Jason Kamras on What’s Ahead for RPS

Rich Meagher: Welcome to RVAs Got Issues, the show that brings you the people and ideas that are reshaping Greater Richmond. I’m your host, Rich Meagher. Public education is facing huge challenges across the country as the Trump administration takes steps to possibly abolish the Federal Department of Education,

News Archival: the Trump administration says it is cutting nearly half of the staff at the US Department of Education, hundreds.

Of staffers will be put on administrative leave starting March 21st.

Rich Meagher: Add to that demands for immigration enforcement and cuts to diversity programs mix in some longstanding structural and staffing concerns. And our local school systems may be facing more challenges than ever.

News Archival: And you know what the dream is?

We’re gonna move education into the states so that the states instead of bureaucrats working in Washington so that the states can run education

Rich Meagher: to talk about it all. We’re sitting down with Jason Kamras, who has been the superintendent of Richmond Public Schools since 2018. He’s talking to me, but he’s also going to answer your questions from our listener voicemail line.

Jason Kamras welcome.

Jason Kamras: Thank you for having me.

Rich Meagher: Okay, listeners, you are up. We asked you to submit questions via voicemail and we got a spirited response. Uh, here’s our first question. It’s a big one from Lauren in Richmond about the alarming news from Washington.

Listener Voicemail: Hi, this is Lauren from Richmond City and I had a question for the superintendent.

If he could please explain what are some of the roles that federal funding takes in Richmond schools? What are some specific programs or percentages of programs? And if federal funding was to be cut off, what are some repercussions that we would see?

Rich Meagher: Yeah. Jason, I’m, I’m with Lauren. I think a lot of people are with Lauren.

We’re really worried about this. Right. And I think a lot of Americans are unclear about how real is this threat to our day-to-day operations of, of public education. I.

Jason Kamras: The threat to public education is real in our country, and it’s not just about abolishing the Department of Education. Um, it’s about privatization.

It’s about siphoning dollars off of public education and putting them into vouchers. And then there’s also just the threat of, uh, controlling what teachers can say, what they can teach, you know, what curricula is acceptable and so on. At the same time, the thought I want people to hold onto is we will not be.

Distracted or deterred by all of the chaos coming out of Washington. Doesn’t mean we’re ignoring it, but it means we’re gonna stay focused on what’s most important, which is teaching and learning and supporting our kids through their daily lives. And that’s what I’ve been telling teachers and families, folks in the RPS community, look, we’re gonna stay true to our values and we’re gonna stay focused on our core mission and not get distracted by what’s going on in Washington.

Rich Meagher: And still, if you get a federal directive, do you feel like you have to kind of drop everything to respond to it? The Trump administration is threatening to eliminate the Federal Department of Education, maybe importantly, eliminate federal funding for schools. What are the stakes here?

Jason Kamras: Well, the stakes are high, and not just for funding, but also protecting our undocumented students, our LGBTQ plus students, protecting our teaching of the unvarnished history of Richmond, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

So there’s a lot at stake here as it pertains to funding. About 10% of our budget comes from federal funding. Most of that. Is for programs like Title One, which sends money to schools that serve low income students, and so we hire extra teachers or literacy interventionists, things of that nature with title dollars.

The federal funds also support kids with IEPs. Those are kids who need special education services and federal funds. Support our meal program as well. Not all of that actually is in the Department of Education, but those are primarily what the federal funds go to.

Rich Meagher: So if the spigot like turned off tomorrow, right?

The schools wouldn’t necessarily close. Uh, you could make some payroll. But you’re saying this would hurt a lot of the programs, particularly for the most vulnerable students.

Jason Kamras: Exactly. It would be devastating. We would stay open, but the schools that serve the kids who need the most support. Are exactly the schools that would be most impacted.

Rich Meagher: So is there any sense that state or city funds could make up the difference? Are there other sources that we could get this money from?

Jason Kamras: I know this city is facing a tight financial year, and so we’re waiting to hear what they’ll be able to do to support us. I do think the state can kick in some additional dollars.

As listeners may know, the JLARC committee, which is the nonpartisan research arm of the General Assembly, put out a report a couple of years ago. Saying that Virginia Underfunds K 12 public education by several billion dollars, and so that could certainly help us if that hole was filled.

Rich Meagher: Another example of how federal activity is affecting you folks.

I mean, you mentioned like teaching history, uh, diversity. There was a, what’s called a Dear colleague letter, right? You got this big official letter that was basically saying, review all your diversity programs in two weeks, or maybe lose your federal funding. I think they sent another letter later that said, kind of nevermind, right?

But at the same time, you have state mandates to do this stuff. How are you squaring that circle? How are you. Trying to figure out what to do in these competing directives as they come in.

Jason Kamras: To be honest, everything coming out of Washington seems to change every five minutes, and so honestly, we’ve just been keeping our heads down focused on the core work, which is teaching and learning and supporting our students, all 22,000 of them.

And so that’s what we’re gonna continue to do.

Rich Meagher: Another more clear response that you had to a federal directive. You came out very strongly against letting immigration officials, uh, ice officers, right law enforcement to come into Richmond Public Schools for purposes of determining immigration status, and you actually released a video on Facebook.

Uh, let’s listen to a little bit of that.

Jason Kamras: To our students. Let me be clear. We love you here, and RPS will always be a safe haven for you. Our approach to law enforcement on school grounds will remain the same to the extent that it enhances student and staff safety. It is welcome. And the minute that changes so too, will our stance.

Rich Meagher: And so you were saying essentially that you know, law enforcement welcome to protect our students, but if folks are just coming in to arrest or deport students, that’s not necessarily in line with the mission. You’re thinking. Now someone would say That’s a brave sand. Some would say that’s a little risky.

Um, what led to that decision making process? How’d you decide that this is the approach we’re gonna take?

Jason Kamras: Well, you heard in the clip I said, we love you here, and that is. Our motto. I say it at the end of every one of our messages, and I really do mean it. We love every one of our students at RPS. I’m a dad too.

I have two kids in the system, and I know I would want them to be protected, and so I. This wasn’t actually a hard decision for me to make. I also wanna appreciate the school board. Uh, they have been 100%, uh, behind me and behind the school system, put out their own resolutions supporting the protection of our students.

We’ve never asked about documented status and we never will, and this was just really a reaffirming of our values and our position and just making it clear for everyone to see.

Rich Meagher: And what’s your plan if ice

officials do come to RPS?

Jason Kamras: Look, we, we have a set of procedures in place. Uh, the, the first part of those procedures is my office gets notified so that I have an opportunity to understand exactly what’s going on, whether they actually have a judicial warrant that is appropriate for what they are trying to do and what the implications would be.

So, uh, we’re not just gonna let folks into our schools. We are gonna be extremely thoughtful, extremely judicious, and do everything we can to protect our kids.

Rich Meagher: All right, let’s get back to our listener questions. Um, just a heads up to some of those who called. Some of these questions have been lightly edited for time and content, but here’s a question from an anonymous staff member about shredding.

Listener Voicemail: I am a RPS staff member, and my question is, why do we not have at least two shredding events each year?

I’m concerned about private information going into the trash.

Rich Meagher: So not exactly the deep seated issue, right?

Jason Kamras: That is the very first time I’ve been asked about shredding. Yeah. Um, I will look into it and see if we can provide more opportunities for our staff to, uh, you know, have access to commercial shredding services.

We, of course, take student privacy extremely seriously. We follow all the federal laws, whether it’s FERPA or hipaa, everything as it pertains to our staff and our students. And you know, I, I don’t know what was behind the question from the color, but it could very well have been a concern about student information getting into the hands of federal authorities.

That shouldn’t be, uh, related to our previous conversation. So of course, that’s extremely important to us, and I will add it to my list to explore.

Rich Meagher: I imagine it is a long list. Uh, we, we have another question that’s a bit of a bigger bite, uh, also about kind of resources. This is from another anonymous listener.

Listener Voicemail: I would like to know what his plan is for buildings that have mold and constant leaky roofs, which is increasing the mold issues that we’re having in our buildings. I don’t understand how it’s expected for students, a lot of who have asthma to attend these buildings, and you have teachers who are perpetually having illness or reactions to the mold in other issues in our buildings.

It’s never ending and very concerning.

Rich Meagher: Alright. Buildings have been a, a big story, right? We’ve heard about these, these issues about mold, other issues in buildings. Why is this a problem in the school system?

Jason Kamras: The reality is our buildings are extremely old and there has been disinvestment in public infrastructure, not just the school system, but we saw with the water treatment plant just recently, everyone is acutely aware.

Yeah. And that is a phenomenon that you see. In urban centers all across the country, and I’m just gonna put it out there, when we had white flight, uh, in the sixties and seventies, that’s when we began to see a lack of investment in the infrastructure. And so we now have the majority of our buildings, are

80 plus years old and while I of course wanna make sure that every last building has every repair that it needs, the cold hard truth is we don’t have the money. We recently had an independent firm review every one of our facilities. Took pictures and analyzed every boiler and HVAC system and roof everything.

They’re all on our website if you wanna look at them. And what they said is, today we need $43 million to just do the current maintenance to prevent future issues down the road. All told we need over a billion dollars in investment. Of course, mold is unacceptable. Anything that makes the. Environment, unhealthy or unsafe for kids or staff?

We do our very best to respond to immediately. Sometimes we fail, sometimes we misstep. And when we do, uh, we work hard to fix that. And so we are, I believe, uh, addressing all of those most acute issues now.

Rich Meagher: I mean, there’s sometimes concerns about, you know, schools in wealthier parts of the city getting more attention, or that schools where there are more resource parents can overcome some of these problems.

Like how do you account for the inequality within the system as well as this under investment?

Jason Kamras: Well, look, I can say with a high degree of certainty that just because the school is in a higher income area, we are not allocating more money, uh, to those schools. In fact, if you look. Where we’ve built new schools over the last several years, we built a new school in the East End, Henry Marsh Elementary.

We built two new schools on the south side, a middle school, river City, and Cardinal Elementary. Those three schools are all serving. The highest poverty parts of our city. And so I do think we at RPS and the city have tried very hard to prioritize kids who, who need the support the most.

Rich Meagher: We’ll hear more from Jason cameras about staffing, shortages, budget challenges, and his personal cell phone number.

When we come back on RVA’s Got Issues.

Jason Kamras: I’m gonna give my cell number out on the air and my email address. You can call or email me directly, and I will make sure that your concerns are addressed.

Rich Meagher: This is RVAs Got issues. We’re back with Richmond Public School Superintendent Jason Kamras. All right. There’s another big issue in the news that we hear often across the Commonwealth, which is teacher shortages, uh, which is related to staffing concerns, which is related to morale. Uh, we have a question here from a staff member named Alvin.

Listener Voicemail: Good morning. My name is Alvin c Trent. I have been waiting on my benefits since 2023. I have made numerous phone calls. No one wants to return my calls, and I’m at a point now of being passed broke, waiting on Richmond Public Schools after all the years that I have put in. How do I get this rectified and will somebody ever call me back?

Thank you.

Rich Meagher: Now we don’t know the details here. Right? But this seems like, I mean, you can feel the frustration from that caller. Um, and it seems like a communication issue here, right? And this is similar to complaints we have heard about city government more broadly about government operations working better.

Is there work to do here in communicating with staff and meeting their needs?

Jason Kamras: I’m gonna give my. Cell number out on the air. It’s 8 0 4 6 5 8 8 4 1 5, and my email address is j Kamras, my last [email protected]. Mr. Trent, you can call or email me directly and I will make sure that your concerns are addressed.

Look broader picture. None of our employees should ever have to worry about a pay issue, a benefits issue, any of those sorts of things. I just want them focused on the kids, and I would concede that right now we are not fully hitting the mark when it comes to employee customer service, and it’s one of my key priorities for this upcoming year.

Rich Meagher: I know you just placed your chief talent officer on leave. There were complaints about the work environment. There’s been reports recently that morale might be a bit higher, uh, that things are getting better. How do you combat this staffing shortage in general? I.

Jason Kamras: Well staffing writ large has been tough in education.

Post pandemic, we just lost a ton of teachers, not just here in Central Virginia, but all across the commonwealth, all across the United States. A lot of teachers just have decided that the profession is too difficult, and I understand that we have been working extremely hard to increase our recruitment capacity, but also to make RPS as attractive as it possibly can, uh, to employees.

Both the ones we’ve got so that we hold onto them and to others to bring them here. That includes things like pay increases, pay isn’t everything, but since I’ve been superintendent, we have increased the average pay for teachers by 41%. It’s still below what I believe teachers deserve, which is a lot, lot more.

But we are making strides. We are also a collective bargaining school system, which provides teachers with a lot of rights, which is very, uh, attractive of course to folks, but we’re also trying to really invest in professional learning and development so that teachers feel supported and want to build their careers here in RPS.

We still have work to do on that front, but I definitely feel that we are heading in the right direction.

Rich Meagher: You mentioned the collective bargaining, right? That is something that I know you supported, right?

Jason Kamras: Yes.

Rich Meagher: Because you need to come up with that money and, and that raises questions about some tough choices you have to make in funding.

We have another question from a staff member here.

Listener Voicemail: Hi, my name is Sonya Roberts and I am a nurse with Richmond Public Schools. And I know that there’s been some talk about decreasing the amount of contribution that RPS is gonna be. Giving to our healthcare. I also read an article in the newspaper about how much money the city’s making off of these speeding cameras.

So I don’t know why some of that money isn’t going back into the schools so that we don’t have to be punished for a lack of funds.

Rich Meagher: Now there’s some good news for Sonya, right?

Jason Kamras: Yes. Yes. There is good news.

Rich Meagher: Talk about benefits. Yes. Didn’t actually lead to act a need to cut benefits, right?

Jason Kamras: That’s right. So in the school board’s wisdom, we have removed that provision and so we will continue to absorb the full increase in healthcare costs for our employees.

I do wanna note though, we are facing some tough choices. The increase in healthcare costs is about. $8 million, uh, for this coming school year that is just shy of what a 3% raise is for teachers, $9 million. And so I only share that to say we are unfortunately, given our funding situation, forced to make some of these very tough decisions.

As for the money from the speeding cameras, I don’t know, but I will reach out to Mayor Avula and, and see what we can work out.

Rich Meagher: Right? So that’s the, the

question here. Why don’t you get the money from the speed cameras? Where do you get your money from? That’s an issue. You have to work out with the mayor, right?

Jason Kamras: 90% of our money comes from the city and the state. I will say the city has repeatedly stepped up over the last several years increasing our funding rather significantly. I do credit Mayor Stoney for, uh, prioritizing K 12 education, um, and I’m very, very grateful for that. And I know Mayor Aula likewise will do so.

His wife is a teacher in our school system. He’s a parent of RPS kids. Again, the big money and where we are being shortchanged is the state. And I do wanna be clear, the delegation of representatives and senators from Richmond has been extremely supportive of us and K 12 all across the state.

Rich Meagher: Now you mentioned, uh, a couple of times today, uh, support from the school board with this last budget proposal, right?

You still don’t know what you’re gonna get from the city, but you put together a budget proposal with the school board. It, it seems to go fairly smoothly. Uh, that hasn’t always been the case in, in recent years. Uh, how has this election changed your relationship with the school board this year?

Jason Kamras: Well, I’ll just say that we have a great school board and they have been working extremely collaboratively with each other and with me, and so I’m just excited to continue to work with them.

Rich Meagher: You were not so excited in previous years. I, I mean, I, I hate to keep pressing on this, but you know, it did seem like you were personally affected right at these long meetings. Marred by infighting and dysfunction, like making tearful pleas for this. Let’s put the kids first kind of, of approach. I mean, how, how that had to have worn on you a bit over the last few years.

Jason Kamras: Well, look, this job is not for the faint of heart and, um, I, you know, uh, appreciate the opportunity to work with this board and I think we’re gonna do great things together.

Rich Meagher: Do you think that the, the outcome of this recent budget negotiation, right, or, or, or working together seems to signal at least a, a good working relationship going forward?

Jason Kamras: I think it does. Look, we all worked together as a 10 member governance team. That’s what great school systems do. I.

Rich Meagher: Okay, this next voicemail might be our most important question today.

Listener Voicemail: Hi Jason. My name is Sylvia. Then I have a grandson. He was transferred and the reason he was transferred because they had school fights going on in the bathroom, posted them on Instagram. Now he’s been threatened to be hunted down and killed in front of me.

You have done nothing about these school fights that wind up having a school shooting you. Y’all tried to hide that information. Now the school’s got gang fights going on inside the building, beating up people, kids. I sent the videos to you and I want you to answer those questions. What have you done to put in place the safety for these kids?

Rich Meagher: Talk about a big issue in schools across the country. Um, but there was a shooting at last year’s graduation. That’s the kind of biggest high profile example. I mean, just on a surface level here, what do you think when you hear Sylvia’s clear concern for her grandson? That the pain that she’s feeling,

Jason Kamras: that’s real.

And I empathize with her concerns, not just as superintendent, but as a father myself. Our solemn obligation is to return our kids at least as good as they were when parents and caregivers gave them to us, and so. I take safety extremely seriously, and we have invested quite a bit, in fact over the last several years to ensure that we’re keeping our kids and our staff safe.

Everything from additional cameras to improved communications systems to more what we call care and safety associates. These are the individuals who help ensure that things are safe in our schools. Upgraded fire safety, upgraded connection with first responders so that if there ever is an incident, we’re able to quickly address it.

I could go on and on and on. I’m talking millions of dollars of personnel and infrastructure. Unfortunately, we live in a country where frankly, it is too easy to get a firearm. We also live in a country where there’s not enough investment and support for mental health. And you put those two things together and we see the tragedies that have occurred all across America for decades, and it’s unconscionable.

So I’ve been very public about and will continue to be public about the need for common sense gun reform and for more investment in mental health to make sure that we can limit the scourge of gun violence, which happens not just in schools across the country, but also in our communities. I.

Rich Meagher: So challenges like school violence, some of the other stuff we’ve been talking about are significant.

I don’t wanna suggest here that it’s all bad news. Um, what would you say the school system’s doing really well right now? Like where, a place where,

Jason Kamras: how much time do you have? Because I got a whole list.

Rich Meagher: I’ll bet you do. How about a couple of things.

Jason Kamras: I’m gonna start with this. On every single academic indicator that the state tracks.

RPS was up last year and is trending up this year. So I’ll start with our littlest learners. Our kindergartners first and second graders, we have erased the pandemic learning loss when it comes to literacy. We are now above where we were before the pandemic and rising fast. On our SOLs, which is our third through 12th graders, up in every single subject, in fact, growing faster than the rest of the state in many subjects graduation, we were up six percentage points this past year, chronic absenteeism down by almost 20 points from the height of the pandemic and so on.

Every possible indicator it is. Incontrovertible that RPS is on the rise. Not only that, but our new strategic plan dreams for RPS has some incredibly exciting things in it. First, what we call passion for learning, which is our effort to turn all of our comprehensive high schools into theme-based high schools.

So we’re gonna be opening up Richmond High School for the arts, but we’re also gonna have a health and sciences high school. We’re gonna have a law and social justice and public policy high school, and so we’re super excited about that. We have another one passion for reading, which is our sort of moonshot effort to get.

All of our kids reading on grade level by third grade, and I think we will be the first school division in the Commonwealth to achieve that. So many other things, investments in athletics and food, we wanna become not just, uh, a great foodie town for adults, but a great foodie town for students as well.

And so we’re looking at partnerships to make our food program as exciting as the restaurant scene here in Richmond. So many more things, but there’s an excitement and a sense of possibility and a sense of forward momentum that we just haven’t had in, in quite some time.

Rich Meagher: Is is that what keeps you doing this right?

You’ve been doing this for a while and superintendents don’t always last this long. There’s a lot of either burnout or moving on to other positions. What keeps you going here in Richmond?

Jason Kamras: The kids! I mean, this is the greatest job in the world. Obviously, it can be stressful and infuriating and heartbreaking at times, but every week I get to go and see kindergartners learn to read for the first time.

I mean, can you imagine anything more wonderful than that?

Rich Meagher: And

what, what do

they make of you when you come into a classroom? Well, do they understand anything about who you are?

Jason Kamras: Um,

usually they think I’m quote the president. Um, and under the,

Rich Meagher: the president of the schools,

Jason Kamras: well of the country, I’m not sure.

Under the former administration, I felt concerned. That made me look rather old. But, um. I, they, I explained to ’em, I’m the superintendent and the way they can make sense of that is they all know their school’s principal. And so I tell them, I’m kind of like the principal of all the principals that makes sense to them.

Rich Meagher: What can our listeners do to help?

Jason Kamras: Number one, send your kids to RPS. It is a fabulous school system. I think we have so much to offer, and I would encourage folks to go visit schools and talk to teachers and learn about the schools in your neighborhood. That’s number one. Number two, support our advocacy efforts, particularly at the state level.

We need. Folks at every level of state government that understand how much more Virginia needs to invest in our kids, and it’s not just for urban centers, it’s also for Southwest Virginia. Mm-hmm. Rural Virginia needs more investment as well. And then third, keep staying engaged. When there are great things happening, tell folks about it and when not so great things happen, let me know so that I can try to fix them.

As I always tell folks, if I don’t know about it, I can’t fix it. But now I got shredders on my list, so we’ll, we’ll make sure to take care of that.

Rich Meagher: Jason Kamras is the superintendent of Richmond Public Schools. Thanks, Jason.

Jason Kamras: Thank you.

Rich Meagher: That’s our show. Thanks to our guest, Jason Kamras and thank you listeners for your voicemails. Our next conversation with a local leader will be next month with Henrico County manager, John Vithoulkas. If you’ve got a question for the Henrico County manager, leave us a voicemail at 8 0 4 5 6 oh. 8 1 0 8. That’s 8 0 4 5 6 0 8 1 0 8.

You can also visit our website. RVAs Got issues.vpm.org. RVAs Got Issues is produced by Max Wasserman and Rachel Dwyer. Donna Lack is our script editor. Audio mix by Steve Lack. Our intern is Cate McKenzie. Our theme music was composed by Alexander Hitchens. Meg Lindholm is our executive producer. Steve Humble is VP’s Chief Content Officer.

I’m your host, Rich Meagher. Thanks for listening.