Starting this school year, the school will accept all Nauck children who want to attend. For the first time in more than 30 years, Drew Elementary will once again be Nauck's neighborhood elementary. It will retain its model school program.
This marks the end of a nearly 20-year struggle for Portia Clark, whose three children all attended at least two elementary schools due to busing requirements. Clark ramped up her efforts two years ago by founding the Community Coalition for Taking Drew Back and finally got the school board's attention.
In Nauck, big new homes sometimes can be found adjacent to modest-sized older ones.
(Susan Straight For The Washington Post)
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NAUCK
BOUNDARIES: Walter Reed Drive to the west, Interstate 395 to the east, South Glebe Road to the north and Four Mile Run Drive to the south.
SCHOOLS: Drew Elementary, Gunston Middle and Wakefield High schools.
HOME SALES: Two homes have sold in the past 12 months, for $295,000 and $475,000, said Kathleen Gibbons, associate broker with McEnearney Realtor Associates. Three homes are under contract, with list prices from $324,500 to $499,700. There are no active sales listings.
WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE: Shirlington shops, restaurants and movie theater, Four Mile Run bike trail, Green Valley Pharmacy, barbershop, billiards, Metrobus stops along Glebe Road.
WITHIN 10 MINUTES BY CAR: I-395, Pentagon, Baileys Crossroads, Clarendon, Crystal City, Pentagon City, Reagan National Airport, Washington.
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Until recently, Nauck children were allowed to attend kindergarten at Drew, but were then bused to first grade at Oakridge, Hoffman-Boston or Abingdon. Clark's oldest daughter had attended three different elementary schools by third grade, because of shifting school boundaries.
"It's a welcome relief" to finally have a neighborhood school "that doesn't shift every time the boundaries change," said Clark.
Clark's youngest daughter is now in middle school, so the Arlington County school board's action came too late for her own kids, but she feels that the benefits of having a neighborhood school will help residents communicate better.
"The school is the glue that holds the community together. We haven't had that in 30 years since busing started," said Clark. "There is a disconnect because the neighbors don't get to know each other through school activities."
To add to that "disconnect," she said, "the demographics are much different than they were 15 years ago. Now there's even a language barrier."
Clark, whose parents moved to Nauck in the early 1920s, attended Drew herself. "I've been here all my life," she noted. She has no plans to leave.
That's a sentiment shared by a number of longtime residents who see the neighborhood as a part of their identity. "I've lived in other places, but this is the place I'm going to stay," said Coachman.
