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November 2001 Issue

D.C. Gets Chartered
A Profile of Josh Kern By Geoffrey Melada

Reprinted with permission from the Jewish Exponent.

What does an Ivy-league educated Jewish kid from the Main Line (a western suburb of Philadelphia) know about teaching poor, black children in Washington, D.C.?

Well, explains Josh Kern, he's not actually teaching at Thurgood Marshall Academy, the new public charter high school he co-founded this year in the District's Southeast side. The 29-year-old graduate of Akiba Hebrew Academy in Merion, P.A. and the Georgetown University School of Law will work as an administrator and fundraiser for the school, while Joe Feldman, 32, another law-school graduate, serves as principal and oversees the curriculum.

Okay, let's rephrase the question.

What do two privileged Jews know about educating poor, inner-city black children?

Actually, says Kern, they know quite a bit, enough to have won the District's approval for a charter school when the other 13 applications that came before them this year were rejected.

Before becoming principal of Thurgood Marshall, which opened its doors on Aug. 22, Feldman had taught in Atlanta's and New York City's public schools. And Kern, as well as his co-founder, 30-year-old Jacquelyn Davis, spent a year volunteering in Georgetown's Street Law Program.

For three days a week, Kern and Davis taught civil-rights and legal procedures to students at Ballou High School, a public school close to the current site of the new academy.

"Through that experience, you really get a feel for the unfairness of the public-education system,2 emphasizes Kern. "You teach really smart kids who are very behind.2

After leaving Ballou, Kern says he and Davis took up a mission to do no less than "reform urban education2 by joining the charter-school movement. The 80 ninth-graders admitted to the freshman class at Thurgood Marshall will have many of the opportunities they should have received in their public schools, Kern hopes.

There will be small class sizes (an enrollment of 20 students will constitute the largest class), longer school days, and faculty advisers to offer academic and personal counseling. The students will even have input in designing the curriculum, and they will sit on the hiring committee for new faculty.

"I don't know what it's like to grow up poor and black,2 Kern concedes. "There are some people in the community who are annoyed at this ‘white liberal do-gooder' and feel that it's not my place to be here.2

But Kern says he can overcome that by "being in the community all the time and treating it like it's my own.2

Eventually, he says, "we'll gain everyone's support by showing them that our intentions are good and true.2

"We're creating something that the community wants and needs,2 he says, "and we're doing it from the heart.2

Geoffrey Melada is a staff writer for the Jewish Exponent. You may contact him via Email: gmelada@jewishexponent.com

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