This week’s in Features, Nico Dodd and Sean Quigley profile first-generation college students and how they transition to Georgetown.

“About eight percent of this year’s freshman class, approximately 120 students, are first-generation college students,” they write. “They come from families and, in some cases, communities where attending college is the exception, not the norm.”

News reports that GERMS has not seen a drop in alcohol-related calls, despite a decline in alcohol violations.

In Sports, Adam Rosenfeld looks at the men’s soccer team’s surprising turnaround.

Leisure interviews Carlee Briglia (COL ’10), who filmed a documentary about Georgetown grads pursuing their dreams in India.

In Voices, Sean Quigley defends the brutalist Lauinger Library from students’ brutality.

The Ed Board criticizes the media frenzy surrounding Hardy School sex education.

Ever since the Washington Post reported that D.C. School Chancellor Michelle Rhee’s office did a cost analysis for moving the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, Rhee has been inundated with phone calls and e-mails from furious parents. Now she’s moving quickly to temper their anger, saying that the District has no immediate plans to move the school out of its Georgetown/Burleith location, although it would eventually like to move it into a new building.

The Washington Post is reporting that Rhee will meet with members of the school’s governing board today, too, to try to mollify their concerns. They had been unaware of the cost analysis report. Bill Turque writes “Michaele C. Christian, president of the school’s governing board, told Rhee in a letter Wednesday that she was ‘appalled’ by the possible move, which had been considered without consulting the school community. She called the Logan site ‘woefully inadequate’ and said the move ‘would eviscerate one of the most outstanding educational institutions in the District.’”

Fears that the school would be moved into a vacant school building near Union Station weren’t helped by Rhee’s recent overthrow of the popular principal of nearby Hardy Middle School.

So for now, the Georgetown and Burleith neighborhood get to keep a beacon of artistic achievement—and Georgetown students know for sure now that their big green drunk perch is safe and sound.

Photo from CitySifting

On Friday afternoon at Georgetown’s Hardy Middle School, D.C. Chancellor Michelle Rhee proved speculations that she would remove the well-liked Principal Patrick Pope from his post to be correct. The Washington Post‘s Bill Turque reported that before a roomful of incensed parents, Rhee announced that Pope would be leaving after this school year to plan a new magnet middle school for the arts.

Parents were outraged, Turque said, and for two hours, accused Rhee of trying to make the school more attractive to families of children at local, white “feeder schools,” which she has held meetings with over the past two years, at the expense of the school’s fine arts reputation.

On Monday, Jonetta Rose Barras seconded the accusations in her Examiner column:

“The recession, a new building and an education reform movement have merged to renew interest in Hardy among white residents. That’s a good thing. Problem is, they favor a traditional academic program and a principal who advocates that model. Hardy and Pope don’t fit that bill.”

Georgetown Metropolitan writes that after Rhee left, the Councilmember from Ward 7 Yvette Alexander told the audience gathered in the school cafeteria, “We’ve got to get rid of Fenty. And Rhee. And you can quote me on that!”

“Pope will be replaced this summer by Dana L. Nerenberg, principal of nearby Hyde-Addison Elementary, who will run both schools as a unified pre-kindergarten through eighth grade program,” Turque wrote.

He gave a speech thanking the audience for their encouragement without saying whether or not he had been forced out.

Photo taken from Flickr user David Clow – Maryland under a Creative Commons license.

Hardy Middle School

Michelle Rhee, the gung-ho, tenure-terminating, union-hated D.C. school chancellor, has more or less left schools in the Georgetown neighborhood alone.

In October, however, a Northwest Current article reported that she planned to make a “major announcement” regarding the local Hardy Middle School.

Parents of children there quickly grew nervous, not least of all because they understood one of her comments, that she wanted to “turn” the school, which is 70 percent black and draws from around the District, to mean that she wanted to make the school more attractive to local white children and their families.

After much uncertainty, Rhee plans to meet with those parents tonight at 6:30 in Hardy’s auditorium. From the Washington Post:

Rhee has yet to describe her plan for Hardy, which parents strongly suspect will include the exit of long-time principal Patrick Pope and a change in the school’s visual arts and instrumental music program. Speculation about his successor is centering on Elizabeth Whisnant, currently principal of nearby Mann Elementary, one of the schools Rhee would like to see Hardy draw from.

“Your voices must be heard before Hardy’s curriculum is changed without your input!” said the flier announcing the “urgent” meeting, scheduled for 6:30 pm in the school auditorium at 1819 35th St. NW.

They’re still not OK with this

This month’s ANC meeting was low on the fireworks, but neighbors turned out to protest valet parking by the Georgetown Club and continue their battle against late night pizza.

Philly Pizza

Philly P has been a common topic of discussion at ANC meetings this year, with neighbors loudly grumbling about late-night patrons of the restaurant (read: students).  The discussion was largely a rehashing of old complaints, but Commissioners passed an important resolution for the upcoming January 12 hearing with the D.C. Board of Zoning Adjustment.  The resolution allowed ANC Commissioners to present their findings at the upcoming Zoning hearing and act as a party with full rights to present evidence and testify.

Student Commissioner Aaron Golds voted against the resolution, which passed by a vote of 5-1.

Commissioners and residents remain steadfast in their efforts to shut down Philly Pizza, charging that it is a fast food restaurant.

Georgetown Club Valet Parking

A surprising amount of time at yesterday’s meeting went to discussing the parking arrangement for the Georgetown Club, located at 1530 Wisconsin Ave.  Neighbors complained that valet parking was creating a public safety hazard by blocking traffic on Volta Place.  ANC Commissioners also chastised the establishment for failing to send a representative to the meeting.  A resolution was unanimously passed  that encouraged the Public Safety Board to allow valet parking at night during a special trial period to ensure the Club was responsive to neighbor complaints.

The rest of the meeting, after the jump!

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Produce stands at the new Hardy School farmers’ market

Until this year, Georgetown farmers’ market aficionados only had one option: the Wednesday afternoon market at Rose Park. This summer, though, the Burleith and Glover Park Citizens Associations teamed up to put together a second farmers’ market Sunday mornings at the newly-renovated Hardy School.

So how do the Rose Park and Hardy School farmers’ markets stack up? Vox visited both this past week—check out our findings after the jump!

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