Courtesy of Alexandria City Public Schools
As Alexandria and other communities come to grips with longtime racial inequities during this time of social upheaval — sparked by the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minnesota — an effort is afoot to change the name of Alexandria's only high school. It follows the recent removal of a Confederate statue in Old Town Alexandria that was long in the making.
A petition has been started to change the name of T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria. The school was named for Thomas Chambliss Williams, the superintendent of Alexandria City Public Schools from the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s. Alexandria City Public Schools integrated in 1965. Williams was opposed to desegregation in schools.
Alexandria Living asked one of the name change organizers, local resident Marc Solomon, a few questions about the effort.
Q: Why did you decide to start a petition to rename T.C. Williams High School?
A: I’ve long been embarrassed that my city’s high school honors the name of the man who fought long and hard to keep my black neighbors from attending school with my white neighbors. In order to consider a name change, the School Board requires a petition. So, we are giving them that petition.
Q: Will you be proposing a new name for the school? If not, who will?
A: We have a placeholder name — Tubman-Chavez — because the School Board requires a petition to rename include a replacement. However, our understanding of School Board rules is that they will then ask the Superintendent to start a naming process similar to how Ferdinand Day School was named: robust community engagement, research, and stakeholder voting.
Q: What are some of the names being proposed by people who would like to see it changed?
A: So many! Alexandria City High School is popular. So is Chinquapin, Petey Jones, Herman Boone, Weber (after a beloved teacher)...
Q: How many people are backing the petition so far?
A: The physical petition requires in-person signatures, so that’s been challenging with COVID-19. I am putting the petition in the mail today with about 172 signatures. We will transition to electronic lobbying for further action. Our Facebook group has over 1,000 members after one week.
Q: Are they all Alexandria residents?
A: Petition signers have to be, by School Board rules.
Q: Do you have some noteworthy Alexandria backers and if so, who?
A: Yes! Councilmembers John Taylor Chapman, Canek Aguirre, and Mo Seifeldein are attaching their names to the signing letter included with the petition. Delegates Charniele Herring and Mark Levine are also signing. Christopher Harris, president of the Alexandria NAACP, is also supporting. Nelson Greene’s family — a member of the Secret 7 — physically signed the petition too.
Q: Any idea when this proposal might go before the school board?
A: That’s up to them. We want it done as soon as possible.
Q: Do you think most Alexandrians were aware or unaware of T.C. Williams' background? Can you tell our readers a little bit about him?
A: It’s funny, I haven’t been able to find one person say a kind thing about T.C. Williams. We have many alumni in our Facebook group that never even knew he was a real person. On the other hand, we have other Alexandrians, who knew him. One of my black neighbors — who couldn’t sign due to his current job — personally had to go in front of TC Williams and the School Board back in the 60’s and beg to be able to attend G.W. High School, which was white at the time.
We still have folks in our city that lived through his tenure, and it’s a disgrace they still have to see his name on a high school.
Q: Any idea how much a name change might cost?
A: I don’t. But it would have cost less to change it 20 years ago, and it will cost more to change it in another 20 years.
Q: What do you foresee as the biggest challenge(s) to renaming the school? How might you and backers meet those challenges?
A: The biggest challenges will be convincing alumni that their identity as Titans or Alexandrians is not tied to the name TC Williams. Changing the name of a high school will not minimize them, nor will it minimize the efforts of the football team in 1971. It's a continuation of the justice that they fought for.
Q: What kind of timeframe do you see for this issue?
A: I would like to see an immediate commitment to rename by 2021, with a months long community engagement process to decide on what the final name should be.
Marc Solomon has been involved in Alexandria affairs for a while now. He is on the Board of Trustees of the Hopkins House, president of the Braddock Station Civic Association and ran for School Board back in 2018 in District A.
In Fairfax County, the School Board has reopened discussions about changing the name of Robert E. Lee High School in the Franconia area.
