This fall, more than a dozen recent graduates of The Washington School for Girls (WSG) will start their high school career at schools throughout the D.C. metropolitan area and, in some cases, other parts of the U.S.

As they embark on the next part of their academic journey, these young women will carry with them several memories, including those from a pandemic that WSG President Dr. Beth Reaves said compelled students to form stronger bonds.

“All we knew was each other on Zoom,” Reaves told The Informer. “They mentioned it to me as they felt like that was a unique part of their schooling here because they hardly knew us. And they didn’t really know each other that well.”

Upon WSG’s return to in-person learning in 2021, students, teachers and staff navigated a months-long transition period that took place amid preparations for WSG’s 25th anniversary celebration . As Reaves recounted, the Class of 2025, then fifth graders, didn’t miss a beat as they partook in extracurricular activities that stretched their imagination and fed their passion for college and career.

“We believe our girls come with all the greatness inside of them,” Reaves said. “They just really need opportunities to exercise that, and Washington School for Girls is a school that really does that for them.”

In recent years, Reaves and other school leaders have curated various opportunities for these students— most of whom live in Wards 7 and 8, and Prince George’s County, Maryland. Earlier this year, for instance, most of the eighth grade class traveled abroad to the United Kingdom. While there, students toured a LEGO store, watched a showing of “Hamilton: An American Musical,” and visited the heavily Afro-Caribbean community of Brixton.

By June 13, when 16 WSG graduates walked across the stage before hundreds of family, friends, and teachers at THEARC, several of them had already compiled several pages about the trip in their journals. They also strengthened and maintained ties with peers and elders from WSG’s sister school, St. Claudine’s Catholic School for Girls, located in Harlesden.

For Reaves, the trip allowed the group of teenagers to expand their horizons.

“They’re right at the age where they’re getting ready to go to high school and becoming independent themselves,” said Reaves, WSG president since 2017. “But they’re with a safe group of adults [and] they really believe that they can find their voices, and discover more about who they are, what the world looks like, and what that means to them.”

Washington School for Girls: A School of Second Chances

Washington School for Girls opened in 1997 as an after-school tutoring and enrichment program inspired by members of The National Council of Negro Women, The Religious of Jesus and Mary and The Society of the Holy Child Jesus.

The institution’s core values include: confidence, perseverance, generosity, joy, goodness and peacemaking. Though the Archdiocese of Washington recognizes WSG, neither campus engages a curriculum determined by the governing body.

Today, Washington School for Girls serves 110 students on two Southeast-based campuses: The VIEW Campus on Morris Road for younger students and THEARC Campus on Mississippi Avenue for their older counterparts. Next year, a new building, located across from THEARC, will replace The VIEW Campus, placing both groups of students closer to each other.

Since its inception, WSG alumnae have gone on to attend numerous public, public charter and private high schools before moving on to well-regarded colleges and universities. Mya Starks, a 2025 WSG graduate, said she will continue that legacy when she attends Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingsford, Connecticut this fall.

“It’s one of the top three boarding schools in the USA,” said Mya, 14. “I like that school because they got connections and I like to travel a lot. I think they will open me up to that opportunity.”

Long before she accompanied her classmates to the U.K., Mya, an aspiring U.S. ambassador, caught the travel bug as a participant in CISV International , a decades-old program through which young people meet and learn about each other’s cultures.

While with CISV in Thailand, Mya spent much of her holiday break with young people from Vietnam, Japan, Poland, and Zealand. She said that experience fulfilled a vision that her mother had when she enrolled her in WSG during her fifth grade year.

“If you were to get my mom on here she would talk you out about how WSJ has opened me up to so many opportunities,” Mya told The Informer. “That’s one of the positive [aspects] of WSG; they have so many opportunities and connections with other people, like The Levine School, the Boys and Girls Club, and so many others.”

Sixteen Girls Experience the Power of Sisterhood

Mya, however, admitted that she didn’t immediately embrace WSG as an oasis of academic and social enrichment when she transferred there from Rocketship Academy Public Charter School.

“I didn’t want to make any friends,” Mya told The Informer. “I didn’t know the people I was with. They came up to me… but I was being a bit harsh.”

She told The Informer that, once she started opening up to her classmates, she learned more about sisterhood.

“I was realizing that people shouldn’t be alone,” Mya said. “That you need friends and that support system outside of your family.”

For Mya, one of WSG’s most important lessons centers on the art of addressing a qualm, which she and her peers were often able to do during small community meetings—or “circles”— that deans or a counselor facilitates.

“If there’s something off, we don’t just hold grudges,” Mya said. “We address that [problem] straight out; we make our own circles [and] we make our own meetings. Everybody here has some strong opinions and nobody will hold nothing back. Even though we have some people who are a little bit on the quieter side, we also…have advocates for them.”

Though she only spent one year as a WSG student, recent graduate Kaylah Richardson said the school showed her so much about the power of unity.

“When I came to WSG for my tour, I felt an instant connection with all my eighth grade friends,” Kaylah told The Informer. “I’ve really built some lifelong bonds that I really hope to keep.”

Kaylah, an aspiring travel nurse and sports medicine practitioner, transferred to WSG during the 2024-2025 school year after what she described as a steady decline in her grades, and the ballooning class size at Cornerstone Schools of D.C.

As Kaylah recounted, she entered her new school without a strong connection to a higher power. However, it was when she joined her classmates in the adoption of a daily ritual that she felt her confidence grow.

“Our prayer routine [at home] is not like how it is at WSG,” Kaylah told The Informer. “It would be on and off some days, but when I came to WSG I felt like my connection with God grew closer and tighter. Now it’s something I can’t forget, even outside of school. At home, I continue to do morning prayer, midday prayer before I eat any meal, and even my end of the day prayer before I go to sleep.”

Next year, Kaylah will attend Bishop McNamara High School in Forestville, Maryland. That’s where she will more than likely serve as a manager of the school football team. She also expressed plans to take courses at University of the District of Columbia for college credit. Though she hasn’t identified her dream college, Kaylah told The Informer that she wants to leave the District.

“It’s very important for me to go to college,” Kaylah said as she delved into a dream to become the first person in her mother’s family to complete this feat. “I like to push myself. Even if it’s hard I’m willing to do anything [to] be dedicated and stay focused on it to get it done. I want to make my family proud.”

A WSG Graduate Speaks About Lessons Learned

When Kaylah matriculates to Bishop McNamara, she will have fellow WSG graduate Breyah Jefferson to lean on during difficult times.

Like Kaylah, Breyah aspires to take advanced coursework that will prepare her for college.

“I just want to focus on my studies when I’m there,” Breyah told The Informer. “I want to take at least one AP class…so I can have a wide variety of subjects to participate in and I want to take a lot of language classes.”

Breyah, who is building fluency in Chinese, French, and Spanish, wants to either practice general surgery or cardiothoracic surgery, a career goal she said was inspired by the hours spent binge watching “Grey’s Anatomy.”

“It would be cool to work with the area of the chest like your heart and your heart valve,” Breyah told The Informer. “And then for general surgery, I wanted to choose that because you focus on all aspects. You’re a part of each part of the surgical field so I thought that would be a good place.”

During her sixth grade year, when she transferred to WSG, Breyah developed an interest in science while learning math concepts that once challenged her. She told The Informer that, the more she immersed herself in the special pre-Algebra instruction, the deeper connections she saw between math and science.

“It’s been easier to catch up since we get one-on-one help,” Breyah said. “Before I came to WSG, I never knew that there was any type of math in science. It was very odd for me but I have grown to learn about it more, and it’s awesome especially at an early age.”