Georgia Washington Middle School


Georgia Washington Middle School is a public middle school in Montgomery, Alabama.

History

Founding and early history

The school was founded in 1893 by Georgia Washington, a woman who was born a slave in Virginia; she was sold along with her mother, away from her father. After emancipation she graduated from Hampton University, an HBCU in Virginia where she then taught for a while before moving to Mount Meigs, Alabama, and starting a small school there called the People's Village School. At the time, Mount Meigs was a rural area with a significant African-American population, and the school's first building was a small cabin, 12 by 13 feet, where Washington had four boys as students. Washington is buried on the school grounds.

Subsequent history

By 1916 enrollment had reached 225. Washington herself retired in 1936, and after her death in 1952 the school was renamed for her. In 1943 the school was deeded to Montgomery Public Schools. It became a junior high school in 1970, and a middle school in 2012. By 2017 enrollment was 600. In 2018, controversy arose because the Montgomery school system, headed by an interim superintendent while under state oversight, announced the sale of the school to the Pike Road Municipal school system; a lawsuit to stop the sale was filed by the Alabama Education Association on behalf of three teachers and parents. The sale would mandate that the school keep its name and that her grave be maintained.