Controversial School Pairing Plan Allegedly Aimed for Equality, Sparks Strong Opposition
Maury Elementary School, located in Alexandria, has undergone a remarkable transformation over the past decade. Carolyn Albert Garvey, who became the principal in 2009, is credited for this transformation, earning accolades for her leadership and recruiting young, talented teachers. As a result, Maury has become one of the highest achieving and most desirable elementary schools in the area.
In contrast, Miner Elementary, just three blocks away, has not shared Maury's trajectory. The school remains majority Black, majority low-income, and struggles academically. In recent years, Washington officials have proposed pairing Maury and Miner into two grade-band campuses as a strategy to desegregate and balance enrollment.
The proposal to merge the schools has sparked controversy, particularly among parents at Maury. Middle-income, college-educated families, like Paige Kowalski, chose to stay at Maury and poured energy and money into the school, leading to its popularity and families buying homes just to be in its attendance zone. However, the proposal has exposed racial and socioeconomic biases among some parents at Maury, with concerns about walking farther with small kids, doubts about the merged school's performance, and fears that wealthier families might leave the school.
Some Miner parents feel attacked by the proposal, assuming the city cares more about wealthier families' opinions. A pro-pairing petition circulated by Miner parent Jeff Giertz garnered 338 signatures, while an opposing petition with about 260 signatures raised questions about the proposal's details and potential impact on teachers and facilities.
The deputy mayor for education, Paul Kihn, was responsible for initial outreach on the proposal and tasked with drafting a recommendation based on community feedback. Kihn's team took care not to frame the proposal as their preference, instead presenting it as an idea that could be pursued if the community wanted to work together.
DCPS-which would be responsible for filling in the many blanks in the plan if the mayor accepted a recommendation to pair the schools-was missing from the conversation entirely during the boundary study process. The district's second-ever 'boundary study' did not recommend going ahead with a pairing, but directed the district to work with leadership of both schools 'to determine how to structure a community working group that could explore a potential Maury-Miner pairing' by March of 2027.
Miner's principal, Lawrence Dance, was abruptly removed for reasons never made clear, according to school staff and parents. Between 2019 and 2023, Miner cycled through about a half-dozen principals or interim administrators and retained 70% of teachers in the 2023-24 academic school year, compared to 92% at Maury.
Two years later, some Miner parents see signs the district is serious about improving the school, with the appointment of a new principal, Carrie Broquard, who led one of the district's highest performing elementaries, Lafayette, for about a decade. Whether the proposed pairing will move forward remains to be seen, but parents at both schools who believe diversity can go hand-in-hand with educational quality could step into the void and drive the idea of pairing the schools forward.
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