Good new DC school numbers. Except…

First Up

District education officials celebrated yesterday’s news that D.C. is first in the country in post-Covid math and reading recovery. The ranking comes from the Education Scorecard, a Harvard, Stanford, and Dartmouth-led annual report. The report “shows what is possible when students are in school consistently, engaged in their learning, and supported by strong instruction,” said D.C. State Superintendent of Education Antoinette Mitchell.

Alas, the fine print is not quite so hot. Washington’s students are still well below where they were before the pandemic, the report says. And the rate of chronic absenteeism — nearly 40% — is 10 points higher than in 2019. Adding to the worries: D.C.’s bounceback was aided by $600 million in federal pandemic relief that’s now gone. Which is all to say that maybe folks following the ongoing mayoral election ought to focus more on education.

As it happens, there are some pretty significant differences between frontrunners Janeese Lewis George and Kenyan McDuffie on this subject. Lewis George, for instance, wants to get rid of IMPACT, the program that gives bonuses to top teachers; McDuffie does not. She also wants to reform the system of mayoral control over schools, while McDuffie has backed it. The philosophical divide, broadly speaking, is that she’s warier than he is about the array of policies that get lumped under the term “education reform.”

It may not be front and center in 2026 campaign ads, but there’s a good chance education is going to play a large role in determining whether this year’s winner gets re-elected.

What D.C.'s Talking About

East of the River Campaigning. WAMU’s Alex Koma assesses the state of the mayoral race in D.C.’s Wards 7 and 8, which include the neighborhoods east of the Anacostia. Verdict: Observers think McDuffie will win Ward 7, which is dominated by older Black homeowners who prefer his more traditional approach. But Ward 8 is up for grabs: Historically D.C.’s poorest, its voters have supported the safety-net emphasis of the late Marion Barry. And Ward 8 now also includes gentrified areas like Navy Yard, which house plenty of the post-collegiates who admire progressive Lewis George.

A Mall Revival. The Trump administration is hosting a Sunday religious rally on the National Mall that could be the biggest in 50 years. Marco Rubio, Pete Hegseth, and Mike Johnson will speak. It starts with a sunrise service at the Capitol and runs through an evening music program on 12th Street. Civil libertarians will recoil at the use of the Marine Band for a religious program. D.C.ers with more parochial concerns may be less worried: There are no road closures announced yet. (Of course, the last Trump-endorsed Mall religious rally, the March for Life, led to several people being exposed to measles.)

Dyspepco. D.C.’s electric utility is still catching flak about energy rates. In March, an appeals court threw out a recent rate hike. But the city’s Public Service Commission hasn’t issued refunds. It’s become a big mayoral campaign issue because Lewis George accuses McDuffie of having been asleep at the switch when he chaired the D.C. Council committee that vets commission members.

H Street Hustle. The former head of a housing nonprofit diverted more than $1 million to himself via bonuses larger than his salary, Washington City Paper reports. Worse: The board of the H Street Community Development Corporation didn't notice. According to a D.C. Superior Court ruling, they weren’t exactly dealing with a master criminal. The judge blasted the “slew of typographical errors” and “unclear and confusing argument” in Kenneth Brewer's claim to have had board permission for the bonuses.

Finally: Four men were indicted for an alleged spree of D.C.-area convenience-store ATM robberies. But according to the charges announced by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, these weren’t your ordinary heists. The accused perps are charged with breaking into the cash machines using ‘jaws of life,’ the hydraulic tools meant to rescue people from car accidents. They also allegedly stole cars to lug the heavy machinery to the targets.

Did someone forward you this email? To subscribe, visit https://dc.citycast.fm/newsletter

Randy Clarke's Magic Wand

In today’s City Cast interview with Randy Clarke, we pressed the Metro chief about serious things like this year’s budget, last year’s bus rerouting, and just how the system ought to push back against fare evasion.

But we did ask him a fun question that pretty much every D.C.er has probably pondered from time to time: If you could wave a magic wand — and money and engineering were no obstacle — where would you put a new Metro station?

He named three:

• Logan Circle: The landmark anchors a vibrant commercial area now. When Metro was built, Clarke noted, it more or less ignored the nearby chunk of 14th Street.
• Ivy City: In 1976, the Northeast D.C. district was home to warehouses and trucks. Now it has nightlife destinations — and could really use a station.
• St. Elizabeths: The site of the psychiatric hospital east of the Anacostia is a new development hotspot, which was probably not on the bingo cards of Metro’s original planners.

What To Do