Location: 8400 River Road, Laurel, MD 20724
Phone: (202) 299-3227 | Fax: (240) 456-4643
Principal: Arnetta Young
The Maya Angelou Academy is the school at New Beginnings Youth Development Center (formerly, Oak Hill Youth Detention Center), the District of Columbia’s secure facility for youth who have been adjudicated delinquent and committed to the Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services (DYRS). The See Forever Foundation assumed management of the school in June 2007, bringing with it the same positive culture and high expectations that make the Maya Angelou Public Charter School successful.
Our goal at the Maya Angelou Academy is to provide a safe, nurturing, and mutually respectful environment that motivates and prepares each student to fulfill his academic or career potential. With the support of a wide circle of caring adults, students develop the skills they need to make sound decisions and lead rewarding lives.
Although our school at the Maya Angelou Academy began in June 2007, See Forever’s work with adjudicated youth began 13 years ago. In 1997, two young lawyers saw that kids leaving D.C.’s juvenile detention facility had no good programs to help them get on track. Those lawyers, James Forman, Jr. and David Domenici, left their jobs to give a few young people what they needed: job training, a salary, and tutoring to help them in school. They subsequently founded the See Forever Foundation and the Maya Angelou Public Charter School.
Now that See Forever manages the school within New Beginnings Youth Development Center, our work has come full circle, and we have the chance to reach more of the young people who need help reconnecting to school, work, and their own futures.
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