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Girls Global Academy faces challenges opening its doors in middle of pandemic

The Global Girls Academy is set to open its doors to the Class of 2024 in the fall, but it’s also preparing for that opening to be virtual. (Courtesy Karen Venable-Croft)

Students across the region are unsure about what their next school year holds, but for a new charter school opening in Northwest D.C., there are a host of questions for everyone involved.

The process of getting Karen Venable-Croft’s idea for a charter school up and running took 10 years before she received a charter for Girls Global Academy.

“We will be applying to become an international baccalaureate world school and our distinctive pathways are in engineering and business,” she said of the school’s aim.

Most of its 90 enrolled students have never been in the school in Chinatown and are getting a virtual welcome from their teachers and tours of the school online.

“It is challenging to be able to have that uncertainty of not knowing if we’re going to have to face open or virtual at-home learning, but we’re actually preparing for both things simultaneously,” Venable-Croft said.

The school is working now to establish connections between the students and the students’ families with faculty.

“May 29 is when we’re going to be all in. That’s when we have our faculty interacting with our students so they can make connections and build excitement about what the classes will look like, and what sisterhood will look like with them,” she said.


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