A student at Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn was struck and killed Tuesday by a Loudoun County Public Schools maintenance truck, according to the sheriff’s office.
A student at Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn, Virginia, was struck and killed Tuesday morning by a Loudoun County Public Schools maintenance truck, according to the county sheriff’s office.
The driver, a school system employee, struck and killed 20-year-old Calina Yu while she was on her way to school, a spokesperson for the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office told WTOP.
The crash happened at around 9:13 a.m. at the intersection of Claiborne Parkway and Portsmouth Boulevard, just steps away from the high school. The driver of the school maintenance vehicle stayed at the scene of the crash and spoke to detectives, the sheriff’s office said in a news release.
WTOP has reached out to Stone Bridge High officials for comment.
The sheriff’s office is asking anyone who saw the crash or has any relevant information to contact detective Mark Lotz at 703-771-1021. Those who wish to remain anonymous can call Loudoun County Crime Solvers at 703-777-1919 or submit a tip through the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office app.
A map of the area where the crash occurred is below:
(Courtesy Google Maps)
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Unpaid school lunch debt is becoming a primary issue in Loudoun County Public schools as food insecurity continues to impact the D.C. area.
Unpaid school lunch debt is becoming a primary issue in Loudoun County Public Schools as food insecurity continues to impact the D.C. area.
“Our unpaid meal date has increased year over year,” Sharon Willoughby, chief financial officer for Loudoun County Public Schools, said during a joint meeting of the Loudoun County Board of Education and Loudoun County Board of Supervisors on Monday.
She said unpaid meal debt is up 52% compared to last year. And requests to be included in the Free and Reduced Lunch program have jumped 180%.
“This year, we’re off to the same trend, where we will most likely be exceeding last year’s unpaid meal debt,” Willoughby said. “After the pandemic, LCPS, along with other school divisions across the nation, has seen their meal debt really increase just across the board.”
She said debt status will not stop students from getting their lunches, but families are getting notifications if they have a negative balance that’s over $5.
Students with a negative balance are not allowed to get extra items in the lunch line but will still get a breakfast and lunch.
Willoughby said school meal prices have increased by 20 cents a meal to address the rising cost of the program. Lunches now cost $3.55.
“We understand the need of having students have food in their stomachs in the morning so they can focus on the day,” Loudoun County Board Supervisor Sylvia Glass said.
At the end of a fiscal year, any outstanding meal debt is absorbed by the school system and does not roll over into the next school year. Families then start with a zero-dollar balance even if they can’t pay their meal debt.
LCPS has partnered with Giant Food and some other organizations to help with donations to cover some of the unpaid debt.
“You may notice when you check out at the grocery store sometimes you have the option to round up for a certain charitable cause. One of those causes has been donating to the school nutrition program,” Willoughby said.
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A Loudoun County student’s suspension is on hold while litigation over whether the punishment was warranted moves forward, a federal judge ruled Friday.
A Loudoun County student’s suspension is on hold while litigation over whether the punishment was warranted moves forward, a federal judge ruled Friday.
The ruling comes after two students’ families filed a lawsuit against the Northern Virginia school district, alleging the kids were wrongfully punished for speaking out about an incident in a school locker room. During the encounter, they said a transgender student identifying as male recorded them in a locker room at Stone Bridge High School.
The students had been suspended for 10 days for harassment. And in a new court filing this week, the school system described incidents in which the two students harassed the other student before the incident in the locker room.
“These boys never directly spoke with the complainant, and so our boys were merely complaining that there was a biological girl in their locker room,” said Victoria Cobb, president of the Founding Freedoms Law Center. “The school has decided to make them political pawns in a battle over ideology.”
In court documents, the school system said witnesses describe threatening incidents or behavior in gym class and school hallways.
In an 11-second video, a speaker is heard saying “girl boy” several times. The student who filed the complaint said the two boys said to “get out” of the locker room and was referred to as “it” during P.E. class.
According to the court files, investigators spoke to Loudoun County Public School staff members and a variety of student witnesses.
The locker room incident prompted some community members to speak out, and resulted in a federal Department of Education investigation. The agency found Loudoun County violated Title IX and retaliated against the boys, who expressed concern about being recorded by a transgender boy in the boys’ locker room.
The incident has also been referenced as the Education Department found bathroom policies at five Northern Virginia school districts violate Title IX. The agency said policies that allow students to use facilities based on their gender identity rather than biological sex violate the law. The families’ lawsuit seeks to end that school system policy in Loudoun County.
A recording of the locker room incident, documents said, reveals a series of comments the two boys made, including things such as “there’s a girl,” “why is there a girl?”
Reviewers described in documents as “independent decision makers” ruled that the two boys had sexually harassed the student.
“Our clients never spoke to the female student,” Cobb, the boys’ attorney, said. “They only expressed confusion and discomfort about having a girl in the boys locker room.”
After Friday’s ruling, Cobb said one of the two students can remain in school while the case progresses. The other moved away from the area, but Cobb said it’s “about their student record more than a suspension.”
In a statement on Friday, a spokesman for Loudoun County schools said the division acknowledges “the court’s decision today and will prepare for the next steps in this matter. We remain committed to fostering a safe, inclusive, and respectful learning environment for all students.”
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Charter schools in Loudoun County will be able to keep asking for funding for infrastructure improvements, as part of an updated policy the school board approved.
Charter schools in Loudoun County, Virginia, will be able to keep asking for funding for classroom upgrades and other infrastructure improvements as part of an updated policy the school board approved last week.
The policy pertains to the establishment of charter schools. As part of an amendment to the proposed policy, charter schools are eligible to ask for funding for infrastructure needs, and those needs could be included in the Capital Improvement Program if the school board deems it necessary.
The Capital Improvement Program is the school division’s long-term plan for acquiring property and renovating and maintaining existing public school facilities. The proposed update passed, 7-2.
The approved policy update put an end to community fears that Loudoun County’s two charter schools would be ineligible for funding to improve their campuses. The original proposal said charter school facilities wouldn’t be included in the Capital Improvement Program for current or future improvements.
“It is a positive step, but I also feel like we’re still going to have continuing conversations on how much funding we can get,” parent Robert Carey said. “Can we really improve the school? How much funds will we be able to receive? That will be a work in progress, but at least it’s a very, very good, positive first step.”
Joe Luppino-Esposito, vice president of Hillsboro Charter Academy’s board of directors, said the newly approved policy takes out the “worst part,” which he described as the section restricting funding for charter schools. Their campus, he said, doesn’t have a music room or a teacher’s lounge, and it has a small lab that doubles as the lunch room.
The campus includes what he calls the “art cottage,” a portable trailer that was supposed to be temporary, “but it’s been there since at least 1996. These are all the type of things that would really not stand anywhere else in the district, except for the fact that it’s been the charter school,” Luppino-Esposito said.
As part of the approved amendment, introduced by Loudoun County School Board member Lauren Shernoff, the school board will defer to current charter agreements for existing charter schools.
At the Sept. 30 meeting, Chief Operations Officer Kevin Lewis told the board allowing charter schools to be considered for capital improvements could be costly, suggesting expansion plans could leave the district responsible for spending millions on enhancements for existing infrastructure in addition to new spaces.
The school board last reviewed its policy for establishing charter schools in 2020.
The new updates, Carey said, allow for capital improvements that are “critical for us to be able to operate and continue to operate in a safe environment for these students.”
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On the first day of the 2025-2026 school year, Virginia’s third-largest school system says it’s focused on making sure students feel a true sense of belonging as they begin the fall semester.
From saving on school supplies to the impact of federal cuts, the WTOP team is studying up on hot-button topics in education across the D.C. region. Follow on air and online in our series, “WTOP Goes Back to School” this August and September.
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Loudoun Co. schools kick off a new year
On the first day of the 2025-26 school year, Loudoun County Public Schools, Virginia’s third-largest school system, says it’s focused on making sure students feel a true sense of belonging as they begin the fall semester.
With 100 schools, a student enrollment of just under 82,000 and an on-time graduation rate of 97.2%, the school system says a feeling of connection is needed to ensure a child can thrive, “and become their best and most engaged self in the classroom,” the school system said.
LCPS hired 626 new licensed teachers and counselors for the school year, of which 59.7% hold master’s degrees and 2.1% hold doctoral degrees. Of the 626 staff members, 237 are brand new teachers to the profession, according to the school system.
As of Aug. 13, almost 99% of the licensed positions were filled.
As of Aug. 15, LCPS had 20 bus driver vacancies, 17 bus driver trainees currently in training, seven trainees scheduled for future training in September, and 25 bus driver candidates in the preboarding process. Until the staffing is at 100%, the school system said other transportation staff will fill-in where needed.
New programs this year include the Loudoun Recovery Academy, designed for students who are in early recovery from substance-use disorders. According to LCPS, as they work toward their diploma, students will “receive the academic, emotional, and social support necessary to complete high school and have the flexibility to participate in internships, work, or fulfill other commitments.”
In readying LCPS students for careers, the Accelerated College and Employability Skills program, or Access Academy begins this year, in collaboration with George Mason University and Northern Virginia Community College.
Focus on kindness, respect, empathy
Several schools in the district have initiatives that go beyond reading, writing, math and science.
Evergreen Mill Elementary School in Leesburg has a “Kindness Club.” Principal Jennifer Thiessen says fifth graders can volunteer to visit and help their youngest schoolmates, preschoolers, with varying needs.
“It creates opportunity for relationships between students that might not normally interact with each other during the school day,” Thiessen said. “It’s an opportunity for teaching compassion, empathy and understanding, and some of those soft skills that we find to be just extremely important at the elementary level.”
Thiessen said preschool teachers will visit fifth grade classrooms early in the year, to tell them about some of the younger students, and the needs they might have, including communication delays.
“It’s really a teachable moment for our older students, cultivating that sense of leadership,” she said. “It’s just a lovely opportunity, and the kids are really excited about it on both ends of the spectrum.”
“We’re in an academic setting. But we also want our fifth graders to leave elementary school with a sense of empathy and this idea of how to be kind to one another, and really to seek first to understand,” Thiessen said.
While the older students benefit from accepting responsibility, Thiessen said the preschoolers love the interaction with fifth graders.
“It’s really cute. They’ve got really big smiles on their faces when they see them. It’s definitely a different dynamic than with their teacher — they kind of see them as like the ‘cool person in the building,’” she said.
Discovery Elementary School has a C.A.R.E. Team, which stands for Council for Active Respect and Empathy, for fourth and fifth graders. J.L. Simpson Middle School’s Empowered Girls Club offers seventh and eighth grade girls of color opportunities to create an additional support system for encouragement and empowerment.
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Students in Loudoun County will now be able to carry naloxone in their backpacks, as part of an update to the school district’s student medication policy.
The change will allow students who have received training, and whose parents have signed off, to carry the overdose-reversal drug at school.
The policy updates come about a year after the school system reported a series of overdoses, including at least eight at one county high school. That prompted Gov. Glenn Youngkin to sign an executive order requiring school divisions to promptly notify families of a student overdose.
“This is completely optional,” school board member Anne Donohue said. “This, in no way, is obligating any student at LCPS to carry naloxone. It is simply saying, if they want to, they will be allowed to.”
According to the approved policy, a student who administers the naloxone has to tell a staff member.
Any student who wants to carry naloxone in their backpack will have to get it themselves.
While some school board members said the change will improve student safety, others suggested it puts too much pressure on students.
“We are asking students to become emergency responders, and I feel like it’s putting a heavy responsibility on the students,” board member Deana Griffiths said. “You may also lose actual confirmed reporting by students if they are administering naloxone.”
Board member Lauren Shernoff echoed that sentiment, suggesting the school division is “putting what I feel to be a very adult thing on our children, if they take that responsibility.”
But, board member April Chandler said, “If you’re faced with an overdose of your classmate, it’s traumatic either way. Are you empowered to do something that could save a life? Or are you going to be traumatized by the fact that you saw somebody pass away? It’s impossible to consider.”
Loudoun County Public Schools will update its student handbook with information about parents’ legal obligation to safely secure guns.
Loudoun County Public Schools will update its student handbook with information about parents’ legal obligation to safely secure guns, as part of a resolution the school board passed Tuesday night.
The Gun Safety Storage Resolution, which board members in the Northern Virginia district approved unanimously, comes in the aftermath of recent school shootings in Georgia and Maryland, plus a series of unsubstantiated threats to schools in Loudoun.
Those incidents, board member April Chandler said, have prompted community members to inquire about what more can be done to keep schools safe.
“There’s no denying that the fear of gun violence at school has an impact on our students,” Chandler said. “This fear is hurting our kids.”
In Virginia, it’s against the law for anyone to leave a loaded, unsecured firearm out in a way that could endanger a child under 14 years old. The penalty for doing that is a Class 1 misdemeanor.
Now, as part of the resolution, the school division will update the student handbook with information about parents’ responsibility to safely secure guns.
A notification will also be sent to parents and guardians, detailing why it’s important to store guns securely and explaining the legal obligation to protect kids from guns that aren’t stored properly.
“The facts show that a lot of people are not responsibly storing their firearms in a safe way,” board member Anne Donohue said. “Which is why I think it is appropriate for the division to put out some of that information to the community, just like we do about the opioid crisis, the mental health crisis, just like we do about other threats to the safety and security of our children and the families in our county.”
Information won’t be collected from parents, Chandler said. The school district also isn’t collecting information about gun ownership, she added.
“It’s a nearly no-cost communication to educate the community,” Chandler said. “Now is not the time to play politics with student safety.”
During Tuesday night’s meeting, Chandler cited data from a 2023 study by the American Academy of Pediatrics that found guns are the leading cause of death for American children and teens.
“People safe-storing their guns is common sense,” board member Lauren Shernoff said. “I know we’ve said that before, but this is an opportunity for us to work together as a community and a school division to say we’re committed to keeping kids safe.”
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In a WTOP exclusive, former Loudoun County Public Schools spokesman Wayde Byard is finally speaking on his own behalf, ahead of the release of his book “The Battle for Loudoun County.”
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Former Loudoun Co. schools spokesman Wayde Byard on indictment, culture wars
He spent 20 years as the spokesman for Loudoun County Public Schools and then found himself at the center of a national controversy — and a felony perjury trial — over the school system’s handling of two sexual assaults by the same student. Now, Wayde Byard, who was acquitted last year in his criminal trial, is finally speaking on his own behalf.
Byard’s perjury case was the sole felony count handed up from an eight-monthslong special grand jury probe commissioned by Attorney General Jason Miyares at the request of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Byard was found not guilty by a Loudoun County jury in June 2023.
“I wanted people to know that a public school system would not cover up a rape or hide student misconduct or not cooperate with law enforcement,” said Byard.
In his book, Byard describes Loudoun County as “the wealthiest, most-educated locality in America. It’s diverse. It’s home to cutting-edge technology. It boasts one of the most-honored school systems in the country.”
He also said it’s home to “bigotry and cultural stupidity on an epic scale.”
“Loudoun is a template for how the Radical Right wants to reshape American politics, using a reasonable façade to push policies that were considered regressive a half-century ago,” he writes.
While the school system’s transgender policy would become the focus of much of the ensuing controversy, Byard said an earlier turning point came in June 2021 when then-Superintendent Scott Ziegler presented “Promise and Progress: Report on Equity 2021” to a work session of the school board. While no members of the media were present, this was the first time an LCPS superintendent highlighted the fact that white students were outnumbered in the school system.
“I think you can tap into people who are nervous about a school division or community going majority minority. There’s a lot of fears there — people think ‘I’ve lost my community,’” Byard opined.
Byard blamed what he calls “social media conspiracy theories” that exploited some honest mistakes made by the school system.
“That’s what people really want to think, is that somehow this big organization with 15,000 people, has this gigantic conspiracy going to poison the minds of the young,” said Byard. “And nothing could be further from the truth.”
The incident
In 2021, Loudoun County became the epicenter of a controversy that played out in the state governor’s race and even on a national level about how the school system handled two sexual assaults done by the same student — the first one in late May of that year in a bathroom at Stone Bridge High School.
The attack came at a time when the school system was considering a policy change to allow transgender students to use the restroom of their choice, and the perpetrator was wearing a skirt (or kilt) at the time.
Shortly afterward, the school board approved the policy allowing transgender students to use bathrooms corresponding to their gender identity.
Byard said local news organizations were willing participants in drawing outsized attention to future school board meetings.
“The news directors would say, ‘OK, Loudoun is the hot spot, so we’ve got to have a crew there,” said Byard. “What made Loudoun special is we had some political performance artists, some of whom came in from Fairfax and Prince William (counties), who wanted to make YouTube videos.”
Byard said mostly outside agitators were adept at getting attention: “They knew the news story would become ‘Parents go crazy at school board meeting, film at 11.’ And here’s a teaser, somebody shouting into a microphone, usually with a couple of bleeps.”
The controversy only grew when the male student was transferred to another high school, Broad Run High School, and sexually assaulted another student inside a classroom in October of 2021.
The boy was found responsible for both assaults, and sentenced to a residential treatment facility until he turned 18. In November 2023, when he turned 18, he was released.
In retrospect, Byard believes the aftermath of the sexual assaults was exacerbated, “because the adults in the room did not get together and communicate,” referring to the school system, the sheriff’s office, the commonwealth’s attorney’s office and juvenile services.
“I think, probably, the boy should have been in an alternative placement, but we didn’t know all the facts. We didn’t know a lot of the facts until two days before things got started, at which time we were at warp speed trying to get the school year started, and things got lost,” said Byard.
A report commissioned by the school system and later ordered released by a judge faulted the school system for not carrying out its own investigation and threat assessment of the student, instead relying on the sheriff’s office. The school board said at the time of the report’s release last September that it has taken “significant actions,” including policy changes since the 2021 assaults.
Indicted
During the 2021 governor election, Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin campaigned on a “parents first” platform — and won. The day he was sworn in, he issued an executive order authorizing an investigation into Loudoun County schools, saying, “School administrators withheld key details and knowingly lied to parents about the assaults.”
Newly elected Attorney General Jason Miyares added, “Loudoun County Public Schools covered up a sexual assault on school grounds for political gain.”
Asked about those statements, which implied premeditation and intent on the part of the school system, Byard said, “I think they’re false.”
“First of all, the student pleaded guilty before the governor was elected. Sentence was imposed before he was inaugurated. The system worked — albeit very imperfectly, the system worked,” he said.
The special grand jury empaneled by Miyares’ office worked for months, seeking to clarify who knew what, and when. Byard testified before the grand jury twice.
Ultimately, in December 2022, Byard was indicted on a felony perjury charge and former superintendent Ziegler was indicted on three misdemeanors. Ziegler, who was fired after the release of the special grand jury report, was convicted last September of a retaliatory firing of a teacher unrelated to the 2021 sexual assaults. However, the conviction was later thrown out and he is set to be retried next year. (Ziegler was acquitted on a second charge, and a third count was dropped.)
Byard recalls the moment in December 2022 when he was told by the school division’s attorney that he and the superintendent had been indicted and Byard was being suspended without pay.
“I was marched out of the building, in a friendly way,” Byard said. “We’d decided that if the building was staked out (by reporters), we didn’t want a perp walk. They took me out to my car. The personnel head was in tears, as she asked for my parking pass. And, I learned what the feeling of being alone was, at that moment.”
Shortly before trial, Byard and his attorney, Jennifer Leffler, were offered a plea bargain. “In my case, they said, we’ll do a misdemeanor of making a false statement, $100 fine, but we’re gonna wait two years to sentence you.”
The pair thought they had a solid defense, so rejected the offer. The case went ahead.
The trial
According to Byard, “My name was barely mentioned during my trial. I felt like a spectator at my own trial — they were trying the school division, through me, as a surrogate.”
When jurors got the case, they only deliberated a short while before informing Circuit Court Judge Douglas Fleming that they had reached a verdict.
“We were confident. I think when they came back in an hour, we felt we’d probably won because if they really had to agonize over the decision, we wouldn’t have gotten a verdict that quickly. I later found out that basically the trial was over after the first day — they did not follow the opening arguments,” made by prosecutors for Attorney General Miyares’ office.
When the court clerk unfolded the paper upon which the jury foreman wrote the verdict, it read “Not guilty.”
“You are free to go, sir,” said Judge Fleming after the verdict was read in court.
With his legal troubles behind him, a meeting was held with the school system’s interim superintendent, chief human resources officer and director of strategic communications, where the group decided Byard would no longer be the voice or face of LCPS.
“It was actually a relief. At that point, I couldn’t see going back out there because I’d be a distraction. If I were there for the opening of school, they’d say, ‘Well, fresh off his perjury trial, here he is,” he laughed.
The group agreed Byard would concentrate on writing projects until his retirement, in December 2023.
Today, after the national scrutiny, the political posturing and the claim that the Loudoun County Public School system was in crisis, what does Byard think is really important to the parents of Loudoun County school students.
“Safety is number one. Two, that my child is successful, that they get a diploma, that they have life skills, that they have a career path,” Byard said. “We did surveys, and 87% of the population is very pleased with the school division.”
At the height of tensions during school board meetings, Byard said the chief of staff asked him to compile how many people participated in school board meetings.
“We had about 40 regulars and 20 part-timers. So, we had 60 people out of a population of 400,000 that were very agitated, very angry, but were not representative of the population as a whole,” said Byard. “It’s a very small minority that’s vocal, and creates this illusion.”
What started as a Loudoun County bike donation campaign has evolved into a program that gives bicycles to students in the Virginia suburb who need them the most.
Bikes were recently distributed to students in Loudoun County at Leesburg Elementary School.(Courtesy Loudoun County Public Schools)
Bikes were recently distributed to students in Loudoun County at Leesburg Elementary School.(Courtesy Loudoun County Public Schools)
What started as a Loudoun County bike donation campaign has evolved into a program that gives bicycles to students in the Virginia suburb who need them the most.
The county’s bike donation program started in 2019, according to Safe Routes to School coordinator Janice Jennings. But it’s evolved, she said, “after we decided that it would be a great initiative if we could give bikes to students in underprivileged families.”
With help from community groups and school leaders, the group has been able to do just that.
It has helped about 70 students per year in the last two years, and suspect hundreds of students have benefited from the bike donation program.
“We focus on Title I schools and Title I-eligible schools for kids that may otherwise not be able to have access to a bike,” said Kelly Smit, another Safe Routes to School coordinator with the school division. “Most recently, we had kids that wouldn’t be able to get to summer programs, or we had high school kids who couldn’t get to work because they didn’t have any type of transportation.”
The bike donation drives are run through Leesburg’s Maverick Bikes, which Smit said refurbishes them to near-new condition. Doug Landau, a personal injury lawyer, donates helmets for the students, and attends the distribution to make sure they fit properly. Because of a Virginia Department of Transportation QuickStart grant, students also get a bike lock and bike light.
Meanwhile, the group Bike Loudoun helps by ensuring the bikes are setup properly and working with students who may not already know how to ride a bike. Jennings said they set up an obstacle course for students to practice on at local distribution events.
“So many kids in the summer are so isolated because they have no way to get to community events or to meet up with friends at parks or pools,” Smit said.
The district tries to offer bikes to students at four schools each year, usually elementary schools and then either a middle or high school, Jennings said. Recently, students at Leesburg Elementary and Sterling Middle got new bikes.
Typically, they work with two schools before winter break in December and then two others in May. The Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office donated four bikes for the most recent distribution.
The family liaison at the school usually selects the students who would benefit most from the bikes, Smit said.
Some recent beneficiaries who stand out, Smit and Jennings told WTOP, include students whose families lived in temporary shelters at the time and a student who has cancer.
“This is another opportunity for students to bike to school, but bike to school safely, and also have the equipment they need — the lights, locks and bells to navigate their community,” Jennings said.
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The Loudoun County public school system in Northern Virginia has decided not to move ahead with a controversial plan to delay start times for more than a dozen school days.
The Loudoun County public school system in Northern Virginia has decided not to move ahead with a controversial plan to delay start times for more than a dozen school days.
After hearing negative feedback from families, however, the plan has been thrown out.
“This was a great example for us to show that when we solicit feedback, we are listening, and we can pivot,” said Loudoun County School Board member Lauren Shernoff. “I think that’s really important.”
Shernoff said she was initially in favor of the idea, but she quickly learned that many parents had concerns about child care and a disruption to routines for kids.
Under the plan, teachers would have started their days at the regular time, but students would have arrived two hours late. That would have occurred about two days per month.
The county has three professional development days already included in next year’s calendar, but LCPS Superintendent Aaron Spence said he was worried that those days wouldn’t provide enough time for teachers to finish all of their required training.
Shernoff posted the idea for the 16 delayed start days on her Facebook page, and it was clear to her that the public was generally against it.
“Normally I get a few likes, but I got over 500 comments,” Shernoff said. “People were definitely engaged and definitely concerned.”
Out of all the social media interactions she had regarding the plan, only about four people were in favor of it.
“Literally everyone else was very opposed,” Shernoff said. “We’re going to go back to the drawing board, and I’m glad we are.”
Spence said school system leaders will continue exploring “alternative options” that would allow teachers to complete their training while “minimizing” any impact on families.
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Canine teams will start randomly searching Loudoun County high schools next month, Superintendent Aaron Spence said, as part of a plan to deter students from bringing illegal substances to school campuses.
Canine teams will start randomly searching Loudoun County, Virginia, high schools next month, Superintendent Aaron Spence said, as part of a plan to deter students from bringing illegal substances onto school campuses.
The scans, which will be conducted through a partnership with the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office and Leesburg Police, are scheduled to start in March. Students won’t be told about them in advance, but the school district said it will communicate with students’ families once the scans are done.
The concept of bringing canine teams into schools isn’t new. In 1989, for example, Fairfax County Public Schools announced plans to use drug-sniffing dogs in schools, The Washington Post reported.
However, a Fairfax County schools spokeswoman said that program isn’t in place in Virginia’s largest school district anymore. Arlington Public Schools also doesn’t have a program similar to the one Loudoun is launching, a spokesman there said.
Montgomery County Public Schools, Maryland’s largest school district, has a memorandum of understanding with the county’s police department. But a school division spokesman said it doesn’t “reference or provide for random canine scans of our schools.”
Nonetheless, Loudoun County leaders are hopeful the sweeps will serve as an effective deterrent.
“We’re sending the message that we mean business. This is serious, we need to take this seriously,” said Dan Adams, a Loudoun schools spokesman. “The kids need to keep this stuff out of our schools, and keep it out of their homes and keep it out of their pockets, because this is some really dangerous stuff.”
As part of the planned scans, the dog units will walk through common spaces and unoccupied classrooms. They won’t be “going up to kids and sniffing their pockets or anything like that,” Adams said.
Michele Bowman, spokeswoman for the Leesburg Police Department, said the dogs will be searching for illegal narcotics, but they’re not trained to search for marijuana.
The school division is anticipating the sweeps will take about an hour and a half, with minimal disruption to class time.
The program, Bowman said, has been in the works for months.
If a dog alerts an officer to a substance it discovers, police will have the opportunity to search lockers, Bowman said. She described a false positive alert as “very unlikely.”
The school district will evaluate the program’s effectiveness at the end of the school year and consider whether to implement it again next fall.
Adams, with the school division, said it’s one step the county is taking to address what he called a “crisis in our community.”
“This isn’t an issue where we’re going to be able to ‘consequence’ our way out of it,” Adams said. “There’s not going to be a magic fix.”
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Loudoun Valley High School senior Addison Miller started learning how to write her own music in middle school. Last fall, she conducted her own composition for the school’s orchestra.
Addison Miller recently returned to the school that gave her the chance to capitalize on her creativity.(Courtesy Addison Miller)
Addison Miller recently returned to the school that gave her the chance to capitalize on her creativity.(Courtesy Addison Miller)
Bored of the music she was working with, Addison Miller started learning how to write her own as a student at Blue Ridge Middle School in Loudoun County, Virginia.
She played the cello, and started recording herself playing different melodies. For fun, she recorded multitrack song covers. Sometimes, she’d look up sheet music of the baseline, then the melody line and the harmony line.
Miller wondered if that was something she could do with her own music. That curiosity prompted her to write her first piece, called “Forest,” and show it to her teacher, who inquired whether it should be played at the spring concert.
Miller conducted while her teacher played the cello, marking the first time she got to conduct her own piece.
Addison Miller conducting a self-composed piece titled “The Final Encounter.” (Courtesy Addison Miller)
Now a senior at Loudoun Valley High School, Miller is writing music for school plays and leading her peers. She’s auditioning for colleges, and still figuring out whether she wants to take the composition path, write music for movies or be a private teacher and performer simultaneously.
“Composing has taught me to always jump at the opportunity, even if I’m unsure,” Miller said.
When Miller was 4 years old, her parents bought her a toy piano, which sparked her interest in music. She started taking piano lessons soon thereafter, but said she quit, because she didn’t like the teacher telling her what to play.
She decided to start playing the cello in the third grade, and has stuck to it ever since. After she finished writing her first piece, she had an itch to continue.
“I just wanted to keep writing and keep experimenting,” Miller said.
As an eighth grader, she wrote “Marvel’s Backup Song,” but it was never performed because the pandemic hit. That changed late last year.
Jennifer Galang had Blue Ridge Middle’s orchestra learn the song, and invited Miller back to conduct. The students had been practicing and enjoying it, Galang told Miller.
Addison Miller playing a cello on stage. (Courtesy Addison Miller)
So in December, with her sister playing violin in the orchestra, Miller returned to the school that gave her the chance to capitalize on her creativity.
“It was kind of surreal,” Miller said of the experience. “I mean, just being back on that stage where I first conducted anything, and it was the same podium, and I was conducting kids that were my age when I wrote that piece. It was a lot to wrap my head around.”
Miller has always been advanced, playing with the seventh grade orchestra as a sixth grader and with the eighth grade orchestra as a seventh grader.
As a junior, she wrote 20 to 30 minutes of a piano score for the spring play. Miller wrote more music for a different play, and most of the critics at the show mentioned her music in their reviews.
Kelly Holowecki, director of choirs and orchestras at Loudoun Valley, said Miller stood out during her audition at the high school. Now, she’s catching the attention, and ears, of her peers.
“They eat up everything that she says and puts in front of them,” Holowecki said. “They love her music. She’s a great leader for the orchestra. And when she’s in front of them, you can see the attention, and they’re very ready.”
Miller also plays field hockey, and is in the top 5% of her class. But still, it’s her love of creating music that motivates her every day.
“I really couldn’t imagine myself not doing music full time,” Miller said. “I couldn’t really see myself being happy doing anything else.”
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Loudoun County, Virginia, teachers Erik Sassak and Laura Brown are being honored this year with awards from the Virginia Council for the Social Studies.
Dr. Laura Brown and James Erik Sassak are being recognized as Loudoun County Public School (LCPS) history teachers who distinguish themselves in teaching history.(Credit LCPS)
Dr. Laura Brown and James Erik Sassak are being recognized as Loudoun County Public School (LCPS) history teachers who distinguish themselves in teaching history.(Credit LCPS)
Before leaving Blue Ridge Middle School on Tuesday, eighth grade civics and economics teacher Erik Sassak created a Mario Party-themed review game.
The goal, he said, is to help his students prepare for an upcoming unit. It’s part of an effort to reach the students who are currently interested in Mario, “since the Mario Brothers (are) back.”
He also loves bringing primary sources into the classroom and is a member of the Ellis Island Statue of Liberty Foundation. Sassak put his family’s name on its Immigrant Wall of Honor and pulls it up in class during the citizenship unit.
Sassak, who said he’s from a family of teachers, is one of two Loudoun County Public School educators getting recognition from the Virginia Council for the Social Studies. He received the 2024 Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Excellence in Teaching Award for crafting lessons that keep students interested and inspiring them to take action in response to injustices.
Meanwhile, Laura Brown, who teaches history from 1865 to the present at Belmont Ridge Middle School, is receiving the 2024 Betsy Barton Teacher of the Year Award. She’s getting praised for similarly putting together engaging lessons and creating an inclusive learning environment.
Both will be recognized during a March 1 ceremony at the VCSS Conference in Farmville, Virginia.
“It is a lot of work to make classes engaging,” Brown said. “And to meet and see all the students where they are. … What might work with one class might not work with another, so you’re changing on the fly.”
Because Brown talks about things that happened before the students were born, she strives to find ways for them to connect to the material. Part of that is creating an environment in which they’re comfortable sharing their thoughts and ideas out loud, even if the answer isn’t correct.
Brown uses political cartoons to help students analyze and understand historical concepts and tries to help students draw connections between historical cultures and their families.
She also works to incorporate positive stories into her lessons.
“Not just always, ‘Oh, this was bad, and this was bad,’ but trying to highlight successes and celebrations that we can do within the different topics we study that relate to the student,” Brown said.
Sassak takes a similar approach, using artifacts and other items to explain to students how primary objects can help tell their family’s story.
He also asks students to analyze current events, “so they can start to see that news is happening all around them, and not just here in Virginia, Loudoun County, Washington D.C., it’s happening in Russia, it’s happening in Japan and Singapore,” Sassak said.
Both Brown and Sassak are motivated by the “light bulb moment” students experience when they understand something clearly.
“I always tell them, ‘History may not be your favorite subject, but let’s try to find one thing or one skill that you really like, and you can see how it will help you later on in life,” Brown said.
Sassak sets similar goals.
“As long as, at the end of the year, my students take away something from the class, whether it is curriculum-related or a memorable experience that happened in the classroom, that they are helping to enrich themselves by just having that one moment is very beneficial to me,” Sassak said.
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