Cesar Chavez school

My day began with a nice breakfast at a fancy downtown hotel, talking

to a foundation program officer about a project that he is planning. I

camped out in the lobby to do some work, and then Metro’d to the Cesar

Chavez Charter High School for Public Policy. It seems like fun to go

there. Two hundred kids are tightly packed into improvised classrooms

in a former office building. There’s a sense that they are helping to

create something idiosyncratic and important. Students participate heavily

in planning the service projects that are central to the curriculum, so

their voice matters. At the same time, discipline is strict: if you arrive

one second late, you go straight to detention. As we walked through the

halls, the principal had something specific to say to practically every

kid she met: "We set up SAT classes for you. Oh, you can’t do them

because you’re in the Corcoran art program. OK, we’ll figure out an alternative."

The neighborhood, near U Street, is full of charter schools—I suspect

because the rent is fairly low and Metro connections are good. It’s a

transitional neighborhood, traditionally African American and working

class, but now with quite a few White yuppies. I was thinking about the

problems and advantages of gentrification when I passed workers restoring

a beautiful row house. Outside the next-door house, an African American

woman stood and shouted at them: "White man already has everything!"

As an illustration, it was too perfect.