Columbia Heights Educational Campus (CHEC)

Washington, DC

Empowering students to build agency and actively shape their learning experiences through liberatory design

Columbia Heights Education Campus (CHEC) is known for its commitment to academic excellence and social justice. The campus enrolls middle and high school students, building a tenured legacy from what was originally an alternative high school for multilingual learners started in 1979 with strong leadership—founder Maria Tukeva still serves as school principal.

With an “Advanced Placement for All” model and a unique dual-language immersion program, CHEC fosters intellectual curiosity, cultural competence, and community engagement.

CHEC is part of DC+XQ, a multi-year partnership to reimagine the high school experience in the nation’s capital. This community-led initiative has brought together educators, families, students, and community members with bold ideas for what is possible for DC’s high school students. Each school’s redesign is unique because every community is different.

Learn More about the DC+XQ partnership.

Students attending CHEC come from over 50 countries, speak many languages in their homes, contribute to the school’s global curriculum, and focus on world cultures. The CHEC team emphasizes the importance of youth voice and choice by building and fostering a school environment where students are co-designers of their learning.

Since CHEC joined the second cohort of DC+XQ schools in the summer of 2023, members of the school’s design team wanted to ensure they intentionally redesigned with a focus on students who indicated on surveys that they didn’t feel like they belonged at school. In late 2023, for example, the school engaged with 45 of its students to contribute to the design of its vision of an inclusive school experience. The students participated in trust-building exercises with their teachers and peers and designed plans for increasing participation and belonging. During the 2023-24 academic year, the school set a goal in their Comprehensive School Plan to have 25% of their student population (including students furthest from feeling a sense of belonging) attend and participate actively in leadership team meetings, faculty meetings, and design sprints.

CHEC saw a 4 percent increase from fall 2023 to spring 2024 in the overall percentage of students responding favorably to a survey about their sense of belonging. As one student who attended the retreat told a CHEC assistant principal, “I really feel like I’m being listened to when I share these things with you. I feel like things are going to happen when we get back to the building.”

CHEC’s design team has fostered authentic student engagement by expanding opportunities for students to use their voices to improve their educational experience. Staff and leadership team meetings, previously only open to adults, are now open to all. Students have been active members of four different design sprints centered on issues they identified:

Improving food offerings on campus
Creating a new master schedule
Making the grading system more equitable
Addressing chronic absences
Designing a community service and experiential learning initiative

In 2024, the CHEC team presented at the ASCD Annual Conference for educator professional development. Their session, “How Design Thinking Infused Student Voice Throughout a DC School,” shared how CHEC students co-design lessons, join staff meetings, and choose projects based on needs they identify in their community.

“It makes me feel really special to have a seat at this table and just express how other people are feeling, their needs and what they want, but also my needs and what I want.”

Abide

CHEC Student

“We are working to create a safe space where students feel their voices are heard. This can be supported as well in the classroom by making the classroom a place where student discussion is prioritized. Students are developing more confidence in sharing their voices as we provide more ongoing purpose and opportunities for the sharing.”

Maria Tukeva

CHEC Principal

“Participating in design sprints is an incentive for me to want to come back and teach [at CHEC] because I get to see the effects of not only my input but also that of my peers.”

Kyando

CHEC Student

“I’m looking forward to seeing what it looks like to be a student and have all this freedom and choice. How would they actually design their day?”

Krishunda Penn Pearson

CHEC Redesign Director

“We’re looking to empower the next generation of leaders. Kids are really getting an opportunity to take their education under their own control.”

Daniel Bellido

CHEC Teacher

XQ Tools and Resources in Action

All high schools taking part in DC+XQ used XQ’s Design Journey to bring the community together around a vision for redesign. They also used XQ’s Educational Opportunity Audit to analyze qualitative and quantitative data, including student transcripts. The EOA helps schools identify student opportunity gaps to facilitate change, ensuring all students are given equitable opportunities to succeed.