Hoskins started his new position 10 weeks ago, succeeding the late Terry Holzheimer, who helmed AED for nine years. Hoskins said Arlington didn’t necessarily do anything wrong under Holzheimer and interim director Cindy Richmond, but it could have done more to position itself for the future. The energetic Hoskins decided to quote Wayne Gretzky to make his point.
“You’ve got to be able to go where the puck is going,” he said. “Arlington didn’t do that.”
School Board member Barbara Kanninen, serving the first year of her term, proposed pausing what’s called the “1:1 Initiative” during the School Board’s budget deliberations last week. Her motion failed, 2-3, with Vice Chair Emma Violand-Sanchez voting in favor.
The initiative has already provided second- and sixth-graders with iPads and freshmen with MacBook Airs. Next year, devices will again be provided to students in those grades.
Oakridge Principal Lynne Wright will be honored with APS’ top award for administrators, 11 years after she won the 2004 Teacher of the Year Award while she was at Taylor Elementary School. Wright managed to improve Oakridge’s Standards of Learning test scores while at the helm of Arlington’s most overcrowded elementary school.
“Lynne is an energetic and charismatic leader who creates a positively charged school where students thrive and families are welcomed,” APS Superintendent Patrick Murphy said in a press release. “She recognizes the importance of building relationships with families and community that supports the diverse student population. Lynne is an exceptional educator and dedicated instructional leader who creates connections among staff, families and the community, all leading to the success of students.”
Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.
MoDev started back in January 2009 not as a company, but as a Meetup group of a dozen mobile developers in Piola in Rosslyn. The idea was to start a community for developers building mobile application, a vacuum in the D.C. area at the time, MoDev founder Pete Erickson said. The aim was to generate conversation and collaboration among developers in the “new ecosystem.”
As Arlington grapples with the cloudy future of transit on Columbia Pike, in the wake of the streetcar line’s cancellation, one question has been largely absent: Is Metro the answer?
The Pike, Pentagon City and Crystal City together are projected to account for 65 percent of the county’s population growth and 44 percent of its job growth in the next three decades, and Arlington doesn’t have a long-term transit plan in place for the Pike to accommodate that growth. So far, much of the discussion has revolved around bigger and better buses.
The School Board’s approved cuts of $7.4 million from Superintendent Patrick Murphy’s budget, unveiled in February. Some of those savings have come from updated revenue figures, but others have come from slashing Murphy’s budget, including cuts to the Arlington Public Schools central office staff.
Other savings came from moving money around, funding replacement buses and new technology with one-time funds from last year’s closeout budget as opposed to ongoing funding.
DCA’s Growth Hurting Dulles — Arlington’s Reagan National Airport is growing fast — it set a new record for passengers on March 27, with 39,073. Congress has widened DCA’s flight perimeter three times and more and more airlines are scheduling flights. In the meantime, Dulles is more expensive to fly out of and won’t have a Metro line until 2018 at the earliest. Reagan now has more daily passengers than Dulles, and Dulles’ consumer base is shrinking. [Washington Business Journal]
Arlington Teacher Selected For Cuba Trip — Yorktown social studies teacher Tom Lenihan is raising funds to participate in Tulane University’s Cuban Culture & Society Teacher Institute. To ensure his place in Havana, Lenihan, also an adjunct professor at Marymount University, must raise $3,000. Lenihan says he will bring back knowledge and experience to share with fellow educators and his World Affairs class. He has set up a GoFundMe page to raise the money. The program is from June 20-July 4.
Arlington Agenda is a listing of interesting events for the week ahead in Arlington County. If you’d like to see your event featured, fill out the event submission form.
Also, be sure to check out our event calendar.
The paper ballots will be digitally scanned and allow more voters to vote faster, and provide a hard copy of ballots in case of technical malfunctions, Arlington County said in a press release. It’s the first time the county has used paper ballots since 1950, county General Registrar Linda Lindberg told ARLnow.com.
The county was forced to make the purchases by a ruling by the Commissioner of Elections recommending the electronic WinVote machines be decertified and prohibited.
(Updated at 3:55 p.m.) In between fighting the crowds to see the cherry blossoms at peak bloom, check out some of the real estate on the market in Arlington.
See our real estate section for a full listing of open houses. Here are a few highlights:
Aman Singh Lail was sentenced to 20 years, with nine suspended, for aggravated involuntary manslaughter, plus 12 months for driving under the influence. Lail pleaded guilty to the charges last summer.
The sentence was the maximum allowed upon the plea agreement, and Arlington Circuit Court Judge Louise DiMatteo apologized to the family of the victim, Chowdhury Saqlain, saying no sentence could replace the son they lost.
While the Arlington County Board enters their final deliberations surrounding the potential closing of the Artisphere, one local entrepreneur is trying to save it.
Pete Erickson is the founder of MoDev, which organizes conferences for mobile software developers. Erickson has hosted a handful of conferences at Artisphere and is planning his latest — MVP (minimum viable product) Conference — for May 18 and 19.
