Mark Schulte journalist, teacher, IT enthusiast

Stoddert Elementary gets an overhaul

Mayor Fenty likes to play.

Memorably described as a "handsome triathlete" by the Post's Michael Grunwald during his run for office in 2006 (next to Linda Cropp's "matronly grandmother"), Fenty has always been enthusiastic about the benefits of exercise--especially for kids.

Since taking office, he's been moving forward aggressively on that basis, using $21.5 million in taxpayer money to update football fields and tracks at six DC high schools in 2007, and most recently unveiling the dazzling new 55,000 square foot Wilson Aquatic Center.

"I think people demand better recreational centers, better playgrounds, and we've got a great team that is doing just that," Fenty said in late August at a ribbon-cutting for a new elementary school soccer field in Columbia Heights.

Closer to my home--across the street, in fact--Stoddert Elementary is well into a yearlong "modernization" that will add athletic facilities to the school's campus. This upgrade has so far involved the razing of 50 or 60 old-growth trees in the northwest corner of the park, reduced parking on Davis Place, and led to an awful lot of early-morning construction noise. (Why do backhoes spend so much time in reverse?)

Some of the crankier tenants in my building are beginning to raise a stink. They say the new buildings are unnecessary and intrusive, and complain that the gymnasium will be open to the public, with city-wide basketball tournaments, increasing parking problems on game nights. There will also be a new access road directly across from my building.

I confess I was initially on the side of the complainers, feeling that Fenty's knee-jerk "build more athletic facilities" approach was going to ruin my pretty little park, at vast expense to the city during a severe economic recession. It still might, but I'm warming to the project all the same.

Taking a look at the ANC presentation, it's clear that the modernization involves much more than putting up a gym where some beautiful old trees once stood. The new LEED-certified buildings will also comprise a media center, cafeteria, and visual and performing arts space. The draft educational specifications are impressive.

So, despite recent questions about the wisdom of Fenty's recreational profligacy, and resisting the urge to adopt a NIMBY attitude, I'm throwing my support behind the project. Or, at least, I'm hoping it will turn out to be the right thing for the kids and the neighborhood. That seems possible, at this point.

Kappa Alpha Sigh

Earlier this month, Mayor Fenty, probably by accident, almost stuck DC taxpayers with a $37,000 bill for an open-bar reception he threw for his  Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. He gave the money back, and sort of blamed his staff. All of which is a bit awkward for a mayor already saddled with some minor appropriations scandals, but for me it brought to mind another problem.

Mayor Fenty graduated from Oberlin College in 1992 (I'm a 1994 grad). The college had then, and still maintains as far as I'm aware, a ban on all fraternities (despite bizarre references to a fictitious all-white fraternity in NBC's The West Wing). Here's the wording, from the student handbook:

"No secret society is allowed at Oberlin, and no other societies or self-perpetuating organization is allowed among students, except by permission of the faculty. This is to be understood to include social and rooming-house clubs."

This ban was one of the things that drew me to Oberlin as a high school senior, and it was a point of pride among most of the students who attended the school. Oberlin tries to be an open community without a lot of weird cliques and social dividers. Even so, the Kappas were known to exist at Oberlin, keeping a low profile most of the time but occasionally conducting hazing rituals on campus.

It's possible Fenty became a Kappa at Howard, where he went to law school, but more likely that he joined while an undergrad. That's a shame. Many students find fraternities and sororities positive contributors to college life, and helpful in career networking after school, but Oberlin's frat ban is an important symbol of the school's commitment to social justice and equality, and it should be respected and enforced.