleagues, I want to begin by acknowledging the proposed 2.55% budget increase.

While it is appreciated, it does not go far enough to support all DC scholars, especially those that attend public charter schools.

Because when we underinvest in charter school students, we are underinvesting in the future of DC.

At DC Prep, every single day, we work hard to ensure that our students are not only well fed, but are nurtured through intentional social emotional learning and challenged through academically rigorous classes.

We do all of this so they are prepared to compete at the high school level, succeed in college, and then pursue the career of their dreams.

These outcomes are only made possible because of the resources and supports we are able to provide.

And when we underinvest in those resources, we are again underinvesting in the future of DC.

As a first-year teacher, I have seen firsthand the profound impact that funding has, not just in the classroom but across communities.

I also unfortunately have seen when those funding resources fall short, and those students most affected are already currently navigating some of the city's greatest challenges.

More than half of DC's public school students attend charter schools.

Public charter school students are DC students.

They also are DC's future business leaders, employees, homeowners, leaders, and community activists.

Yet I am deeply concerned that the mayor's proposed budget allocates approximately 2,000 more per student at DCPS students than to charter students.

All public school funding, both DCPS and charter should be allocated through a uniform and equitable fund formula, the UPS FF.

Anything lessens the message that one group of students is more deserving than another.

And when we underinvest in charter school students, again, we are underinvesting in the future of DC.

So I ask, what message is the budget trying to convey when funding does not reflect equity?

Could you imagine telling your student who believes that their education could potentially break generational cycles that their school is closing because the city didn't believe it deserved equal funding?

Or could you even imagine telling a family that their child's favorite extracurricular program was canceled because the school didn't get the necessary funding to keep it going?

For many students, school is the safest and most affirming place that they experience every single day.

DC's education ecosystem depends on both public and charter schools to meet the diverse needs of the city.

Now is not the time to scale back.

If anything, it's the time to invest equitably and fully, because when we invest in charter schools, we are investing in the future of DC.

Thank you for your time and commitment to the students and families of this great city.

Thank you, Mr.

Bannister.

Kathy Riley Thank you.

I I appreciate I'm Kathy Riley with Ward 4 Educants, C3 DC and SHATE.

I appreciate the opportunity to testify in this in this tight budget year.

I am thankful for the funds for the Advanced Technical Center and the Pilot Truancy Project, as well as the increase in the UPSFF.

While some changes are still necessary, I appreciate DCPS's increased adherence to the school's first policy.

And the absence of hundreds of DCPS parents here today signifies a success not to be taken for granted.

I am glad to see continued investment in school modernization projects.

DCPS is the public system responsible for providing by-right education to all comers.

It is at the core of our democratic system.

It guarantees access and works for equity by spreading funds between schools, keeping them open across the city.

Hope we can make that still possible.

While the city has invested in and expanded citywide options and the lottery, this remains a core responsibility.

For this reason, while unpopular, I support the structural change in the FY27 budget that shifts DCPS's utility costs to DGS.

There are advantages and disadvantages for DCPS as a city agency, subject to different regulations and responsibilities.

And line I veto on your part.

Capital and operating budgets function in the context of the larger needs of the city.

The promise of the charter sector was that it would be more effective and efficient, privately run, and not subject to union contracts.

Well, it's good that this year the W2U contract salary gains are included in the UPSSF and the charter schools realize significant funds thanks to that negotiation.

However, with thousands of children enrolled in 67 different LEAs, the city does need to struggle with services being equitable and not necessarily equal, but equitable.

Each of the charity school systems has different needs.

Some have been able to bank significant funds, others operate close to the line with debt incurred due to the promise of yearly escalating facilities allowance, a promise made in richer times.

To your point on the financial plan, with projected birth rate decline, the loss of federal jobs and those residents, the deportations of valued immigrant families, and the reduced lottery applications, there is a challenge.

The joint planning for public education education and consideration of some structural changes is now critical.

DC public education is not just a market system where we have to tolerate closures.

The 2023 boundary plan fulfillment of recommendation 23 that requires joint planning is necessary.

As is the fulfillment of recommendations number nine and number 17 that why it would require DCPS to do equitable programming for rigor and dual language across the city.

The council can require a vision, strategy, and public education plan for growth, equity, and quality.

And so I would like to help you work on that financial plan.

It anticipates what's going forward.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Riley.

Pamela McKinney.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson.

My name is Pamela McKinney, and I am the parent of two DCPS students at Amadon Bowen Elementary School and the Chief Advancement and Advocacy Officer at Capital City Public Charter School.

I believe that all of our schools deserve to be fully funded and have the resources they need to support their learners.

Unfortunately, this current budget proposal does not align with that belief.

I've seen the inequities that lie with it within DCPS because some schools' PTAs can cover full staff positions, while others with less needs like Amid and Bowen have to work tirelessly to fund critical needs like supplies.

And now we see that the mayor's draft budget values charter students at $2,000 less than my own children in DCPS.

The inequities within our school funding mechanism are obvious, unfair, and cruel.

Due to Amadon Bowen's enrollment growth and the high need population it serves, I understand that it has fared better than others and allotted funding for next year.

In my opinion, Amadon Bowen's success is driven in part by its leader, Principal Jackson, and his team's focus on school culture, spearheaded by its wellness team and the school support staff and teachers who clearly care about their students' success.

You can feel a difference at Amnon Bowen this year, and the school's panorama survey data has data has demonstrated this impact.

At the same time, Amadon Bowen is bursting out of seams as it awaits modernization.

The school added over 50 students this year, and any available space for a classroom no longer exists.

With modernization pushed to begin construction in fiscal year 2031, there has to be a solution for Aminon Bowen space issues for the intervening five years.

These space issues are real.

My kindergarten student has launched at 1040 a.m.

two hours after she receives breakfast because the cafeteria isn't large enough to serve all students during an adequate lunch period.

Their teachers or parents have purchased snacks out of their own pockets to ensure the kids have something in the afternoon because asking Ken Gardeners to go almost five hours without food is a recipe for disaster.

I urge DCPS to work with the Amanon Bowen school community on both the space issues and swing sites and modernization.

Now that we know it's back in the CIP thanks to Councilmember Allen.

The last message we received from DCPS about modernization was in March 2025.

On the charter side, I know you will hear a lot today about the funding inequities in the proposed budget that leaves charter schools with $2,000 less per student, and you should.

Funding DCPS outside of the per pupil formula doesn't invest in our public schools as a whole.

It doesn't allow charters to hire top talent, provide enrichment programs, or make the repairs they need while still providing a full educational program.

DCPS cannot meet the needs of every student city, nor can charters.

But charter schools shouldn't have to do it with less funds.

Schools like Capital City City are filling a need in the city.

The school serves a large English language learner population and has intentionally hired many bilingual staff to ensure families can be active partners in their children's education.

Many of our students at Capital City will be the first in their families to attend college, and a handful will be the first in their family to graduate high school.

And Capital City has the results to show its approaches working.

Capital City's graduation rate exceeds the citywide average by eight percentage points.

Our NC college attendance has been higher than the national average for low-income students for years.

Our work at Capital City is to provide the best education we can for students who come to us from every ward and every background.

We can't be expected to do this work with less funding and still produce the same results.

And I know the going off still with 19 seconds, but just want to note as well that as always I hear that we've got to put all of the weight on the poor, the black, and the low-income residents of DC.

We should instead raise taxes on the wealthy, because if this is a hard year, it needs to be a hard year for everyone.

Thank you.

And I urge the council to fund all of our schools fairly and equally, so UPSFFF.

Why do you stop the clock?

Thank you.

Neil Swansiger.

I believe he's not accepted.

So we'll come back to him.

Christina Hughes.

Good morning, Chairman and members of the council.

My name is Christina Hughes, and I am a parent of a third grader and kindergartner at Shirley Chisholm Elementary School, a Title I and Spanish dual language school in Ward 6.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My kindergartner, Neil Swansiger, who was scheduled to appear immediately before me, is unfortunately currently at lunch and recess, and his teachers and aides would not thank me for polling him right now.

But I want to note on his behalf that every day I hear about his classroom aides just as much as his teachers.

This is important because I am here today requesting the council support funding that will allow Chisholm to maintain four kindergarten classroom aids for the upcoming school year.

DCPS has denied our budget assistance request and our allocated funding results in a reduction of our kindergarten aids from one from four, one for each kindergarten classroom to only two.

Beginning in August, the school will be temporarily relocated to a swing space while the existing building undergoes a long overdue modernization.

Our students and teachers will already be navigating a significantly different physical environment.

Against that backdrop, the proposed egg reduction constitutes removal of critical support at the worst possible time as very young learners transition to a very intensive part of their education and navigate a cascade of significant changes.

Eating lunch in the cafeteria for the first time, losing nap time, moving from two recesses to one, transitioning between two classrooms and two teachers each day.

Each of these changes is manageable with adequate adult support in the room.

In a swing space year with an aid staffing model that leaves two classrooms sharing one aid, these changes become a significant source of stress and instability for the very children least able to absorb it.

Also, effective instruction in a Spanish immersion classroom is not based on whole group lecture.

It is structured around small group rotations where the teacher works intensively with one group and the aid is engaged in independent or partner activity supervision.

Without adequate aid coverage, children in unsupervised groups cannot receive the focused productive learning time the rotation model requests requires.

While it has been proposed to backfill any available personnel with any available personnel as time allows, the primary approach to handling the aid reduction is expected to be having one aid cover two classrooms, where one person will be effectively asked to do the work of two in two separate physical spaces simultaneously.

There's also heavy impact on the stability and effectiveness of the classroom routines.

AIDS learn how to teach your structures the day and how individual children learn.

That is time and energy that will be taken directly from children as teachers have to work with the rotating cast of staff.

I respectfully ask the council to ensure that Chisholm has adequate funding to maintain four classroom aides so that our youngest learners have the support they need to succeed.

I apologize for going over time.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Hughes.

Alessandra Pinna.

Good morning, Chairman, Council Member, and staff.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to testify today.

My name is Alessandra Pinna, and I'm the impact director in Washington, DC with the literacy lab.

Today I want to highlight a workforce issue hiding in plain site.

And one that the district has a real opportunity to address.

Across the C public schools and public charter schools, nearly 3,000 paraprofessionals play a critical role in classrooms, especially in early literacy and special education.

They provide small group instruction, individualized support, and help keep classrooms stable.

Yet the system does not always treat them accordingly.

Training is inconsistent.

Professional development is limited.

Career pathways are unclear.

And these roles are often treated as temporary rather than as meaningful entry points into the teaching profession.

The result is high turnover, which disrupts instruction, increases costs, and contributes to teacher burnout.

This is not just a workforce problem, it's a classroom stability problem.

It is also a missed opportunity.

As the district works to build a grown your own teacher pipeline, we already have thousands of individuals gaining classroom experience and building relationships with students.

But we are not investing in them as future teachers.

The literacy lab has developed a proven classroom-based model built on strong initial training, ongoing coaching, and a clear professional identity.

When educators are supported this way, they stay and students benefit.

With targeted investment, this model could be adapted to create a structure para professional pipeline that improves retention, strengthened classrooms, and creates a real pathway into teacher certification for DC residents.

Done well, this is both an education investment and a workforce development strategy.

Creating accessible dignified careers while meeting urgent school needs.

At the time of tight budgets, these is also a smart use of resources.

Reducing turnover lowers costs and improves instructional continuity without building new systems from scratch.

We urge the council to consider how the fiscal year 27 budget can support a more professionalized high retention paraprofessional workforce.

The literacy lab stands ready to partner with the district to make this a reality.

Thank you, and I welcome every question.

So that concludes the testimony from all the witnesses.

I have a few questions.

I'm going to start with Ms.

Fuchs since you're here in person.

So you went through your testimony fairly quickly, staying within time limit.

I appreciate that.

So I'm looking at page one.

Your first point was ensure the dedicated line item funding for green card processing.

Now we put money in the budget this year, 200 to 300,000, and the administration simply refused to spend it.

Even though I agree with the value of the program, I'm hesitant.

Why would we put money in the budget that's not going to get spent?

Now you could say, well, they don't have a right to veto, but maybe they don't have a right to veto, but they have the ability to not spend the money.

So I feel like it's an exercise in futility.

I do hear that.

I think it's just important to signal to the next mayor who will inherit this budget that this is a program that needs to happen.

Now, of course, we're working politically to also make sure whoever the next mayor is understands that like we will be in their phase come June, demanding that this program get restarted and strongly suggesting that they signal to DCPS they should do it immediately because we have people that cannot wait till January when a new mayor takes office.

Like it needs to be started now.

Um, so that they don't get forced to leave this country, let alone this district.

So, you know, we know times of the essence, we just think continuing.

So it's kind of two things.

One, DCBS said part of the reason they wouldn't spend it because we can't guarantee we'll get it next year.

So let's like put that to the side and be like, okay, you got it.

You could start it right now.

You could spend the money you have right now because you know you're gonna have funding for next year to continue it.

You'll be able to continue to pay for the lawyer that you claim you don't want to hire just to let them go.

You can continue to pay for the fees.

So they could start spending it, right?

And so maybe this would signal to them.

Not if we take them at their word that they were worried not having about multi-year funding, which I don't, but let's just say you take them at their word, then this would signal there it is multi-year funding.

Now there are two issues.

One is green card processing, and the other is H1B visa processing.

And we had testimony earlier about the visa processing taking.

And I believe the costs for that have gone up.

What's that?

I think it's obviously for the new visas, there's the big kerfuffle over like what the fee is, and I think that could partially explain why 2026 is so much lower for new visas, but for the existing ones, at least my understanding is the costs are going up because basically people are running out of time.

It's going even past the kind of time you can wait while it's getting processed.

And so then schools are stepping in to pay the expedite fee.

It does seem like it's probably a Trump administration shakedown, like because it is then getting processed very quickly, so it seems kind of clear like they want the fee, and then they process it.

Um that is several thousand dollars per person right now that is being funded largely through PTOs stepping up or running a GoFundMe.

Um that's not acceptable for sure.

Um but DCBS is always made either the school or the person or like an outside or like a PTO pay the expedite fee.

So that's not a new policy out of them, and they're not eating the cost, and they never have.

So like members have always had to pay their own expedite fee if that's what they wanted to do, or find someone who would kind of step in and do it.

Let me move to the second point.

The DCPS follows the WTU contract at the school level around accessing WTU educators, and does not purposely cause additional teacher turnover and chaos.

Um I have not heard this complaint.

How extensive is this accessing of WTU educators?

Um it's hard to get a handle on a lot of times, so we're really working hard to try to get our schools to communicate what's happening.

Um, but right now we have 40 schools that say they're going to be accessing somebody.

Um of the schools have reported that they're working out, you know, internally and informally, like to follow the process, which pretty much means like if let's just say this seems to be happening a lot, all three of our grievances right now are around instructional coaches.

If you get rid of an instructional coach position, not necessarily for funding, but for a programmatic change, it's like okay, a budget process, we're changing this, we want to call it something else, or have a different position, then it kicks in an accessing process through our contract.

And one of the provisions that protects our workers is that basically if there's another position open for which they are qualified within the school, then they don't leave the school, they go into the qualified position.

They're not accessed, right?

Because it's not about their performance, it's just we don't want this position anymore, we're gonna have that position instead.

So if they're qualified for it, then you don't hire someone else and let them go, like according to our contract, they would just slot in.

Um some schools are just choosing not to do that, which then causes the grievance process to kick off, right?

And like so, you have three grievances right now.

Yes, we we may well actually we just filed a fourth one yesterday.

So I mean, like they're coming in because we're we're trying to block it.

Like our whole goal is to not end up with someone getting severed from the district, then fighting all the way through arbitration, which again we win on accessing, the language is strong.

We come out and we win.

We then get back pay, we get all the like different harms that were caused, lawyer fees, like we get it all for what they kind of just put them in the position, that's all we wanted.

We just wanted them to not lose their job that the contract protects.

So I think it's just this manufactured chaos that I don't understand why they do it when the language is, in our opinion and an arbitrator's opinion, is very clear.

If they are qualified for the role and it opens up in their school, then the person who's getting accessed should just go into that position and not lose their job.

So what you're describing sounds an awful lot like point four in your testimony.

DCPS be required to invest more heavily and more quickly processing contract grievances and ending the backlog that causes WTU contract to go unenforced, uh, thereby costing district millions of wasted dollars and undue harm.

Yeah, so like the early stages of the grievance are kind of in-house.

It's we file it with the principal, right?

The person who's choosing in this case, not the in our opinion, follow the contract.

Our hope is it's just like the building rep the principal, maybe someone from my office, but that's it.

No lawyers, right?

We just meet, we say, hey, there's this process, you need to follow it, and they can be like, okay, let's follow the process.

That's our hope, at least, and then it's resolved, and like we keep it moving because our whole goal is just to make sure people are not unduly losing their positions in DCPS for no reason.

Sure.

And the positions exist.

So point two is a subset of point four.

Well, it's just if it gets past that, right?

If they refuse and then they refuse again at the superintendent level, and then it starts getting to when the DCPS lawyers get involved, that's when the whole process seems to slow down exponentially.

So like the first two steps of the process, we can usually get done in about 10 to 15 days.

And those meetings tend to happen, and we either get a favorable result or we don't, but then we all just kind of keep it moving, however, we're going to move.

Once we get to the point where lawyers are involved, everything slows way down.

There is a huge backlog.

We only get about nine to 12 meetings per month.

And we file 160 impact grievances in August.

So like just even getting through those is going to take the whole school year, let alone everything that crops up during the course of a year.

And that's just kind of and again, that's supposed to save us money in the sense that it doesn't involve outside attorneys, right?

We're just trying to resolve it in-house with DCPS.

Once we leave that step and eventually clear that backlog area, that kind of little funnel that causes everything to slow down.

That's when we start getting hearing officers and arbitrators and how many arbitration awards has WTU won in the past year.

That's a good question.

I'd say probably like there's kind of there's one and then they're settled.

Um so we have settled probably five or six, and then I'd say we've won.

Probably also five or six.

And then there's just a lot ongoing.

Because that process, it takes forever.

It takes months, DCP takes it to court saying you can't be here.

We win that, we end up back in front of them.

It then takes even longer, and by the time we do win, years have passed.

And then we're coming in and saying you owe for every year our member went on paid, you owe for back taxes, you owe for their pension, you owe for you, oh, you oh, you oh, like we're gonna try to nail them.

Because our member went through harm for years while this gets dragged out for something that when you just look at the sheet of paper, and the arbitrators also look at the same sheet of paper of the contract, they say, What were you doing?

I'm gonna leave it there, and let me ask uh Mr.

Goldstein a question.

Uh thank you, Ms.

Fuchs.

Um, Mr.

Goldstein.

Um I believe one of the points you made toward the end of your testimony was a theme that uh some many other witnesses have talked about, and that is the increasing funding of DCPS costs outside the formula, which then hurts to charters.

Am I remembering that correctly?

That was a point you brought up as well.

Yeah, I started to allude to that relative to PCSB.

So the um charter sector estimates that the discrepancy is now close to 100 million dollars.

How do we fund that?

Yeah, so I would say I'm not an expert on um the numbers of the discrepancy, and I know that you know there are both sides make an argument about money that they get in in different streams um regarding facilities regarding bonuses and other things.

What I would say is that one of the things we have suggested that I think does help make up for that discrepancy is what they are take talking about is impact bonuses specifically being outside the formula.

That was something obviously that was privately philanthropically funded for some time and is now funded outside the formula with a separate allocation.

We've made the argument for some time that is not an efficient uh use of money, and that may be a separate policy issue.

Um, but as we've suggested for many years, that we have a need, especially in the charter sector to help with educator retention.

And think, in fact, you've heard from almost every charter school leader, you've heard from that that is a challenge.

Part of it is a funding challenge, but there's other challenges as well.

We know the charter sector turnover numbers are much higher than in DCPS in recent years.

And so we think one of the most effective ways to deal with that discrepancy is to set aside money in an educator retention fund that would go to the highest turnover schools.

They could that could funnel through Aussie potentially, or we could look at another source that would go to the schools with the highest turnover in the charter sector, and we can look at the approach on DCPS as well.

But that would be dedicated money to try strategies that are research and evidence backed that would help them with educator retention.

That would actually be more of an equivalent to the issue they're talking about, which is they're saying they struggle with educator retention, and in part of that is the impact bonuses are going to DCPS.

But we there are more research-backed ways to tackle educator retention than than merit-based pay, and we think that is the most effective way to try to even that issue out and address higher turnover in the charter sector.

And educator retention fund that would be available to the charter sector schools with the highest turnover.

Yes, and we we recommended that both sectors have access to it, but the reality is that charter sector turnover is higher, so there may be more charter schools eligible for that if we took that approach.

Um and I will just say our charter school teachers have been asking begging for years for something like this approach.

Um like uh an investment in flexible scheduling and permanence, which worked according to Aussie's own report at increasing retention.

In fact, a new state of the teaching report nationally just found flexible scheduling was the number one thing nationally, educator said would impact their retention.

Um so we know those things can work if we set aside money for charter schools to specifically do some of that.

I think it would help and offset some of their concerns as well.

Uh thank you.

One last question, and that is uh for Ms.

Hughes regarding Chisholm.

Um as best you know, and I'm not you are you on the LSAT for Chisholm?

I am not on the LSAT, I am on the PTO executive board.

Okay, but you as far as you know, um Chisholm is looking.

The only cuts that Chisholm is looking at is a reduction of two kindergarten aids next year.

I believe there is one other reduction, but I cannot remember at this point what that was.

Um I know that the trade-off for the two kindergarten aides is um the um they're adding a dual language staffing, um, which as a dual language school is also critical.

Um we are hoping to maintain uh our enrollment uh as much as we can, but with the swing space, I know we are losing some enrollment.

Um however, when we return to uh our renovated building, we expect that enrollment to not only regain uh its current level, but probably surge beyond that.

Uh so let me just say that uh we've done an initial schools first in budgeting act uh calculation, and I think Chisholm leads to PAC in terms of the gap.

Uh there are not very many schools that uh the mayor's budget falls short of school's first requirement.

Your school is one of them, and uh by our calculation is about 280,000, 281,000.

So it's our goal to restore all of that.

I not promising that we'll be able to.

Um it's unfortunate that you looking at uh the budget as you know it today, and have to make choices, and if we're able to fix it, we won't fix it until June.

But um at least that's what we're gonna try to do.

Thank you, sir.

Um it's unusual that the budget assistance request for the school was denied.

Uh to our knowledge, no school uh moving to a swing space has ever been denied a budget assistance request.

And that really is the source of uh much of this pain uh financially.

Um thank you for your attention to this matter, however.

Yes, thank you for your testimony.

So thank you all of you for your testimony.

I appreciate it.

You all are excused.

I'm gonna move on to the next group of witnesses.

Uh Zendi James, who's a teacher with empowered ed.

Henria Tujlo, who's a teacher with empowered ed.

Michael Lake, a teacher with empowered ed.

Elizabeth Weiss, who's a teacher with empowered ed.

Rosalyn Lake, who's a teacher with empowered ed.

Don Smith was a parent leader with PAVE.

She may not be online yet.

Dee Smith might work.

Yeah.

Catrice Turner, who's a parent leader with PEG.

I'm here.

Hi.

Okay, don't start yet.

Parent leader with PAVE.

Tara Brown, parent leader with PAVE.

Ty Andrews, apparent leader with PAVE.

Yolanda Anderson, apparent leader with PAVE.

Ashley Simpson Baird.

You are I did not hear a word you said.

Okay.

Great.

Ashley Simpson Baird.

Jenny Settlin.

LaTroy Bailey, site coordinator of community schools.

Josh Bailey, also site coordinator with community and schools.

Anthony Garcia Farcia.

A student with community schools.

Gabrielle Patterson, a student with community schools.

Ashley Williams.

Yvette Selby, apparent leader with PAVE.

Catherine Prokope, executive director at Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science.

Antoine Balimba.

I'm going to stop there.

Balamba.

Okay, let's go back.

Sandy James, I believe is not here.

Teacher within Power Ed.

What can we do?

Andrea Trujulo Trujillo, who is uh online.

Can we actually do Michael Lake?

Good afternoon.

I'm sorry.

Thank you all for actually.

Can you hold a second?

I was told that Michael Lake.

Who I thought was not here.

Is he here?

Of course.

Michael Lake?

Do you see him?

All right.

Then we'll go back to Ms.

Trujillo.

Hendria Trujillo, you're up.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Andrea Trujillo, and as the chairman said, I'm with Empower Ed.

I currently teach fourth grade special education inclusion at Ludlow Taylor.

I previously taught pre-K self-contained, and prior to that I spent many years in in California teaching education and privilege and responsibility of working with some of the most resilient, capable, and deserving students.

You know, it's not a one-size-fits-all thing.

So it requires specialized instruction, differentiated materials, assisted technology, and time for planning, collaboration, and direct student support.

Current budget limitations often mean larger caseloads, fewer instructional aids, and not enough access to evidence-based interventions, which impacts our ability to fully meet the needs of the students.

Also, I see how the budget affects their ability to gain access to the other services that we need, such as occupational therapy, speech, behavior support.

And so they're not able to hire a behavior interventionist.

So those students who need the behavior support don't get it.

And students don't get that support consistently.

Schools often go a long time without having a speech therapist on site, which makes it very difficult to provide the adequate speech services for students who require it.

Increasing funding for special education, would it allow schools to hire and retain qualified staff?

Such as teachers, paraprofessionals, and related service providers.

If they're not overwhelmed with their case levels, they are more likely to be retained.

Access to high quality instructional materials and intervention programs that are proven to work and provide ongoing professional development so educators can stay current with their practices and better support diverse learners.

Students with disabilities deserve the same opportunities to succeed as their peers.

Um not where their educators are forced to make a decision about what needs can realistically be met with what's available.

Um I urge you to consider the real daily impact of funding decisions on special education.

Thank you.

Uh thank you.

Um let's see, Michael Lake is not here.

Elizabeth Weiss.

I am here.

Sorry, I'm teaching.

All right, here I go.

Good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My name is Elizabeth Weiss.

I'm a teacher and parent of Broad Education Campus in the Carbon Lanson neighborhood and Ward High.

In 2024, DCPS thoughtfully adopted financial literacy standards to help students make informed decisions about money.

We should be able to say the same about how we are spending money in our schools.

Today I want to talk about a $1 million contract with IRED and whether it's actually improving outcomes for students.

Students lose many hours of instructional time each year to test them.

If we're going to take that time, every assessment must provide actionable, timely, and instructionally relevant data.

But this isn't just about reducing testing, it's about a system that is misaligned and distorting instruction.

In elementary math, I ready is our primary adaptive assessment.

Students take it three times per year and it places them into broad performance bands, multiple grade levels below, below below or on grade level.

This becomes the primary measure used to judge students' progress.

But the question is what does this actually tell a teacher about what to do next?

Let me give one example.

In fourth grade, students learn fractions through conceptual understanding using models, reasoning, and explaining that fractions represent equal parts.

On CAPE, they are asked to apply that understanding, analyzing representations, selecting correct answers, and justifying their thinking.

But in IRD, students are often guided step by step to compute an answer.

They can complete the task, but they are not consistently asked to reason, compare strategies, or explain their thinking in the same way.

So the thinking is different.

In the curriculum, students build meaning.

On CAFE, they apply and justify meaning, but in IRED, they're practicing how to get an answer, and that's what the assessment is measuring too.

IRIT is not is the old not IRIT is the only cross-grade adaptive measure we have in elementary math, but it does not provide clear actual insight into our student growth.

And that is not aligned to the figure of the curriculum or CAPE.

Because it is tied to teacher evaluation, it becomes high stakes.

As an instructional coach, my compensation is directly tied to whether students meet IRED growth targets.

So I have to ask, if your salary depended on it, would you teach to the test?

This is not a reflection of teacher priorities, it's a reflection of system design.

DCPS has invested in high quality math curriculum in Eureka Math Squared and strong intervention supports.

We need we do need an adaptive assessment, but it should clearly track growth and provide meaningful interpretable data.

An assessment like map growth, which DCPS already uses in secondary, does that.

It uses a consistent scale across grade levels and gives a clearer picture of whether students are catching up or falling behind.

Replacing IREDI with a more coherent growth-focused assessment would reduce misalignment and improve instructional decision making.

There's also a broader broader concern about time.

Programs like IREDI require significant screen use, especially for our youngest learners.

That time comes directly out of discussion, problem solving, and teacher-led instruction.

Every minute on a screen is a minute not spent reasoning, talking, and learning with the teacher.

Finally, it's a question of priorities.

DCPS is spending a fractional one million dollars on IRED, an assessment that could be replaced with a tool we already have.

If we redirected those funds, we can invest in what actually drive students' outcomes.

At roughly 100,000 per position, that funding can support eight to ten community school coordinators.

Staff can connect students and families to critical resources.

No intervention program can overcome unmet basic needs or lack of access to support systems.

We cannot intervene our way out of inequity if we are not investing in the conditions that create it.

Right now we are choosing to invest in a system that produces more data instead of investing in the systems that make the data matter.

Thank you.

And you speak to an issue the testing, which has been a concern of ours.

So thank you.

Rosalind Lake, I believe, is not here.

Don Smith, I believe is not here.

I'm here.

You're Ms.

Smith.

Yes.

Please proceed.

Good morning, Councilmember Mendelssohn.

I'm sorry, Chairman Mendelssohn.

My name is Dawn Smith, and I'm a member of Pay, Citywide Parent Lead on Board.

I have three wonderful children, two who have graduated and mass elementary.

I'm here today to talk about the importance of protecting the three million in funding for high impact tutoring and for investing in literacy in May focused educator professional development.

The data proves that HIT works.

A study done by Empower K-12 on HIT programs implemented by a city school's collaborative shows that students who receive HIT gains an additional 15, I'm sorry, 59 days of class loan instructions.

Chairman, I know that you are aware of the gains DC has made the fastest recurring urban school district in the country.

But we aren't where we need to be.

We have to raise our proficiencies in both literacy and math.

HIT is a data-backed way to do that.

And in a budget year where we have to make tough choices, it is clear how beneficial HIT can be for students across the district.

As I think about my youngest daughter, Faye Educational Journey, I want to know that if she is struggling and needs extra support, she has access to the program she needs to thrive without having to pay hundreds of dollars a month.

Not only should we protect the investments in HIT, but we might, I mean, I'm sorry, but we must also invest in our educators.

DC has incredible teachers who have played an integral role in most student success.

We must ensure that our educators are receiving training in the science and reading and in evidence-based math instruction.

We have to pour into our educators so we can pour into our children.

Last month, I was able to see the impact of science, a reading-based educative professional development in the classrooms at Friendship Armstrong Public Charter School.

As I walked through the classrooms at Friendship, I watched teachers work with students in small groups in and out the classroom, giving them the individualized support they needed.

When I entered the first grade class, I had tears in my eyes as I watched the children love reading and work together and learn.

In kind of in the kindergarten classroom, students were working on their spelling and writing deals.

The students had adopted a pet.

Pete for the spring, a little boy called me over to read his story and sounded the words.

Seeing students who are invested in their learning and excited to share it with others is a result of incredible work.

Their educators put it in each and every day.

If we want to see our students build a love for learning, which can lead to positive attendance outcome and build skills, they need to be proficient in literacy and math.

We must give our educators the tools they need to get them there.

Improving proficiency rates and notes is no small task.

It requires coordinate efforts and intentional investments.

But HIT and educator professional development are the types of investments we need to make to push our students forward.

I urge the council to protect the $3 million in funding for HIT and to invest in literacy and math professional development for educators across both sectors.

We all want our students to thrive.

Let's help each other do that by investing in what know what we know works.

Thank you for this opportunity to testify today.

Thank you.

And I'll look forward to the first time.

Thank you.

All right, good afternoon, Chairman Mendelssohn, Council members, and these other members of the committee.

My name is Catrice Turner.

I'm a native Washingtonian, a Ward 5 resident and a citywide board member with PAVE.

I'm also a problem there are four boys within both sectors of the DC public uh school system and serve as the chief of family community engagement at Monument Academy Public Charter School in Ward 7.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I come before you both as a school leader and a parent.

Two roles that give me a clear and sometimes hard view of what our students need and what our system still struggles to deliver consistently.

Today I want to focus on two investments that we know work.

High impact tutoring and meaningful ongoing professional development for educators.

Let's start with HIT or high impact tutoring.

We are no longer in a space where we are guessing what helps students accelerate.

The research is clear.

When tutoring is consistent, aligned to classroom instruction and delivered by trained adults during the school day, students grow, period.

I have firsthand, uh I've seen firsthand how targeted relationship-driven academic supports can shift the students' trajectory, not just academically, but emotionally.

Students begin to believe that they can do the work, and they do the work.

But access to high impact tutoring across DC is still inconsistent.

Some schools have robust programs, others have none.

And families don't always understand what their child is or is not receiving.

So if we're serious about closing the gaps, then HIT cannot be optional or uneven.

It must be a baseline investment, not a supplemental one.

I urge the council to ensure dedicated protective funding for HIT across both DCPS and public charter schools.

Implemented with fidelity, monitored for quality, and accessible to the students who need it the most.

Now, as we consider our educators, we cannot expect high outcomes without high investment in the people delivering instruction every single day.

Professional development must be timely, relevant, and sustained, not one-off sessions that check a box, not simply asynchronous learning models, but modalities that fit the needs of every educational space.

Teachers need real support in delivering strong literacy instruction, especially at the secondary level, strengthening math content knowledge and pedagogy, using data effectively to adjust instruction in real time.

And when educators are equipped, our students feel it.

I have seen the difference when teachers are given a space to collaborate, analyze data, and refine their practice with the right coaching.

Confidence grows, instruction improves, and retention increases.

And in a time where we are working to keep strong educators in our schools in the district, that matters.

So my essay is simple.

Invest in what works.

Fund hit as a core academic strategy, not an add-on.

Ensure that educator professional development is not only funded but structured in a way that actually builds capacity and drives student achievement.

Finally, as a parent who has had students at both DC public and public charter schools, and as a charter school leader, I urge the council to ensure equitable funding across the two sectors.

Parents and families want to know that no matter where our students are going to school, they have the resources they need to thrive.

With the current funding inequities, charter schools will have to make tough decisions about their ability to implement some of the programs that I've discussed today.

Because we invest in both schools and adults who serve them, we don't just improve outcomes, we build a stronger, more sustainable system for DC's future.

Thank you so much for your commitment to our children, and thank you for this time to testify.

Thank you, Ms.

Turner.

Uh, Leshima Burnett.

Ms.

Burnett.

Okay.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson.

Members of the committee of the whole and staff.

My name is Lashima Burnett.

I'm a Ward 8 resident and a proud mother to two amazing children at Ludell Taylor and McKinley Tech High School.

While I am not a native Washingtonian, I've had the pleasure of living in DC for 17 years and care deeply about our students' success.

I'm here today to discuss the importance of high impact tutoring and educator professional development.

Access to high impact tutoring, also known as HIT, is a way for us to bridge the gaps in DC.

Council members.

DC can be a tale of two cities, the has and the have nots.

It is our job to level the playing field so that all of our students can excel regardless of where they come from.

Students from East of the River deserve the chance to become an astronaut, engineer, or whatever it is that they set their minds to.

To help all children meet their goals, they have to be proficient or better in literacy and math.

HIT is a way for us to ensure that all of our students meet or exceed this threshold.

As a parent, I have seen the impact of HIT firsthand.

My daughter has received high impact tutoring through the math with friends and reading with friends HIT program at Ludlow Taylor Elementary School.

My daughter began her HIT in literacy and math in the third grade.

Her growth has been astronomical.

In one year, she jumped two levels in reading and one level in math according to her school's end of the year exam.

This year in fifth grade, my daughter has continued with the HIT program.

I've seen significant growth.

She's more engaged, and she's more passionate about school.

She's noticing what it is to learn and place closer attention to her grades.

My daughter has blossomed into a student who loves reading and decided to go to school.

While I have access to HIT programs for my daughter and can cover the fee, I worry about those who do not have access to HIT programs.

We must help all students bridge their learning by providing access to HIT programs.

This is why I urge the council to protect the $3 million in funding for HIT in the FY27 budget.

In a tough budget year, we have to invest in programs that we know work, which is why we should continue to invest in science of reading based literacy training and evidence-based math professional development for our educators.

I have seen the impact of well-trained teachers.

Recently, I taught Friendship Armstrong PCS with other paid parent leaders.

I got to see the impact of science of reading based literacy training for educators as a step into the classrooms where students were working hard to sound their words out and help each other succeed.

Not only do you feel the difference when you walk the halls, but the data backs it up.

In 2025, four different friendship public charter schools campuses were named bold performance schools.

I want all of our students to shine.

We must support our students with the resources they need to do so.

This is why we must protect the investment of high impact tutoring and invest in educators' professional development.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today and your continued partnership.

Thank you, Miss Burnett.

Chair Brown Good morning.

Good afternoon.

My name is Sarah Brown.

I'm a paid parent leader in Ward 6 on the advisory board.

Please forgive my uh eye contact.

I have a lot to get through in three minutes or two minutes and 46 seconds.

I'm here to share the data that proves that high impact tutoring is a necessary investment to make.

This is what the data tells us.

Positive high impact tutoring outcomes in DC.

A Stanford study of over 5,000 DC students receiving HIT found a reduction of daily absenteeism by 7%.

Students are less likely to miss school on their tutoring days.

Its students have increased proficiency scores.

The city's proficiency scores are dangerously low, even as graduation rates increases.

Students receiving HIT through City Schools Collaborative with the equivalent of 59 additional school days in math.

92% of lower achievement students assigned to a tutor receive HIT dosage with these students achieving 138% of expected growth in math and 133% of expected growth in reading.

Positive HIT outcomes across the country.

Mariposa County Unified School District decided to incorporate targeted skills instruction by leveraging California funding streams for evidence-based intervention.

They scheduled students in grades three through six for four lessons a week in math and reading after 36 lessons.

Rock Church Academy in Maryland leveraged targeted skills instruction three days a week for their middle school math program and just nine lessons of targeted skills instruction.

80% of students achieved mastery of the targeted skills.

But no Israel in Maryland wanted to close COVID-related learning loss and get K through 12 students back on grade level in reading and math.

In one semester, 57% of elementary students achieve mastery, and 43% made significant progress toward mastery of the targeted skills.

At the middle and high school level, 82% of students achieve mastery and 18% made significant progress towards mastery of the targeted skills.

The impact of an equitable funding on HIT Access, 48% of our students are classified as high risk.

Aussie grades 3 million for HIT, this only covers 3,000 kids.

Schools that do not receive HIIT funding but understand the benefit of their students' proficiency outcomes, would have to budget for it themselves.

This is a burden, especially for charter schools that do not have their fit facilities expenses covered by DGS like DCBS.

Having to cover those expenses out of pocket gives them $2,000 less per student to spend.

This inequity makes it difficult to absorb the cost of HIT.

Chairman Mendelssohn, today I have shared examples of what HIT has done to improve proficiency rates both in DC and across the country.

I've shown how it reduces daily absenteeism.

I have shared the data proving that HIT leads to increased instructional time.

I provided articles in my submitted testimony from reputable sources like Stanford and the NEA, calling HIT one of the most efficient effective ways to improve student outcomes, particularly for students furthest from behind.

With my last uh oh, I'm over, so I'm going to uh trust that you'll read the rest of my testimony, and I just ask what else do you need to know to convince you and the rest of the council to continue to invest and perhaps increase the investment in high impact tutoring.

Thank you for thank you for your testimony.

Um I'm not sure I need to be convinced since I already understand the quality of the program.

Thank you.

Uh Ty Andrews.

You need to accept we can go to Yolanda Anderson, waiting for you, Miss Andrews.

So Ms.

Henderson, please proceed.

Thank you, and good afternoon, um, Chairman Mendelson, um, members of the staff.

My name is Yolanda Anderson, and I'm a member of PAVES advisory board.

And I am also a very proud mother of two very intelligent DC PCS graduates.

I am here today to talk about the importance of HIT and Ed and meaningful HIT high impact tutoring and meaningful educator professional development.

I've heard it explained from kindergarten to third grade, we teach our students to read.

And from third grade on, our students are reading to learn.

Now I know I have three minutes, but I want to slow down and repeat that.

From kindergarten to third grade, we teach our students to read.

And from third grade on, our students are expected to read to learn.

Now, I want that to sit.

This means that if our students are not proficient in reading by third grade, it will be increasingly difficult for them to participate in school.

With only about 37% of our students proficient in reading, that means nearly 60% of our students will have difficulty assessing materials and expanding their knowledge as they progress through school.

I love the gains that the district has made.

And sorry.

Yeah.

I love the gains that the district have made and celebrate along with everyone else.

But what hurts is that yes, our graduation rate has increased, but according to the state of DC school by DC policy center, only 16% of our students are meeting the SAT college and readiness benchmarks.

This means we need to do more for our students.

Graduating students who are not proficient does not help our students, but it grossly hurts our society.

My story.

Both my children graduated from DCP A DCPS school, and while they both graduated at above grade levels, I worked with a CBO in an after-school program that assisted students at this very same school.

Where I witnessed students who struggle.

We obtained their records every semester and noted that their reading levels, we noted their reading levels to offer assistance.

Many were reading at third and fourth grade reading levels in high school.

A lot of them were athletes.

We did all we could to offer additional supports with tutors we hired, but even when the help went with that help with even but even with the help did not get to where their reading levels were at grade levels.

However, of the students I work with in my two-year tenure, some graduated, and many of them graduated with my son in 2025.

This is very disheartening.

This is why it is critical to protect high-impact tutoring and invest in meaningful educator professional development.

We know that both of these investments help our students increase proficiency levels.

We want our students to do more than just strive or survive in the district.

We want them to thrive in this.

Thank you, sir.

I appreciate this opportunity, and my testimony has been submitted, so thank you for doing that.

I apologize for technical difficulties.

Thank you.

Um Ashley Simpson Baird.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson and staff.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My name is Ashley Simpson Baird, and I lead research and policy work for Brea Public Charter School.

As DC's first two-generation public charter school, we serve more than 1,100 students each year.

Parents enrolled in adult education and workforce programs and their young children in bilingual early childhood classes.

Our families are some of the furthest from opportunity in DC.

They are primarily immigrants, and 85% qualify for free or reduced price meals.

And I'm proud to say our outcomes are exceptional.

Adult English learners exceed national benchmarks year after year, and 96% of our pre-K students meet or exceed literacy and math growth expectations.

In our workforce programs, 100% of our child development associate students and 92% of medical assistant students are in their credentials, and 93% of our workforce graduates report they are employed within six months of completion.

This has earned us PCSB's highest ratings every single year.

These outcomes are not accidental, they are the result of intentional public investment.

At present, too many of those investments are falling short.

First, DC funds adult education below adequacy.

The latest school funding study recommends increasing the adult weight to 1.3 to account for the high proportion of students who are English learners, have special needs and or are at risk.

Second, and relatedly, the proposed FY27 budget includes another year of reductions in adult and family education grants, DC's local we OF funding match.

Since FY25, more than 2.5 million dollars has been cut from this grant, reducing access to workforce pathways that connect adult learners to high-wage, high-demand fields.

What is particularly concerning is that the AFE cuts are happening at the same time as the district is making new investments in career and technical education for high school students, including more than $7 million for the advanced technical centers.

These are valuable investments, and we support expanding opportunities for young people.

But we should not be taking resources from adult workforce programs to fund new initiatives for high school students.

DC's public education and workforce systems were intentionally built to serve residents across the lifespan, especially those who have already left the K-12 system or are never fully served by it.

I urge you to restore AFE grant funds.

Third, the adult learner transit subsidy is essential but insufficient.

Transportation is one of the most immediate barriers to attendance for adult learners.

The current $70 monthly benefit has not kept pace with rising costs, and many of our students run out of funds before the end of the month, forcing them to make the difficult choice between paying their bills or attending school.

I urge the council to increase the benefit to 100 per month.

Fourth, adult learners rely on a strong safety net to persist in their education.

Programs like the DC Healthcare Alliance, SNAP, and TANF allow families to meet their basic needs while pursuing their long-term goals.

Weakening these supports directly undermines educational attainment and workforce preparation.

Finally, like all charter schools, I ask that all public education funding be delivered through the UPSFF.

Charter schools educate nearly half of DC's public school students, including 5,000 adult learners, and funding outside the formula creates inequities that divert resources away from classrooms and students.

Adult education and two-generation education is not peripheral.

They're central to DC's workforce, economic mobility, and family stability.

When we invest in adult learners, we are investing in entire families in the future of our city.

Thank you for your time and your continued commitment to public school students of all ages and sectors.

I'm happy to answer any questions.

She's not accepted.

Josh Bailey.

Anthony Garcia Farsium.

A student, Gabrielle Patterson, a student Ashley Williams.

Good afternoon, Chairperson and members of the committee.

My name is LaTroy Bailey, and I serve as a site coordinator with communities and schools of the nation's capital at Brooklyn Middle School.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I also want to thank Mayor Bowser for including funding for community schools grants and the proposed FY27 budget.

And I strongly encourage you to support this critical investment.

At Brooklyn Middle School, our partnership with communities and school exists because our school leadership made the decision to fund it using their own budget.

That decision speaks volumes to the value of our work.

But it also highlights a larger issue than that every school has the resources to make the same choice.

As if as a result, not every student has access to the supports that help them show up, engage and succeed.

At my school, I directly support a caseload of 34 students, many of whom face chronic absenteeism and unmet basic needs.

However, my work extends beyond these students to the entire community of the school.

Brooklyn is a Title I school serving 348 students.

And the challenges our students face are significant, ranging from food insecurities and social emotional needs to lack of adequate clothing and basic necessities that directly impact the tenants.

Some of our students travel long distances across the city to get to school.

Weather and transportation challenges can make consistent attendance difficult.

Others miss school because they don't have clean uniforms or proper seasonal clothing like coats, gloves, or even even shoes that fit.

Some students stay home to care for their younger siblings while parents work.

These are not isolated incidents.

These are regular everyday realities for our students.

Despite these challenges, one thing remains constant.

Families want the best for their children, and students want to succeed.

What many lack is access to resources, student support systems, and opportunities to make success possible.

That is why communities and schools make a difference.

At Brooklyn Middle School, my focus is on building student confidence and ensuring every student feels seen, supported, and valued.

I work to remove barriers so that when our students walk through our doors, they can focus on learning and not on what they're missing.

This includes organizing school supplies, uniforms, code drives, and maintaining a school pantry, coordinating mentorship programs, hosting attendance incentive programs, and even providing barbering and rooming days so that our students can come to school and feel confident and prepared.

All of this work is centered around one goal removing barriers to attendance and engagement.

However, each year, this becomes more challenging as available funding decreases.

Miss Bailey, I'm gonna have to cut you off.

I do have your statement, uh, but you're over your time.

Okay, thank you so much.

So thank you.

I may go back.

Umrews.

Good afternoon, um, Chairman Mendelson and members of the council.

My name is Ty Andrews.

I'm awarded parent, a DCPS graduate and an advocate for educational equity and student success via parents amplifying voices and education phase.

I'm here today to strongly support continued and increased investments in two strategies that we know make a real difference in student achievement.

High impact tutoring and educator professional development.

If we are serious about improving math and reading outcomes across the district, we must invest in both because one without the other is not enough.

High impact tutoring works.

Research shows that students who receive consistent small group tutoring at least three times per week can gain three to five additional months of learning in a single school year.

That is not incremental progress, that is accelerated progress.

At that level of support, and that level of support is exactly what many of our students need right now.

In DC, too many students are still not meeting grade level expectations in math and reading.

High impact tutoring provides targeted personalized instruction that helps close those gaps.

It allows students to build foundational skills, regain confidence, and stay on track academically.

But tutoring alone is not the full solution.

We must also invest in our educators.

High quality instructional educational materials are only effective when teachers are properly trained to use them.

That is where educational professional development becomes critical.

When teachers receive ongoing coaching, training, and support, they are better equipped to deliver rigorous instruction, differentiate learning, and meet the needs of every student in their classroom.

Professional development ensures that strong instruction is happening every single day, not just during tutoring sessions.

Together, these investments create a powerful system.

High impact tutoring provides targeted immediate support for students who are struggling, while strong professional development strengthens core classroom instruction for all students.

This is how we build both short-term recovery and long-term success.

If we want to see real improvements in math and reading outcomes across the district, we must invest in strategies that are proven, consistent, and scalable.

Our students deserve nothing less.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Ms.

Andrews.

Josh Bailey.

Yeah, so I'm here.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon, Chairman and members of the committee.

My name is Joshua Bailey, and I serve as a site coordinator with communities and schools of the nation's capital at MacArthur High School.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I also want to thank Mayor Bowser for including funding for community school grants in the proposed FR27 budget and encourage the council to support this area of the budget as well.

McGartha High School is a school that serves over 560 students from various wards across the city.

Our work served as a beacon of hope, safety, and belonging for all.

Community and schools partnership is made possible through the school's own budget.

School leadership made a deliberate decision to invest in the support in these supports because of their impact.

At the same time, this approach reveals a gap.

Not every school has resources to provide the same, which means access to these supports is inconsistent for all students.

Through our partnership, we work alongside school staff to identify student needs early and respond in a coordinated way.

Through our ability to provide direct service programs like our Mina MacArthur and Quest of Womanhood mentorship programs, as well as brokering services with various community partners, such as Josh University Hospital, the U.S.

Coast Guard, and Zeta Fabatus Rewarding to come in and deliver transformational life-changing experiences for our students.

We also work to strengthen trust with families by meeting them where they are and helping them access resources in a way that is practical, consistent, and student-centered.

This work reflects the core mission of community and schools.

We focus on ensuring every student has the relationships and resources they need to realize their potential.

When those supports are in place, we know that students are more likely to stay engaged, show up consistently, and succeed academically.

Community schools grant funding creates an opportunity to expand this work across more schools in a consistent, equitable way.

It builds on a strong partnership between communities and schools and the DCPS and helps ensure that more students can benefit from integrated supports regardless of a school's individual budget.

We also see an opportunity to continue coordinating with the Office of the State Superintendent of Education to align resources that support families and address challenges such as chronic absenteeism.

Strong coordination helps ensure students and families can access the support, just access the support they need without unnecessary barriers.

We appreciate the continued partnership with DCPS and the district committee to support the whole child.

Expanding access to this model will allow us to reach more students, strengthen outcomes, and deliver on the promises that every young person has the opportunity to succeed.

Thank you for your time and your continued support support of DC school students across the district.

I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jenny Settlin.

Hello.

Good afternoon.

Chairman Mendelson and members of the council.

My name is Jenny Settlin, and I am a kindergarten teacher at Shirley Chisholm Elementary School in Ward 6.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

I want to say that I am only able to testify right now because of one of the person's positions that I am here advocating for.

She is watching my classroom right now and making sure that everything goes smoothly, and I have to acknowledge her effort and her support.

I am here to ask the council to support funding that will allow Chisholm to maintain four kindergarten classroom aids for the 2026-2027 school year.

Kindergarten is the foundation of a child's academic journey, especially in reading.

Our success as a kindergarten team over the past several years is not accidental.

It is directly connected to having classroom aides who can work one-on-one with students and consistently support small group instruction.

That level of targeted support has allowed us to meet students where they are and move them forward.

If we are to reduce our aids, would we be able to achieve the same level of success?

As a classroom teacher, I have seen firsthand how having an additional adult in the classroom makes it possible for me to give students more individualized attention.

With the support of our aides, we are able to differentiate lessons, complete quarterly and bi-weekly progress testing seamlessly, and most importantly, build strong emotional relationships with each and every student.

Every year it seems that additional responsibilities have been added to our workload.

I know the district has made early literacy and early childhood education a priority.

These new responsibilities hold us accountable, and I have seen positive changes over the last few years, especially in regards to dyslexia awareness and testing.

Our responsibilities as educators have increased because of this, and investing in kindergarten classroom support is one direct and effective way to continue to advance those early literacy goals.

Reducing our aid support while expectations continue to increase, puts further strain on teachers and ultimately impact students.

It is also diminishing to the work and effort that our kindergarten aides have done to help grow our students over the last few years.

I understand that monetary decisions like this are complex.

However, we worry that this decision will be something that cannot be undone in the future and will have long-term consequences on our students.

Many DCPS schools have a dedicated aid in each kindergarten classroom.

Producing aids at Chisholm would put our students at a disadvantage compared to their peers.

Our goal is to simply advocate for what and who we know best supports student success.

I respectfully ask the council to ensure that Chisholm can maintain four kindergarten classroom aids so that our youngest learners still have the support they need to succeed.

Thank you very much for your time and consideration.

And I really hit the time there.

Thank you, Ms.

Sutlin.

Thank you for your commitment to education.

So as I indicated to a previous witness about Chisholm, uh, we've done a calculation under the School's First in Budgeting Act, and Chisholm is on the list as having been underfunded.

I can't guarantee that we will find the dollars to make this right, but uh you're definitely on the list.

Thank you so much, Chairman Mendelssohn.

I'm pretty sure.

Thank you, and thank you for your testimony.

Um I believe Anthony Garcia Farcia is not here, Gabrielle Patterson is not here, Ashley Williams.

Yvette Selby, I believe is online.

Ms.

Selby Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson, members of the committee of a whole, and members of the staff.

My name is Evet Selby and I serve on the advisory board in Ward 5 parent leader board with parents amplifying voices in education.

I have twins currently in college who graduated from Capital City, PCS and McKinley Tech High School.

First, I would like to thank the mayor for prioritizing education in the budget, specifically the increase in the UPSF and support for high impact tutoring.

That investment matters, especially when it comes to math.

If we want real math acceleration in DC, we must invest in both high impact tutoring and strong sustained professional development for math educators.

Math outcomes in DC are still not where they need to be.

We are seeing decline starting in middle school and persistent gaps for black and brown students, students with disabilities, and students from low income communities.

And the data tells us that high impact tutoring works.

Students who receive it can gain the equivalent of two or more additional months of learning.

However, more time only works when the instruction is of high quality, which means tutoring cannot be stand a standalone solution.

It must be connected to what's happening in the classroom, and that depends on teacher support.

Right now, DC has invested heavily in literacy training, but we have not made the same level investment in math focused professional development, and that's where the gap is.

We know from DC's own data and national research that schools improve math outcomes, schools that improve math outcomes do a few things.

They invest in ongoing teacher coaching, they build strong feedback systems that help students develop confidence in math and they ensure teachers are equipped to teach conceptual understanding, not just procedures.

Because math success isn't just about getting the right answer, it's about whether students believe they are capable of doing math in the first place.

I've seen this personally.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Miss Selby.

Catherine Prokope.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My name is Catherine Procol, and I'm the executive director of the Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science, a charter school in Ward 1, serving students from grade six through eight.

And I'm also a proud Ward 6 resident.

Our students come from every ward in the District of Columbia, and I'm proud to represent a community that reflects the full diversity of this beautiful city.

Our school is growing academically and in every way that matters.

Our students' proficiency scores on DC CAPE assessments demonstrate consistent, meaningful growth year over year, often surpassing the state average.

We're especially proud of our gains in mathematics, which we attribute in significant part to high impact tutoring funded by this council.

And we're praying that they continue to support it.

That investment is working.

Our partnership with Howard University's Mathematics Department and School of Education has deepened that work, bringing research resource-based instructional practices directly into our classrooms and strengthening our pipeline of talented educators.

We're grateful for the proposed 2.55% increase in the UPSFF based formula.

It is an acknowledgement that the cost of providing an excellent education continues to rise.

But I would be less than candid if I did not share that it is deeply disheartening to stand before this council again and make the case for equity between charter schools and DCPS students.

This should not be an annual fight.

The mayor's proposed budget directs $96 million in operating funding to DCPS outside of the UPSFF, amounting to approximately $2,000 per pupil more than charter school students receive.

Our students, nearly half of all DC public school students deserve the same investment.

Every child in this city, whether they sit in a DCPS classroom or one of ours, deserves a fully and equitably resourced education.

I urge this council to fully fund the UPSFF to protect the 3.1% annual increase in charter facilities allotment and to reject any budget mechanism that creates a two-tiered system.

The strong education of our school can provide, excuse me, the strong education our school can provide is because of fair equitable funding.

Please make sure it stays that way.

And that charter school students like ours don't get less.

Thank you.

And Antoine Palamba is, I believe, not here.

I don't think I missed anybody online.

Um I want to thank everybody for the testimony.

I do want to ask you, Miss Baird, the uh can you say more about this we OA funding?

Sure.

So there's obviously the federal WOA funding that comes from the feds, and then there's a local match that we call the adult and family education grants that flows through Aussie.

It's been slowly declining since FY25.

This year it's about a 435,000 dollar cut.

Uh the funds go to both LEAs and charter-based organizations, or excuse me, community-based organizations to fund workforce programs.

So the cut is to the local match.

That's right.

But if it's a match, then that would reduce.

It's not a one-to-one match.

So it doesn't affect the federal funding.

That's right.

I know that the DME did an analysis of the success of these different workforce programs.

Yeah, and I would say though the AFE fund the AFE funded programs are some of the highest performing, and that's actually a requirement to continue to receive the grants every year.

Um it's a little different than some other workforce funded programs in the city.

Um when you say highest performing, do you know what percentage get jobs?

Um I can speak to that at uh EBREA.

So we have to do a six-month follow-up survey with all of our workforce graduates, and um regularly, or at least in the past year, 93% of them have reported that they're still employed six months after graduation.

What percentage get jobs?

Uh 93%.

I thought you said 93% are still employed six months later.

Six months later.

Um, I can get back to you with uh you're looking for as soon as they graduate.

Is that what you want to know?

Well, 93% of whatever number, let's say only 10% of the students get a job, and then 93% of them.

Oh, I see what you're saying.

Yeah, yeah.

Um, I don't have that number in front of me, but I can follow up if you'd like.

If you would, you can just send us an email with that.

Sure, no problem.

Uh, that is something I want to ask the deputy mayor about.

Uh please do.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Uh thank you, everybody, for your testimony.

And the two of you in person, thank you for being in person.

I'm going to continue with the list.

We're at number 51.

Catalina, these are all students of Bria Public Charter School.

Catalina Alvarado.

Claudia Sosa.

Cindy Carbal.

Will seeuban DeUban.

Rowende Sawa Dogo Sawa Dogo.

Jason Gorellic.

Peter Anderson, head of schools, and CEO at Washington Latin.

Alani or Elainey Lawrence, Chief Academic Officer, Carlos Rosario.

Shagufta Sharman, a student of Carlos Rosario.

Mary Ann Forrest.

She's here.

Lorena Flores.

Regina Summers.

Is online.

Martha Cruz.

The woman who's sitting down.

Your name is.

Martha Cruz.

I'm pretty sure a lot of you.

Juita Colbert.

I don't see them.

Dr.

Kofi Anuma, first vice president organizing and policy committee chair AFGE Local 2725.

Don't see them.

County building assets should be both.

Somebody came up.

Kelly Okun.

Who's a teacher, Charter Union President, DCX Local 1927, AFT.

County Gilliam, who's president of AFG Local 2725.

Here?

No.

Yeah.

Oh no.

I think I'll stop right there.

I'm going to do the three in-person folks first.

Alaney Lawrence.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson and staff.

My name is Elaine Lawrence, and I serve as the Chief Academic Officer at the Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School.

I am a native Washingtonian, a DCPS graduate, a parent of a child in a charter school, as well as a charter school graduate, a charter school board member, and award Ford resident.

I'm passionate about public education in the district.

For more than five decades, the Carlos Rosario School has served adult learners across the district, primarily English learners, working adults, and parents who are building foundational skills, earn industry recognized credentials, and pursuing family sustaining careers.

Today we serve more than 2,000 students from all eight wards through an integrated model of academics, workforce training, and wraparound supports.

Our outcomes demonstrate both quality and accountability.

Over the past two years, we have graduated more than 600 students, including new U.S.

citizens, certified nurse aides, bilingual educators, culinary professionals, and IT specialists.

Many of our graduates are now employed across the district in schools, hospitals, restaurants, and community organizations, contributing directly to DC's workforce and economy.

Adult education is public education.

It is also workforce development, economic modility, and community stabilization all at once.

Our students balance work, parenting, and significant responsibilities.

Yet they persist.

As you consider the fiscal year 27 budget, I'd like to highlight four priorities that are essential to sustaining and scaling this impact.

First, increase the adult learner weight in the uniform per student, a funding formula from one to 1.3.

The DME's own funding study found that this is what's required for adult education.

Second, increase the adult learner transit subsidy from $70 to $100 per month.

Transportation remains one of the most immediate barriers to attendance and persistence.

When students run out of funds before they end before the month ends, they miss class, not because of lack of motivation, but because of the cost.

Third, maintain a strong social safety network for DC families, including the DC Healthcare Alliance, SNAP and TANF.

We see every day how basic needs stability impacts academic success.

And finally, fund charter schools equitably by ensuring that all school costs, including staff compensation and fixed costs such as utilities, are fully funded through the UPSF.

Adult public charter schools are accountable, outcomes-driven institutions with targeted investments in funding equity, transportation success, and basic needs.

The district can strengthen all adult education as a core pillar in its workforce and economic strategy.

Thank you for your time and your continued commitment to DC's adult learners, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelssohn and members of the council.

I'm Shegupta Sharmin, an advanced English student of Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School.

I arrived in DC last spring.

Before coming here, I worked for more than 18 years in international development organizations and the even in my country.

Throughout my career, I was passionate to work for the marginalized people, knowing them and supporting them to grow.

When I moved here, I left almost everything of my life back in my country.

Then I started looking for an opportunity for a new beginning.

Then I found Carlos Rosario where I'm not only learning language from a single teacher, but I am also enlightened myself through the people from around the world.

Carlos Rosario is my very own window to see through the world.

My classmates from all over the world.

We are different ages, from our 20s to over 60 years old.

But we share a common goal to improve our lives through education.

One of my 65-year-old classmates started learning English as a beginner and completed level eight in four years.

Meanwhile, she got citizenship after having the citizenship course at Carlos Rosario.

Now she is the confident lady who has found meaning in life after her sixties.

She can now travel across the city on her own and participate fully in her community.

That is what this school makes possible independence, dignity, and opportunity.

Carlos Rosario has also helped me connect beyond my immediate community.

I would like to share two is that the district can extend them that this impact.

First, I asked you to increase the adult learner transit submitted subsidy from 70 to 100 per month.

When I first received my smart card, it gave me a sense of freedom.

I learned how to use the bus and metro system, and I gained confidence to travel independently in this city.

For many students, transportation is not just about getting to school, it is about access to opportunity, community, and independence.

Increasing this subsidy will help more students attend consistently and stay engaged in their education.

Second, I ask you to increase the adult education funding with in the uniform by student funding formula from one to 1.3.

Adult learners bring diverse experiences, but we also face real challenges, language barriers, career transitions, and responsibilities at home.

Schools like Carlos Rosario provide the support we need to succeed, but they need adequate funding to continue this work at a high level.

I come to this country with experience, skills, and a desire to contribute.

Carlos Rosario is helping me turn that potential into reality.

With your support, it can continue to do the same for the thousands of other adult learners in the city.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you, Ms.

Sharon.

And Ms.

Flores.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelssohn.

My name is Lorena Flores, and I am here today because of the community our school leadership has built.

A true village, or as we would say, nuestro pueblo.

It's grounded in care, accountability, and shared commitment to helping every child thrive.

Budget conversations often focus on enrollment, funding formulas, and increasingly on technology.

But I ask you to consider what truly makes the school work, what makes children feel safe, supported, and ready to learn.

It's human connection.

In a fast-moving world, children still need stability, time, and meaningful relationships to grow and feel secure.

At Oyster Adams, that commitment to the whole child is visible every day through mentorship, human-led tutoring, and educators who know our children deeply and respond to their individual needs.

I want to recognize those who make this a reality for us, our principals, Ms.

Brito and Ms.

Verrocal, whose presence, vision, and action, cultivate a strong and inclusive community, our student growth team, counselors and therapists who support the developmental and emotional well-being of each child as an individual, not a data point.

Our teachers who are the heartbeat of the school, their skilled professionals at navigating complex classrooms and families with care, adaptability, and expertise.

Our administrative front desk and facility staff who ensure an organized, welcoming and dignified environment for everyone.

These are not interchangeable roles or short-term inputs.

Human knowledge in school communities compounds over time through relationships, experience, and trust.

That continuity is what allows children to feel safe, to experience joy and learning, and ultimately to thrive.

As you consider this year's budget, I urge you to prioritize what matters most when it comes to childhood education.

It's people.

Invest in human-led tutoring, mentorships, and small group learning.

Evaluate technology investments for effectiveness before expanding them.

And I also want to acknowledge something broader.

DCPS reflects the system with accountability, one that prioritizes children and equitable communities over the redirection of public resources to private interests.

That distinction matters.

Investing in people is essential.

They prepare our children not just for standardized tests, but to be resilient for the complexities of the worlds they will inherit.

It also means providing our educators with the recognition and resources their multifaceted work deserves.

Our educators are on the front lines, constantly learning, adapting, and growing alongside our children.

That is the investment that lasts.

I want to close by thanking the DCPS community, especially those at Oyster Adams.

You are our village.

Thank you for your time and can you continue continued service.

Thank you, Ms.

Flores.

So thank you for your testimony.

Catalina Alvarado.

Yes.

Europe.

Good afternoon, members of the community of the whole.

My name is Catalina Alberaro Quinteros.

I am a parent of a children attending charter schools in DC.

The mother of a child with an IEP and a student Abrilla Chatter School.

I am here today, not just for myself, but for families like mine who depends on this school every day.

As a parent, I have seen what a different charter school can make.

I have seen my children feel supported, feel seen, and feel like they they belong.

And as a mother, that means everything to me.

For us, this is not just about education.

It's about giving our children a real chance at a better future.

As a member, as a mother of a child with an IEP, I live with worry.

I wonder if my child will get the support they truly need if they are understood.

Creative fairly and given the support, the opportunities as every other child.

That support is not extra.

It's not optional.

It's essential.

And as a as a student myself, I know how powerful education can be.

A Bria, I am not only learning, but I am growing.

I am learning how to support my children, how to advocate for them, and how to be present in their education in ways I couldn't before.

This program is not just helping me in is a changing for my family's future.

That is why today I am not only concerned, but I'm also frustrated because budgets are not only about numbers, but also about real families.

Today I am asking the console for three things.

First, increase the funding to share the school so they can continue providing high-quality education and support to students and families.

Second, increase the adult learning subsidy from 70 to 100 per month so students like me can keep up and rising writing metro pass for continue attending the school.

And third, protect infant social safety net program that families rely on and stay stable while working towards the better future.

When you invest in families like mine, you are not just in funding education.

You are changing lives.

As today, I truly listen to us to see and to stand with us.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

My name is Cindy Carval, and I am a student at BRIA public school charter school.

I am also a mother of three children.

Two that are in DCPS, one in elementary school, and the other one is in 3K.

And my third child is in university.

She's attending second-year university and she graduated from a high school in Washington, DC as well.

As a mother and as someone who has worked as a teacher before for nine years, I deeply understand the value of education.

I have even seen how education can open doors, change lights, and create opportunities not only for individuals, but for the entire family.

Even with my experience in education, continuing my own learning journey has not been easy.

Like many parents, I balance my responsibility at home while trying to improve my skills and create a better future for my children.

That is why BRIA has been an important part for me.

It provides the support structure and encouragement.

Especially my child in university.

I want to be able to guide them, communicate confidently, and continue setting an example that learning never stops.

I am here today to ask you to support students like me by increasing the adult education weight from 1.0 to 1.3, or providing a short-term grant to support these programs.

Increasing the adult transit subsidy from $70 to 100 so students can reliably get to school.

Thank you for your time and for supporting programs like BRIA that make a lasting difference.

I believe is not here.

Rwandy Soadogo, I believe is not here.

Both students of BRIA.

Jason.

Jason Garelik.

Excuse me, Chairman.

Antoine and Claudia are connected, but for some reason you cannot see them, but they are connected online.

Who is that again?

Antoine and Claudia.

I see my previous panel.

Don't see that.

I have an Antoine Palamba.

Yes.

Yeah, I don't like going backwards on the list, but especially when we have a long list.

But if he's logging on.

Can you hear me, please?

Please proceed.

Yes, uh, I am uh I am connected now.

Thank you so much.

I am Antoine Oroget Bolamba.

Please proceed.

Yeah, good morning, Council members.

My name is Antoine Bolamba, and I am a student at BRIA Public Charter School.

I am also a father of four boys, ages of 20, 18, 16, and 13.

As a widowed single father, my children are my greatest responsibility and my biggest motivation.

Education is a very important to me because it helps me grow and better support my family at BRIA.

I am a student.

These programs will help me build skills so I can find a stable career and provide a better future for my children.

Child development at BRIA is especially meaningful to me.

It allows me to understand how to better support children, not only my own, but also others in my community.

As a non-profit founder, focused on child protection.

This knowledge strengthens me, strengthens my work and my ability to serve families.

Because coming at coming to BRIA, I worked as a journalist before coming to BRIA.

I worked as a journalist in international broadcasting.

Now I am working hard to continue my education and create new opportunities for myself and for my children.

As a parent and a student, I ask that you continue to support programs like BRIA that help families like mine.

These programs are not just about education, they are about opportunity, financial stability, and hope for a better future.

Or providing a short-term grant to support these programs.

Nope.

So maybe what you should do is log off and come back on.

So let me go to the next witness, Peter Anderson.

Mr.

Anderson, are you here?

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon, Chairman.

And members of the committee.

My name is Peter Anderson, and I'm head of schools and CEO of Washington Latin Public Charter Schools, a classical education LEA serving 1,234 students in grades five through 12 across two facilities in wards four and five.

We recently completed our 20 year charter review with the DC PCSB, and we did so with a record that reflects what rigorous, joyful student centered education can look like when a school is given the freedom and the resources to do it well.

Washington Latin has spent two decades proving that classical education and diversity are not intention.

Our students who are from all eight wards of the city and include emerging multilingual learners, students with disabilities, and students from a wide variety of racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds are reading primary sources, wrestling with enduring ideas, and developing the habits of mind that will carry them through college and into meaningful lives.

That is a promise we made to the DC families when we opened our doors, and it is a promise we intend to keep.

This year we took a major step toward fulfilling that promise permanently.

After years of planning, fundraising, and sacrifice, we opened the permanent hope home of our Anna Julia Cooper site, a middle school and a new high school, giving our students the stable, dignified learning environment they've always deserved.

We took out a $50 million loan.

We raised nearly 12 million dollars in philanthropic support.

We did what charter schools do.

We found a way because no one was going to just hand us a building.

But I want this committee to understand what it costs to sustain that.

Washington Latin operates two full sites, two sets of utilities, two facilities, multiple buildings that require maintenance, repairs, and care.

All while inflation continues to drive up the cost of everything from construction to staffing.

Every dollar we spend keeping the lights on and the elevators running is a dollar we're not spending in a classroom.

And besides this new site, we've occupied our second street site for 12 years, actually for 13 years, and major repairs are upgrades to the roof to the HRAC system to our parts, other parts of the facility are in our imminent.

So when I hear that the mayor's proposed budget would freeze the charter school facilities allotment increase through FY30, I have to be honest with this committee.

That is not a neutral policy.

For an LEA like Washington Latin, carrying real debt, operating real buildings, serving real children, that freezes consequences.

Holding our facilities funding flat is not maintaining the status quo, is asking us to do more with less year after year, or the gap between what we need and what we receive continues to grow.

So my ask is to restore the 3.1% annual facilities allotment increase, ensure that every public school student of the city, regardless of which sector they attend, is funded fairly and fully through the UPSFF.

The children of Washington Latin barred against their future to build something worthy of them.

This council has the opportunity to make sure that that investment was not made in vain.

Thank you.

Yes.

Mr.

Gorillack, let's try you again.

Hi, can you hear me now?

Oh, it's a beautiful sound.

Thank you.

All right.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelssohn, uh, members of the committee and staff.

My name is Jason Gorlik, and I am a proud eighth grade ELA teacher at DC Prep, Edgewood Middle here in Ward 5.

Uh, I want to just say thank you for allowing me to testify in front of you all today.

Uh, before I begin, I want to say that I love my job like we all do, and a huge part of that is because of the kids I get to work with every single day.

Um, they are my why.

They are our students who are gonna be the future leaders of DC, of our country, of our world.

They are our future doctors, lawyers, uh, teachers, even future astronauts, as we've just seen a few weeks ago.

Um, I think about all the kid the all the good our kids are doing and will continue to do, and it's because of the resources and access they currently have.

Uh I think about Shamon, Sophia, and Justin, who have all grown as writers, as readers, as mathematicians, as scientists, historians, etc., uh, because of the rigorous, challenging education they receive.

Um, I choose to work here at DC Prep because our kids put in the work.

Um, a Stanford University study shows that a DC Prep education um equates to an additional 132 days of math and an additional 42 days of ELA instruction per year.

Um, our schools have been recognized from Empower K-12, both performance schools, they've been recognized by the DC Math Hub, and we send all our students to competitive high schools who are in eighth grade, and some of those high schools are charter schools.

Um, this is just some of the great work that's being done at our charter network and across different charter schools in DC.

I do want to say that I am grateful that our mayor has proposed this increase in their budget, but I am concerned that the mayor's proposed budget allocates this $2,000 more per student to DCPS students than to charter students.

Unfortunately, this just doesn't make sense and will inevitably cause more harm for our charter school students.

Our charter school students here in DC are about 47,000 students, and they're going to be negatively impacted if you know this budget is passed as is.

With this equitable funding, all students in DC will be able to continue going above and beyond inside and outside the classroom with equitable funding.

All students in DC have that access to a better education.

Education is access.

Please respectfully do not take away that access by not funding our charter school students.

I respectfully ask that you think of those 47,000 plus students who are making your decision, and I thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Gorlik, yeah.

Yes.

Thank you, Mr.

Gorlik.

Thank you, Chair Mendelssohn.

And I do have your statement.

Umrest.

She needs to accept, so we'll move on to Regina Summers.

Virginia Summers.

Oh, I thought you were in uh virtual.

Well, Europe.

Okay.

Blessings chairman, members of the committee and staff.

My name is Regenia Summers.

I am a Proud Award 8 small business owner.

I was raised in DC and attended Simon Elementary School and Hart Middle School and chose to send my daughter to both DCPS schools as well.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today about my daughter's positive educational experience and the ways in which I collaborate with local DCPS schools as a small business owner to support budding youth entrepreneurs.

When it was time to enroll my daughter in elementary school, I will admit I initially had some concerns about sending her to Simon due to the neighborhood perceptions.

Ultimately, I relied on my own positive memories as a former student and took that leap.

I am grateful that I did.

The teachers and staff at Simon were exceptional, especially during the challenges of COVID-19 pandemic.

They played a critical role in supporting students and families and preparing my daughter for a successful transit transition to HART Middle School.

During my daughter's first year at heart as a student returning to in-person learning after the pandemic, I felt the school could benefit from additional efforts to strengthening community and student belonging.

I shared these observations publicly.

And to my surprise, Principal Strickland reached out and invited me to the school.

Her leadership and openness were, I'm sorry, her leadership and openness were truly impactful.

She shared the international strategies that were in place to foster culture and connection amongst students.

As a result, my daughter thrived at heart, developed uh developed such a high pride in her school that she became a student ambassador, giving tours and guests to guests during open houses and community events.

While my daughter was a student at heart, I started my business EPU printing, which contributes to apparel and printing services in DCPS schools.

Through my professional and personal relationship through the schools, I had the opportunity to witness students in the Avid program.

Seeing the need for more opportunities and support for youth inspired inspired me to extend my impact.

I founded Never Black Down in 2017 with a commitment of creating opportunities for youth to build confidence, develop skills, and grow into leadership through entrepreneurship and self-advocacy.

Never Black Down provides outlets for youth to express self-confidence, dedication, and leadership ability through entrepreneurship.

Those hands-on work experiences are through my shop while assisting young students and building their own businesses.

In March, we hosted in partnership with Hart Middle School, our first youth entrepreneurship summit with over 40 students to register and pitch their businesses, sow their merchandise, and network with local youth entrepreneurs as well as adult entrepreneurs.

Through our programming, we extend learning and organizations like ours into youth and support them, their dreams, and they show up to Excel.

Thank you for continuing to support with our youth and the next generation of our local small business owners, providing funding and DC public, providing funding to DC public schools, and thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

Absolutely.

Thank you, Ms.

Summers, and thank you for being here in person.

Has Marion Forrest accepted yet?

Ms.

Forrest.

Hi, I'm sorry I missed that earlier call.

Um, but I'm happy to be here now and thank you for taking my testimony.

My name is Mary Ann Wood Forrest, and I'm a Ward 4 resident and a proud parent to a first and fourth grader at John Lewis Elementary School.

I'm here today to ask the DC Council allot additional funding to John Lewis's fiscal year 27 budget to ensure budget stability and prevent disruption of services and opportunities to our students and families.

First, I would like to thank the council for passing the School's First Amendment Act of 2025.

I hope that requiring DCPS to ensure school budgets increase by at least the change in the average cost of a teaching position each school year will, in the future, address some of the community-wide budget concerns shared here today.

As you likely know, John Lewis is a sought-after elementary school in Ward 4.

Since the pandemic, our enrollment has steadily increased from 427 in 2023 to 546 this year.

Given the nature of the whole harmless provisions in schools first in budgeting, despite these increases in enrollment, the given budget budget each year has made it challenging for our school administrators to provide consistent levels of services to our students.

When compared to other schools that are similar in terms of student body and location, budget numbers reflect some concerning patterns.

For instance, the current and projected enrollment of Truzdale, Tacoma, and Dorothy Height is less than John Lewis, but the budgets for Tacoma and Truesdale are greater than John Lewis.

Looking more closely at one of these schools, the projected enrollment of 173 students fewer than John Lewis, but their school is budgeted to receive 1.1 million more than John Lewis for the second year in a row.

While we acknowledge that schools who are losing enrollment may need more resources, we ask that John Lewis does not lose out in this process.

This year, our LSAT committee had to make difficult decisions and cuts in order to maintain our current classroom staff and model.

These decisions included cuts to key student support services, aftercare subsidies, student enrichment opportunities, and delayed the replacement of our ELA curriculum.

We are particularly concerned about the cuts to student support services, given the overall proposed cuts to DBH and the potential of losing our community-based mental health care provider.

If our Hellcrest social worker does fall victim to this DBH cuts without action by the council to give us additional funds, the school's ability to support the mental health needs of our students will be severely constrained.

As you can imagine, the health and wellness of the entire student population is an important, important facet of maintaining a stable and nurturing learning environment for our whole school community.

In addition to providing additional funds to ensure budget stability this year, we ask that in the future you also consider further amendments to the Hold Harmless Provisions of Schools First in Budgeting that would ensure that schools such as John Lewis, who are growing in enrollment year over year, experience budget stability and are able to provide the same level of services to our students each year.

Hold harmless should not feel like hold harmful to our school community.

Thank you.

I may come back to you, so don't disappear.

Thank you.

Martha Cruz.

Hi, good afternoon, Chairperson Mendelssohn and members of the committee.

My name is Marta Cruz.

I'm a DC native mother of three.

My oldest attend John Francis Education Campus, and my younger two are enrolled in the dual language program and Marie Reed.

I am a parent advocate with a campaign to reduce lead exposure and asthma, and currently serve on the Chancellors Parent Advisory Committee.

With a background in public health, I approach education from a holistic perspective, recognizing the social determinants that impact a child's ability to learn because, in my experience, the classroom is only part of the equation.

I'm here today to share my son's story and to urge the council to invest in the instructional strategies and teacher support that made his success possible.

It's the story of my second child who was born just before the pandemic.

Like many children in his cohort, he exhibited many of the challenges common among the children of that time.

He had an IAP through kindergarten where he exited the program because he successfully met his speech therapy goals, but he continued to struggle in reading and math.

By the middle of first grade, he was one and in some cases two grade levels behind, but his teachers remain committed to helping him succeed.

Through intensive small group instruction, focused phonics and decoding strategies and intentional support, reaching Spanish and English instruction, my son made extraordinary progress.

By the end of first grade, he had grown 222%.

That is right, 222% in ELA, far exceeding both benchmark and stretch goals.

This level of growth demonstrates what is possible when families, teachers, and school leaderships are given the tools and support necessary to succeed.

To ensure more students experience this success, I urge the council to make three investments in FY2027.

First, establish a teacher, a dedicated fund for teacher-led professional development, allowing educators to access high quality training outside of DCPS and receive reimbursement.

Second, funding structure, train the trainer model where high performing teachers with proven results are compensated to lead peer training sessions.

And finally, continue investing in evidence-based literacy intervention to support dual language learners.

I strongly believe that instruction must be responsive and individualized because my son's experience shows what's possible with the right support.

His growth did not happen by chance.

It was a result of targeted instruction, skilled teachers, and consistent communication.

And at this time, I would like to recognize those teachers, Miss Haley Barrows, who built a strong ALA Foundation, Miss Archie Tusso, who continued incorporating best ELA practice and gave us encouragement to continue going, and Miss Patricia Donati, who helped my son apply his English decoding skills to Spanish literacy.

These are the kinds of teachers our school need and must retain.

I'm deeply grateful to these teachers, and he is fortunate to have the same educators working with him this school year.

I'm here to tell you that these investments are not optional.

They are necessary to ensure that all students, especially those in the pandemic cohort, continue to receive the support that they need to reach grade level and beyond.

Thank you for your continued support and leadership.

Thank you, Miss Cruz.

And that's a great story about your son.

Umita Colbert.

I believe it's not here, Dr.

Kofi Anuma.

I believe it's not here, Kelly Uclen is sitting at the table.

Good afternoon, uh Chair Person Middlesous, and it's good to see you again.

My name is Kelly Ukun, and I'm a teacher at Mundo Verde PCS Ward 5.

I'm a former Empower Ed Fellow, which you probably remember me, but I'm currently the president of DC Acts, the charter school union in DC established in 2019.

Our union now represents over 600 charter educators and staff who serve thousands of students across the city.

And those students, as you know, make up about half of the DC public school's population.

This is a preview of what's going to come next.

I want to start out by telling you what the board budget forecast looks like on the ground.

I've been at Moon of Verde for eight years, but for the past four years, our HVAC system has been on the lamb.

Right before spring break, it broke down.

Um they passed it together when we returned.

We walked into a building that was impacted by a lot of, you know, enormous water in the staff lounge at one of our campuses, and it was caused by a system that can no longer sustain the needs of the school.

It's uh cold on one side of the building, it's hot on the other, and some places don't even have either.

So this is not the environment for learning that anyone wants for the kids.

So, although our school is committed to fixing it, like many charter schools, they'll have to do that and build that cost into an already strained operational budget.

So their choice was either fix it, fix the building, fix the problem, or support students.

And that is not a choice that any public school should have to make.

And yet, this is exactly what the inequitable funding forces many charter schools to do.

Charter schools in DCPS serve roughly the same number of students as you know.

You already know the funding gap that a lot of people have come and testified about.

What I'm talking about today is the impact as well.

The gap shows up in our classrooms and fewer supports for staff and students, delayed repairs to buildings, and those are the buildings that we have to walk into every day with our students.

This is not accidental, it's about not prioritizing the funding parity and the district maintaining a system where charter schools absorb the costs that DCPS does not.

So our ask is straightforward, you know, fund the facilities, increase the increase the uh protected tube 3.1, move towards parity by ensuring that all funding flows through the UPSF and treats all public school students the same.

Because right now, equity depends on a system and not the student.

And that has to change.

Another issue is that our charter school is still organizing, and we send our love and support to breakthrough Montessori, Ward 5, who's negotiating their first labor contract.

But they are the fourth school in two years that DCX has helped organize.

This is another conversation that we probably need to have.

Through DCX now, we are we are tailor-making, we are we are tailor-making res um bargaining agreements at charter schools that are responsive to the LEAs and the students and communities that they serve.

So this broader conversation is an ask from us.

I believe it's time now that we have a conversation between the DC Council, DCPS, I'm sorry, DC Council, Aussie about what it looks like to have organized charter schools with bargaining agreements and what that means for funding.

We are seeking a audience with you, a conversation about that.

We have bargaining agreements that we would like to engage with the council and with Aussie and with the with the policymakers here about what it means for charter schools that are organized to sit and have budget conversations on our own.

Thank you for your time.

Uh thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

And the last person I have here is County Julian.

They're going to be back at the end.

Yeah.

Oh, they're going to be at the end.

And you're going to remind me there at the end.

Um, I have just uh questions for a couple of people.

So um Miss Akoon, is that the correct way to pronounce your name?

Yes, you can call me Kelly though.

Kelly is fine.

I can, but we're at a hearing.

So I'm gonna call you Miss Akun.

Okay.

Um would be happy to meet with you, uh, which I think is what I heard you ask at the end.

Yes.

And just reach out to my office.

Um, and um my schedule is a little tight, but would be happy to meet with you.

Um actually that may be all I have to say to you.

Okay.

But thank you for your testimony.

Ms.

Forrest.

Thank you.

Are you still here?

Yes.

So um I read a statement by someone else from uh John Lewis.

Julia Lindfors.

Yes.

Whom you should know because you're all at John Lewis.

Uh so I am going to ask the Chancellor about uh the funding for John Lewis.

I will note this.

The um according to our analysis with the Schools First in Budgeting Act, uh John Lewis was underfunded, uh, but not by the amount that your testimony uh speaks to.

Schools first in budgeting is intended to bring stability to school budgets.

Uh it's not intended to deal with the equity issue.

Uh, we're still trying to figure out how we can deal with the equity issue.

I will say that for schools with high at-risk populations, we have additional funding for it's called the at-risk concentration rate, which is one level for schools 40 percent or more students at risk and a higher funding weight for schools 70 percent or higher at risk population, uh, which I think does would not uh help John Lewis.

The um, although I say that too quickly, I don't know if it would, but in any event, um what we have seen is before we adopted schools first in budgeting, as many as roughly 80 percent of the schools were dealing with funding cuts every spring.

The chancellor would give the schools their budgets.

And uh, we saw that these uh funding cuts made no sense.

Schools were growing in enrollment and having their budgets cut.

Uh some schools were actually losing enrollment and having their budgets increased, uh that there was a high number of schools with uh high at-risk population that were seeing cuts in their budgets.

And uh, as I said, about 80 percent.

Uh this year it's uh less than 20 percent.

In fact, I think it's 20 schools out of 11.

Uh so we've made progress in terms of stability.

Uh, but still, the issue that you bring up where you and your colleague with her statement say that uh similar schools with similar demographics on a per pupil basis are being funded very differently is of concern.

And so it is something I will discuss with the chancellor.

Of course, he may throw it back at me about schools first, but I believe that stability is important first.

So I just wanted to say that.

I don't know if you want to say anything in response.

No, I appreciate that.

And I don't want it to be a comparison game between us and those schools.

Everyone should be lifted together, but just as a point of difference as we looked at our budget and the surrounding schools.

Thank you.

Yes.

So thank you for your testimony.

Thank you, all of you for your testimony, especially those of you who are here in person.

I'm going to continue.

Carly Fisherow.

Shannon Hodge, CEO of KIP DC Public Schools.

Sanjay Mitchell.

Sarah Buckley.

Kristen Sinclair.

Online.

Teresa Coates, Chief External Affairs Officer, DC Prep.

I said Teresa.

It might be pronounced TIRSA.

Jose Sousa.

Can they get Justin Lessick, Executive Director of Sojourner Truth Public Charter School?

Beth Perry.

Pat Brantley, CEO of Friendship Public Charter School.

Who?

Good afternoon.

Don't start.

Whoever said that.

Do you need the stone?

Yeah.

Okay.

Scott Marcus.

Last name is Scott Marcus.

Yeah.

So the name now is the Alca online.

So I'm not.

Elena Harper.

Don't see her.

Megan Fowler.

Mom, she's keep testing testified.

Laina Cox, head of school, Capital City Public Charter School.

Greg Martin.

Online.

Looks like it's high school music and band director, Capital City Public Charter School.

Chris Avila.

Belisia Reeves, Tech Director of Two Rivers Public Charter School.

I think I'll stop right there.

So Carly Fisherow, I called, and I don't believe is here.

Shannon Hodge is online.

Ms.

Hodge, you're up.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson and Council members.

My name is Shannon Hodge, and I'm the CEO of KIP DC Public Schools, where 1,400 teachers, staff, and leaders educate and support over 7,000 students across campuses and wards two, five, seven, and eight.

We are navigating a year unlike most.

Our educators and students have shown extraordinary resilience in the face of federal funding threats, public safety, public safety crises, and uncertainty across our communities.

That resilience makes the argument I'm here to make more urgent, not less.

The proposed FY27 budget widens a growing incoherence between how this city holds charter schools accountable and how it funds us.

Charter schools in the district operate under a rigorous public accountability system.

Every five years we face an existential review based almost entirely on performance.

We can lose our charters and face closure based on that performance.

In fact, KIP DC just completed a 25-year charter review, a tough process we welcomed.

That public accountability is a key part of the bargain that brought charters to the city.

So too is equitable funding.

Through hearings and direct comparisons, this council has made clear what it expects from charter schools.

Strong academic outcomes, high teacher retention, stable school leadership, and reduced chronic absenteeism.

Those are the right measures.

We accept them.

The contradiction in this budget is plain.

The proposed budget moves $96 million in cost for DCPS outside the funding formula for utilities, teacher bonuses, and early stages.

Charter students are funded at $2,000 less per student for basic school operations.

Meeting the expectations the city sets for us requires resources.

Improving student outcomes, increasing teacher retention, reducing chronic absenteeism, and ensuring stable school leadership require the ability to pay teachers competitively, invest in professional development, and plan beyond a single budget year.

Equitable funding is not the ceiling of what we need, it is the floor.

The council has heard a version of this argument for several years.

Yet the pattern of moving spending off formula has continued.

We are grateful for the city's continued commitment to public education and for the 2.55% funding formula increase the mayor has proposed.

My ask is not just to fix this budget, but to commit to resolving it structurally so that charter school leaders can stop spending their Aprils testifying and start spinning them with their students.

To do that, the council should route all education funding through the funding formula and maintain the 3.1% annual increase to the charter facilities allotment.

Thank you for your time and consideration, and I welcome your questions.

Did you submit it or would you?

I did submit it this this afternoon, but we can make sure you get it directly.

Great, thank you.

Uh Sanjay Mitchell, I believe, is in person.

Yes.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson and members of council.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

My name is Sanjay Mitchell, and I am the executive director of Cesar Chavez Public Charter School for Public Policy located in the Parkside Community in Ward 7.

Our school serves students in grades 6 through 12.

We enroll just over 350 students, approximately 84% of whom identify as African American or Black, and 11% as Hispanic.

Three out of four for our scholars are designated at risk.

One in five are students with learning differences, and we serve a growing population of English language learners, currently at 34 students.

I share this context because it matters as we consider the fiscal year 27 budget.

While we appreciate the proposed 2.55% increase to the UPSF as a starting point, the overall FY27 budget creates real challenges for schools like ours.

Approximately 96 million is being allocated outside of the funding formula to cover items such as DCPS utilities and teacher incentives, funds that do not extend to charter schools.

That results in an estimated 2,000 per student gap for schools like ours.

That gap shows up in real daily decisions.

It means choosing between covering rising utility costs or investing in instruction.

It means working to retain strong teachers while also maintaining aging building.

Every dollar directed towards basic operational needs is a dollar that cannot go directly into our classrooms.

The facilities challenge is especially urgent.

We are responsible for an aging building, including an HVAC system that may cost approximately a million dollars to replace.

Even routine expenses continue to rise.

This past winter, a single snowstorm cost us more than 25,000 in snow removal alone.

These are not exceptional costs.

They are the predictable burden of maintaining older infrastructure with fewer predictable resources while being held to the same standard of safety and quality as any other public school in the district.

I therefore bring three specific requests before the council today.

One, protect the 2.5% increase to the UPSFF as a floor, not a ceiling.

Protect the 3.1% annual facilities increase so that charter schools can plan for and manage real cost, and three, route more funding through the UPSFF so that dollars reach all students equitably, regardless of school or sector.

These are not requests for special treatment, they are requests for fairness.

Despite the funding gap, our students are achieving strong outcomes, and those results make the case for what equitable investments could unlock.

Unlock.

These outcomes are being achieved despite the funding gap, not because our resources are adequate.

So imagine what becomes possible when they are.

I want to close with a moment that have stayed with me since last year's budget season.

During a budget briefing, one of our eighth grade scholars walked into my office, like many 13-year-olds, he began asking questions about what he's what he overheard.

He did not understand a bigger picture, but what he understood was that there's inequitable funding in terms of how his school is looked at compared to schools around his neighborhood.

Shava scholars are paying attention to those to these differences earlier and earlier.

They say the growth they see the growing gap in funding and resources across the city, and they're asking honest questions about why it exists.

The answer cannot be that a child's opportunities depend on which school they attend.

The answer must be that we, as a city, will ensure equitable and sustainable funding for every public school student, regardless of school type or sector.

We stand ready to work with you collaboratively and thank you for your time, your partnership, and your continued commitment to our students.

Thank you, Mr.

Mitchell.

Sarah Buckley, who I believe is online.

Yes.

Hello, and thank you, Chairman Mendelssohn.

I'm Sarah Buckley, a parent of two and a member of the PTA at Amadon Bowen Elementary School.

I first want to thank the mayor's office and council for their support for the current uniform per student funding formula.

The formula with its targeted support for important school needs has greatly helped Amadon Bowen meet student needs and serve our community more effectively over the past few years.

Amadon Bowen has a high at-risk population, 57%, a high special needs population, 28%, and a growing ELL population.

The funding formula has helped us meet those needs by funding more teacher aids and staff to support our special needs classrooms, instructional aids, and behavior support, even as our enrollment has grown significantly.

That enrollment growth is a testament to the school culture that our leadership has developed and which these funds have facilitated because our growth has come entirely from inboundary families who are choosing Amadon and choosing to stay because we have been better able to meet our community's needs.

Of course, our school is not without its challenges, and that enrollment growth is also one of those challenges.

In school year 2022 to 23, we had 336 students at enrollment audit.

This year we have 446, 51 above our projected enrollment last budget season, and 27 students above our maximum programmatic capacity according to the DME.

In terms of classroom space, we are at capacity.

Next year we will need to take a classroom from Food Prints, a cherished program for our students to have enough classroom space.

DCPS has audited our building and agrees that by school year 2028 to 29, we will need to find auxiliary space to accommodate our enrollment.

This highlights an ongoing problem for Amadon Bowen as well as a path to a solution.

As this committee has heard from us before, we are in need of a swing space for our school modernization that has now been delayed by four years to school year 2023, or sorry, 2031, after DCPS was unable to identify any alternatives to sending our students three and a half miles away across the city to Meyer Elementary during our renovation.

For the last three years, we have urged DCPS to fund a modular campus in Southwest to serve as our swing space.

There is a 90,000 square foot DPR field immediately behind our school and undeveloped lots near the waterfront metro that we have proposed as spaces.

We've been cautioned that a modular campus would require 15 to 18 million dollars and more than a year to build, but that investment is necessary.

There are no swing uh brick and mortar swing spaces available in all of Ward 6 and no swing spaces within a reasonable commute outside of Ward 6 that could accommodate our population.

We are an overwhelmingly in-boundary bike and walk to school community, which often relies on family and caregivers in the neighborhood and at nearby Jefferson Middle School for pickup and drop-off support.

So, to solve for both our space constraints and swing space problems, we urge DCPS to invest in trailers to accommodate our enrollment growth in the next few years, which can then be expanded to serve as a swing space for our delayed modernization.

I thank you for your time, and we hope that DCPS will make a plan and an investment now to provide the best and most efficient solution for these problems.

Thank you, Miss Buckley.

And I know that your school parents have been working with uh councilmember Allen, who's I've really been sort of looking to him to take the lead on this issue.

I don't have a copy of your statement.

If you as I mentioned it earlier this morning.

All right, so we'll look for it.

Thank you.

That would be helpful.

Uh Kristen Sinclair.

Hi.

Good afternoon, uh Chairman.

Thank you for having me here today.

My name is Kristen Sinclair, I'm a Ward for resident and another John Lewis parent.

And I'm also a member of the LSAT.

And I heard your comments on Mary Ann's testimony and Julia's statement.

So I'm gonna skip around a little bit in my testimony to focus on some new information that you might not have heard before.

So one thing I just want to emphasize is I think some of the other schools in our uh cluster who have much lower populations but significantly higher budgets.

Um there are some discrepancies in student population.

They're not exactly the same, but to us having a population that's 200 and students less, but a budget that's a million to 1.5 million dollars higher, where it seems a little uh fishy to us.

Um and we want to be clear that we reject sort of any competition for funds between John Lewis and our neighborhood schools and recognize that schools who are losing enrollment or face other challenges absolutely may need more resources.

Um, we just simply ask that John Lewis not lose out in the process.

So I wanted just to say a little bit more specifically about some of the difficult decisions that our LSAT had to make.

Um, essentially, in order to maintain our current um classroom teachers and aides, um, we had to really pinch pennies and cut a lot of other services from the school.

Uh so for example, our school counselor retired, um, and so we chose not to fill that position again in order to make sure to prioritize classroom teachers and aides.

Um as a former public school counselor myself and someone whose children sometimes benefit from those kinds of services.

I'm really concerned about this cut, given the product cuts to DBH and the potential of losing our community-based provider, as you know, we won't know if we're gonna lose them for a little bit.

Um but if we lose our Hillcrest social worker and we've had to cut our school counselor position in order to maintain um classroom teachers, right?

It would be very difficult for the school to support the mental health needs of general ed students.

Um, some other decisions we made.

We also delayed the replacement of our 10-year-old ELA curriculum, one that many other elementary schools have been able to update.

Our funds for supplies, enrichment opportunities, other services, including technology are extremely limited.

Um I just wanted to reiterate what Marianne said that I think you know, we're hoping that you can consider further amendments to schools first in budgeting that would ensure that schools such as John Lewis experience budget stability and consistency of services, hold harmless really ends up feeling like hold harmful to our school community, and I know that this has happened in previous years as well.

And I couldn't, I was thinking as I was putting together this testimony, um, sort of why are we consistently losing out under schools first and more importantly, how many other growing schools across the district are also losing out, um, and what can we do to support them as well.

So thank you very much for your time.

I also know that you don't have a copy yet of my testimony, but I'll send that over right away.

Uh yes, please do.

So when you mentioned updating the curriculum, how much does that cost?

About 50,000.

55.

I would want to double check with administrators on that.

Sure.

And you mentioned some other what we call MPS costs, non-personal services, uh like uh data, technology.

Yeah, I think like our classroom, the the lines for supplies is just like pretty bare bones in terms of custodial and classroom supplies, nothing beyond that.

We were able to put in our budget just in order to maintain our classroom teachers.

So if you're going to submit your statement, maybe you could update it with some dollars.

I mean, it's not critical, but it would be uh useful to know.

Yeah, absolutely.

I can do that.

All right, thank you.

Yep.

Um Tiersa Coates.

Good afternoon, Chairperson Mendelson.

My name is Tirsa Coates, and I serve as the Chief External Affairs Officer at DC Prep.

Uh, equity has always been central to who I am.

It's been reflected in my experiences as a former ANC commissioner, a public servant, and most personally, when I became an adoptive parent to two children from DC's foster care system.

Like any parent, I wanted the very best for my children.

And DC Prep gave them exactly that.

A strong education, the wraparound supports they needed to be ready to learn in a community that cared about them and held them to high standards for the kind of citizens they would become.

That meant full-time nurses and mental health clinicians who could support the whole child, not just their academics.

From one of my children, it also meant special education support to help them learn and grow on their own terms.

My family benefited firsthand from those investments.

And today I have the privilege of working at DC Prep to help ensure more children have access to those same opportunities.

I'm here because I'm worried that that may not continue to be the case.

The UPSFF is supposed to ensure that all public schools receive resources equitably, and I appreciate that the mayor has proposed a 2.55% increase to the per student funding formula.

However, there are approximately $96 million in costs being funded outside of UPS FF exclusively for DCPS, and that means that each charter school student will receive about $2,000 less than DCPS students for their education.

Those aren't just numbers on a spreadsheet to help us temporarily meet the financial obligations of today.

Those funding gaps could potentially represent a perpetual disparity in teachers' supports, programs, and access.

Nearly half of DC's public school students are going to feel the difference and bear the brunt of any decision that falls short of equality.

We should be proud that DC has the fairest school funding model in the country, and I hope we'll commit to protecting it by making sure that all funding goes through the UPSFF so that every public school student gets the same opportunity to reach their full potential.

Let's also maintain funding for school-based mental health clinicians and special education so that our children and children like mine have the resources they need to develop and grow.

Thank you very much for listening and thank you for the work that you do on behalf of DC's children.

Thank you, Ms.

Coates.

And I do have your statement, so thank you.

Jose Sousa, I believe, is not here.

Justin Lessick, executive director of Sojournal Truth.

Did we we may have lost him?

Justin Lessick.

Hey, good afternoon.

Are you able to hear me?

Yes, we can.

All right, wonderful.

Good afternoon, Chairman Mendelson and other members of council.

My name is Justin Lessig.

I'm the executive director and a teacher.

Actually, I'm in class right now.

You can probably see some of my students behind me.

At the uh at so Journal Truth Public Charter School in Ward 5.

We are a growing school, and we currently serve about 400 students in grade six through 12.

We are proud to be part of DC's 30 year charter school legacy and the citywide movement that has expanded opportunity and choice for families across DC.

We know the charter schools serve nearly half of all public school students in the district, and that charters offer possibilities in programming that would not be possible otherwise.

So Journal Truth, for example, is the district's first and only public Montessori Middle and High School, and so, like many other charters, offers families something different.

Truth and our Montessori program for grade six through 12 would not exist without a strong well-funded charter sector.

We appreciate Mayor Bowser's 2.55% increase to the UPS FF for fiscal year 27.

Equitable local funding through the UPSFF remains our most urgent priority, however.

Data shows that the proposed budget directs about $96 million in operating funding to DCPS outside of the UPSFF, which shortchanges students at charter schools like Truth by about $2,000 per pupil.

Even for a small school like us, that means that students at Sojournal Truth are getting over $900,000 less than their peers in DCPS schools.

When charter facilities funded, DCPS capital funding are included in the calculation, it's a difference of over $9,000 per student.

As a charter school, we pay PEPCO bills, Washington gas bills, DC water bills out of our UPS FF.

DCPS fixed costs, however, have been absorbed by the DGS budgets that they don't need their UPS FF.

DCPS is able to provide its top teachers with over $25 million in impact bonuses that come outside of the UPS FF, but as a charter school, I would have to use UPSF funds if I wanted to provide similar bonuses.

All public schools, both DCPS and public charter, should be equitably and transparently funded through the UPSFF.

We valued it the Deputy Mayor of Education's role to promote, coordinate, and oversee collaborative efforts among district agencies.

We've seen the positive effects of programs like Safe Passage, DC School Connect, and the Task Force for Everyday Counts, and we're grateful for the DME's work there.

At times, however, there have been some gaps in coordination, and it's felt like the nearly 50% of district students attending charters have sometimes been an afterthought.

This was felt particularly acutely during the year's winter storm when emergency street clearing was done for DCPS schools, but not for charter schools like Truth.

Once again, we were left to pay out of our UPSFF for something that the city did manage differently for the 50% of students attending DCPS schools.

So Journal of Truth is grateful for the State Board of Ed's increased engagement with charters over this past year.

Representation on the task force looking at graduation requirements was appreciated, as well as engagement through the Educator Excellence Committee and participation in upcoming standards reviews.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today, and thank you again to all members of council for your ongoing support.

Thank you, Mr.

Lessick.

Beth Perry, I believe, is not here.

Your Beth Perry.

Okay.

Okay.

Good afternoon.

My name is Beth Perry.

I work at DCPS High School.

I'm a DC resident and the mother of two DCPS graduates, both social workers in DC.