VOICES: Stories from Alexandria City Public Schools

Meet the Jovovic Doussard family. They have three boys who are all ACPS students and range in ages from eight to thirteen. Cooped up together during the #COVIDclosure, they're learning to structure their learning day and to get along.

Want to hear more stories of our students, alumni and staff? SUBSCRIBE to the ACPS podcast VOICES: https://www.acps.k12.va.us/voices

John and Beatrice fell in love against a backdrop of racial tension, when America was on the precipice of change. Listen as John and Bea reminisce about a life lived in Alexandria as we wrap up our Black History Month series.

The content of this VOICES is courtesy of the Alexandria African American Hall of Fame. “A Speech for Prosperity,” given on October 23, 2018 at the Carlyle Club, in Alexandria, VA. To see the speech in its entirety please visit alexandriaafricanamericanhalloffame.org

Dr. Faye S. Gunn is the granddaughter of a Chincoteague Island sharecropper who was encouraged to build a better life for herself. She traveled 100 miles each day to earn her high school diploma even though her small island had three elementary schools and two high schools. Those schools were for whites only. She went on to earn her degree from Norfolk State University, became a teacher at ACPS, and was the first black minister of Alfred Street Baptist Church.

Listen to Dr. Gunn share the challenges she faced growing up as a black woman.

Senior Mya Hall can sing but as a transfer student wanting to join T.C. Williams’ advanced choir, she had to get past an audition with Choir Director Theodore Thorpe, an ordeal she describes as tense and scary.