By Ronald E. Carrington

Richmond Schools Superintendent Jason Kamras has spent the last 100 days engaging with school community while trying to calm the storms from previous administrations.

Since his arrival Feb. 1, the 44-year-old former Washington public schools administrator and 2005 National Teacher of the Year has spent two to three hours at each of Richmond’s 44 public schools, talking with students, teachers, staff and principals. He has read books to students and taught a couple of math classes.

It is part of his plan for engagement, equity and excellence, core values he espoused in his 100-day plan.

“I have probably spent 80 percent of my time connecting with people — at schools, in the community, in homes and at different events all across the city,” Mr. Kamras said in a recent Free Press interview.

He wants RPS teachers and staff to follow his example by going out in the community and making home visits.

“I hope that they see that engagement is not just a word for me,” Mr. Kamras said. “I hope folks are seeing and feeling that they know that I am trying very, very hard to be fully engaged with the community. It is not just me, but the entire school system.”

Since 2002, RPS has had five superintendents, leading teachers to express concern over what they view as a revolving door of leadership that has caused chaos, confusion, a lack of vision and little concern for deteriorating school facilities.

A Broad Rock Elementary School teacher with 24 years of experience informed Mr. Kamras during his meeting at the school, “With all that (turnover), the students are not going anywhere.”

Standing before that group in South Side, Mr. Kamras responded that he is committed to staying through the term of his contract, which runs through June 30, 2021.

“One of the things I have tried very hard to do is to be exceedingly clear about what the reality is,” Mr. Kamras said regarding ongoing school system issues and decisions. “When I feel that the reality is distorted, I call that out.”

Even with his initial steps reaching out to teachers and others, Mr. Kamras faces a laundry list of issues and seemingly insurmountable challenges left over from previous administrations, as well as major financial hurdles to get the system back to a finely tuned educational machine.

Mr. Kamras has spoken often and loudly about equity and making sure that the students needing the most get the most while also helping them confront the barriers they face, whether that is poverty or institutional racism or trauma in their lives.

One of RPS’ formidable goals is to offer a world-class education to all 24,000 public school students. The Richmond School Board defines that, in part, as meaning all schools are accredited and students are in modern, properly maintained facilities free from unhealthy conditions.

Mr. Kamras has vowed, without giving full details of the plan, to have all 44 schools accredited by 2023. Currently, 19 schools are fully accredited.

He has been active identifying and supporting other funding sources to increase dollars for school construction and maintenance, whether it is through the city meals tax hike that goes into effect July 1 or a City Council member’s proposal, although unsuccessful, to levy a cigarette tax in the city.

He gives City Council credit for passing the 1.5 percent meals tax hike and applauds them because “that took some political courage and it is a significant amount of funding that will help RPS begin to address the process of remediating facilities’ issues.”

At the May 7 School Board meeting during a budget review, Mr. Kamras noted that RPS has only $850,000 left in the current budget for school repairs and maintenance, while $30 million is needed.

“I have publicly advocated the need to look at property taxes and other broader based taxing sources to ensure that RPS has the funds necessary to provide all of our students in every part of our city with a beautiful, clean, healthy, modern facility to learn in,” Mr. Kamras said during the interview. “That’s basic. That’s the foundation.

“The reality right now is that we do not have the money we need to either rebuild our schools or to do the routine maintenance that needs to be done,” he continued. “I don’t know how much more clearly I can say that.”

During the May 7 meeting, the School Board approved Mr. Kamras’ plan for collaboration between RPS and the city to construct four new schools buildings to replace aged and decrepit George Mason and Greene Elementary schools, Elkhardt-Thompson Middle School and George Wythe High School.

The four projects are to be financed through the meals tax increase. The $9 million the tax hike is expected to generate annually would be used to repay the construction debt on the estimated $150 million project over the next five years.

Mr. Kamras is eager to work with Mayor Levar M. Stoney and the City Council to find resources to put pending facilities issues to bed once and for all “so we can stop talking about bricks and start talking about books,” he said.

“It is my responsibility to paint the RPS vision, and that vision will be in the form the strategic plan,” he noted.

Despite the school system’s array of problems, Mr. Kamras is optimistic about turning things around.

“Once we have the RPS strategic plan in place, I will be out selling the plan, first and foremost to the city and the state, but also to the business community, the nonprofit community, to our partners,” he said with confidence. “This will show the city and the entire Richmond community how they can be a part of the RPS vision for the future.

“We should be proud of all of the greatness in RPS, be honest in all the work we still have to do, be hopeful about our ability even more and realize all of the greatness in all of our children.”