# Richmond Public Schools

Richmond Public Schools is a public school district located in the independent city of Richmond, Virginia. It is occasionally described locally as Richmond City Public Schools to emphasize its connection to the independent city rather than the Richmond-Petersburg region at large or the rural Richmond County, Virginia.

## Administration
### Superintendent

The superintendent is Jason Kamras, who was also the 2005 United States National Teacher of the Year.

### School board members

The school district is governed by an elected school board, with one member from each of nine districts. The current Members (2023) are:
| 1 | Elizabeth Doerr |
| 2 | Mariah White |
| 3 | Kenya Gibson |
| 4 | Jonathan Young |
| 5 | Stephanie Rizzi, Chair |
| 6 | Dr. Shonda Harris-Muhammed |
| 7 | Cheryl Burke, Vice Chair |
| 8 | Dawn Page |
| 9 | Nicole Jones |

## Schools
### High schools

| Name | Address |
| Armstrong High School | 2300 Cool Lane, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| Huguenot High School | 7945 Forest Hill Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| Thomas Jefferson High School | 4100 W. Grace Street, Richmond, Virginia 23230 |
| John Marshall High School | 4225 Old Brook Road, Richmond, Virginia 23227 |
| Open High School | 600 S. Pine Street, Richmond, Virginia 23220 |
| Richmond Community High School | 201 East Brookland Park Boulevard, Richmond, Virginia 23222 |
| Richmond High School for the Arts | 4314 Crutchfield Street, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |

### Middle schools

| Name | Address |
| Albert Hill Middle School | 3400 Patterson Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23221 |
| Dogwood Middle School | 1701 Floyd Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23220 |
| Lucille M. Brown Middle School | 6300 Jahnke Road, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School | 1000 Mosby Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| River City Middle School | 6300 Hull Street Road N, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| Thomas C. Boushall Middle School | 3400 Hopkins Road, Richmond, Virginia 23234 |
| Thomas H. Henderson Middle School | 4319 Old Brook Road, Richmond, Virginia 23227 |

### Elementary schools

| Name | Address |
| Barack Obama Elementary School (formerly J. E. B. Stuart Elementary School) | 3101 Fendall Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23222 |
| Bellevue Elementary School | 2301 E Grace Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| Broad Rock Elementary School | 4615 Ferguson Lane, Richmond, Virginia 23234 |
| Cardinal Elementary School | 1745 Catalina Drive, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| Chimborazo Elementary School | 3000 E Marshall Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| Elizabeth D. Redd Elementary School | 5601 Jahnke Road, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| Fairfield Court Elementary School | 2510 Phaup Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| Frances W. McClenney Elementary School | 3817 Chamberlayne Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23227 |
| G.H. Reid Elementary School | 1301 Whitehead Road, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| George W. Carver Elementary School | 1110 W Leigh Street, Richmond, Virginia 23220 |
| Henry L. Marsh, III Elementary School | 813 N 28th Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |
| J.B. Fisher Elementary School | 3701 Garden Road, Richmond, Virginia 23235 |
| J.H. Blackwell Elementary School | 300 E 15th Street, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| J.L. Francis Elementary School | 5146 Snead Road, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| Lois Harrison-Jones Elementary School | 3021 Maplewood Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23221 |
| Linwood Holton Elementary School | 1600 W Laburnum Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23227 |
| Mary Munford Elementary School (formerly PBS Kids Mary Munford until 2013) | 211 Westmoreland Street, Richmond, Virginia 23226 |
| Miles J. Jones Elementary School | 200 Beaufont Hills Drive, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| Oak Grove-Bellemeade Elementary School | 2409 Webber Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| Overby-Sheppard Elementary School | 2300 1st Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23222 |
| Southampton Elementary School | 3333 Cheverly Road, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| Swansboro Elementary School | 3160 Midlothian Turnpike, Richmond, Virginia 23224 |
| Westover Hills Elementary School | 1211 Jahnke Road, Richmond, Virginia 23225 |
| William Fox Elementary School | 2300 Hanover Avenue, Richmond, Virginia 23220 |
| Woodville Elementary School | 2000 N 28th Street, Richmond, Virginia 23223 |

### Specialty schools

* Amelia Street School
* Franklin Military Academy – first public military school in the nation, serves grades 6-12
* Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts
* Richmond Adult Technical Center
* Richmond Alternative School
* Richmond Career Education and Employment Academy
* Richmond Technical Center
* Richmond Virtual Academy
* Virgie Binford Education Center
Maggie L. Walker Governor's School for Government and International Studies is a regional magnet school to which RPS contributes students, located directly between the Virginia Commonwealth University and Virginia Union University campuses.

## History

Richmond did not have public schools during much of the 19th century, only private institutions funded by user fees or charities. From 1906 until 1962, the city of Richmond segregated its public schools by race, and schools serving African American Virginians received less funding and poorer facilities, which led in part to the U.S. Supreme Court's two decisions in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. Defiance of those decisions by the Commonwealth of Virginia led to the Massive Resistance crisis in the state which lasted more than a decade. One of the people involved in eventual peaceful desegregation of Richmond's public schools was Eleanor P. Sheppard, who began her public involvement with the Parent-Teacher Association of her children's school in the Ginter Park neighborhood. In 1954, "Mrs. Sheppard" became the first woman elected to the Richmond City Council, and she became the city's first female mayor in 1962, and served in the Virginia General Assembly for a decade. The Richmond School Board acknowledged the crisis in part by naming an elementary school to honor her and one of the school district's first principals of African American descent, Overby-Sheppard Elementary School.
The Richmond school district partly resolved the Massive Resistance crisis in its jurisdiction by eliminating racial terminology from this school district's official reports in 1962. Another important person in resolving the crisis was Virginia native and Richmond lawyer Lewis F. Powell Jr., who served as Chairman of the Richmond School Board from 1952 until 1961. Powell did not take any part in his law firm's representation of Prince Edward County, Virginia in Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, which became one of the five cases decided under the caption Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. The Richmond School Board also lacked authority at the time to force integration, since beginning in 1958, the state government assumed control over attendance policies. Powell later became president of the American Bar Association and an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

## Academic struggles and improvements

In October 2009, the Richmond Times-Dispatch printed an editorial entitled "Dropping In," briefly outlining a program meant to reduce the number of high school dropouts in Richmond's public school system. In this article it was revealed that Richmond's dropout rate was "hovering around 15 percent". It was also stated on the Richmond Public Schools' website that the four-year-cohort dropout rate was 14.8 percent for the 2005-2009 cohort, declined from its 16.2 percent rate for 2004–2008.
While the percentage is declining, dropout and late graduation rates are still an issue. In October 2009 in a News Release about Richmond Public Schools, it is stated that "the latest data for students in the 2005-2009 cohort indicate that nearly 69 percent (68.7) of Richmond's students graduated on time." This is an increase from the 2004-2008 cohort rate of 65.8 percent and it is well below the state average of 83.2 percent.

### Dropout Prevention Initiative

While high dropout rates in the school system are a problem, positive action is being taken, as of 2009. On October 21, 2009, the superintendent of Richmond City Public Schools, Yvonne W. Brandon, unveiled a plan called "Dropout Prevention Initiative" (DPI). The objective of this program is to continue to decrease the school system's dropout rate.
There are a few objectives to the DPI. The first is to find high school dropouts and convince them to return to high school to graduate through mentoring programs, Individual Learning Plans (ILP), and partnerships with others in the community. These "others" include higher education institutions, elected officials, as well faith-based and community-based organizations. One of the most appealing aspects of the DPI is that it requires no additional funding and is solely a redistribution of resources.
There is a district-wide mentoring program as a part of DPI that encourages Richmond Public Schools employees and students to serve as mentors once the recovered students return to school. There are also mentors provided by the higher educational institutions and the faith- and community-based organizations with which the DPI has partnerships.
A unique aspect of this program is that recovery specialists within the DPI literally walk door-to-door to the homes of students who have dropped out to talk with them about and encourage the possibility of returning to school. Students returning to school are assisted by the DPI Intake Counselors, who work with recovered students to help the student re-adjust to being in school and receive an ILP. The ILP is, as stated by the Richmond Public Schools website, "an online educational plan for students that helps pair students' career goals with academic and career and technical courses needed to accomplish their future interests".
The program also recognizes at-risk students and works on preventing student dropouts, rather than only trying to reverse it. Richmond Public Schools have implemented "Extensive Mandatory Professional Development" for staff on how to effectively identify and help at-risk students. There is also a new "Get In – Stay in" media campaign on the radio and television to help encourage attendance among students.