RelayGate: DC’s Political Elite Hijacked Black Students’ Futures for Profit and Power

Six years after veteran principals, administrators, and teachers at Boone Elementary blew the whistle on systemic injustices inside the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS), city leaders are still stone silent, and that silence reeks of complicity.

Courageous educators revealed that Title I elementary schools serving mostly Black students, in high poverty areas, faced forced segregation, unequal treatment, and brazen ethics violations.

They exposed a systemic scheme that diverted local tax payer dollars, and or federal funds meant for disadvantaged children, into fraud, favoritism, and insider deals--allegations today backed up by investigations and admissions of wrongdoing.

And anyone who opposed Relay and or spoke up to expose the brazen ethical violations was met with swiftly retaliation and fired, to include all whistleblowers’ close associates were relentlessly retaliated against or pushed out.

Attention DC Voters: With another election in six months, we must demand answers: Every candidate who wants your vote and money must answer for RelayGate—on the record, in public, with specifics. Where did they stand? Will they draft tougher legislation about vetting contracts, ethics violations, and whistleblower retaliation?

Black Childhood for Profit

The DCPS superintendent’s modus operandi (MO) was brazen. Leveraging her authority, she coerced Title I school principals—overseeing schools in high-poverty areas—into signing contracts with DC government contractor Relay Graduate School of Education (Relay).

These contracts required schools to divert scarce budgets to Relay for mandatory trainings and programs, enriching both the private organization and the DCPS superintendent, who also worked as a contractor. Investigations have revealed she pocketed up to $170,000 by coercing schools into these deals while simultaneously serving as a Relay consultant—a clear conflict of interest. The superintendent's DCPS annual salary was already $195,000. Damn, is that not greedy?

Schools, already strained by underfunding, faced an impossible choice: comply with directives to prioritize Relay’s programs or risk retaliation, including poor evaluations and terminations. Resources that could have supported student literacy, technology, or high impact tutoring (HIT) were instead siphoned into a pay-to-play pipeline, leaving classrooms starved.

The Whole Damn System is Guilty

DC’s political establishment stayed silent, letting accountability die and public trust rot, while the basic questions remain: who benefited, and who covered it up? Even local media bosses won’t touch it. So, who the hell are they afraid of?

The evidence is beyond a reasonable doubt alleging the superintendent’s bosses—the Chief of Elementary Schools, Deputy Chancellor, Chancellor, and the Mayor—knew about her blatant Relay conflict. While the finger-pointing game begin, let's hold them accountable.

Role of Gatekeepers and Institutional Complicity

This was not an individual failure but a system of gatekeepers. Top senior leaders within DCPS, along with appointed officials and elected representatives, enabled the superintendent’s actions. Rather than protect vulnerable schools and children, they smoothed the path for Relay contracts, allowed the misuse of public funds and played willfully blind to numerous ethical violations. Their inaction transformed institutional authority into a tool of oppression, undermining trust in a system already fractured by racial inequity.

The media and watchdog organizations also failed to hold these leaders accountable, despite a 2020 whistleblower complaint alleging procurement fraud, double-agent conduct, and discriminatory practices. For years, silence allowed the scheme to fester, with Black elementary children in DC's poorest Wards paying the highest price.

The Fallout and Lasting Impact on DC Education

Thousands of elementary children will never get a second chance—their one window of opportunity slammed shut. Every stolen dollar redirected a child’s future. Every silenced educator erased a champion for justice. Every shady contract intentionally dismantled a powerhouse Black-led school all to personally enrich the pockets of top brass.

Since 2017, the Bowser administration deliberate segregation of Wards 7 and 8--while protecting affluent, majority-White schools--combined with the superintendent’s ethical abuses and Relay "no excuse" nationally controversial program practices, has not only harmed students but deepened and entrenched racial inequity.

The Bowser administration took funds that were supposed to help the most vulnerable kids in DC and instead used them in ways that harmed or exploited them.

Restoring Trust in Public Education

RelayGate is a wake-up call. It demands a new mayor and all councilmembers to demand accountability for those who profited at the expense of Black children and systemic reforms (tougher legislation) to prevent such abuses.

What #RelayGate Exposed: corruption with children as collateral.

• DCPS funneled public dollars into Relay while Black-majority schools in Wards 7 and 8 were forced into its programs, even as wealthier, whiter schools were spared.​

• Principals and administrators who questioned Relay’s harmful, prison-like discipline model were targeted, retaliated against, and in multiple cases fired.​

• Ethics findings now show DCPS leaders earned six-figure connected to Relay while overseeing the very schools pressured to pay Relay out of their own budgets.​​

What We Must Do Now

RelayGate is a line in the sand. Either DC chooses children, or it chooses the people who cashed in on them.​​

• Demand radical transparency in every contract touching public education funds.​

• Supercharge whistleblower power so educators can expose abuse and fraud without facing trumped-up evaluations, or termination.​

• Put every innovative program under a microscope—if it controls Black bodies, strips student dignity, or militarizes classrooms, it has no place in public schools.​

• Abolish profit-driven models like Relay’s that turn underserved schools into testing labs and cash machines for contractors and connected insiders.​

DC Voters: Your Move

Now, the question is not what the whistleblowers will do. It is what DC residents will do.​​

• Every candidate who wants your vote must answer for #RelayGate on the record, in public, with specifics. Where did they stand? What will they do about the contracts, the ethics violations, and the retaliation?​​

• DC voters must make clear that “I didn’t know” and “that was someone else’s office” responses are not acceptable. If they were silent while Black children and Black educators were targeted, that silence was a choice.​

The question on the ballot is simple: Do our public schools belong to our children—or to private interests and personal slush funds? T

To all DC candidates running for office—whose side are you on?

#RelayGate: Our Children's Futures Are Not for Sale.