Update: The D.C. Council on Tuesday gave final approval to a bill to rename Woodrow Wilson High School after Edna Jackson and Vincent Reed, two Black educators with deep ties to the school.

The name, Jackson-Reed High School, was approved by a vote of 11-1-0, with Ward 4 Coucilmember Janeese Lewis George abstaining and Ward 7 Councilmember Vincent Gray absent.

Lewis George has supported naming the school solely after Edna Jackson.

Original:

The D.C. Council approved a measure Tuesday that renames Woodrow Wilson High School after two Black educators with deep ties to the school: Edna Jackson and Vincent Reed.

Jackson, who died in 2004, became Wilson High’s first Black teacher after Bolling v. Sharpe, the landmark 1954 legal decision that integrated D.C.’s public schools. Reed served as the high school’s first Black principal and went on to become D.C. schools superintendent. He died in 2017.

Lawmakers voted 11-1-0, with Janeese Lewis George (D-Ward 4) abstaining and Vincent Gray (D-Ward 7) absent, to rename the high school Jackson-Reed. Lewis George supported naming the school solely after Jackson rather than both educators.

The vote follows a years-long campaign by Wilson alumni, students, and parents to remove Woodrow Wilson’s name from the public school in upper Northwest after community members drew attention to the former U.S. president’s efforts to re-segregate the federal workforce after years of racial integration.

Mayor Muriel Bowser’s administration had initially proposed renaming the school after prominent Black playwright August Wilson, but many alumni and students pushed back, pointing out that Wilson had no clear ties to the District or D.C. public schools.

Tim Hannapel, who attended Wilson High School in the 1970s, helped lead the effort to rename the school after Jackson and Reed. Jackson taught his 10th grade European history class.

“She was the best teacher I ever had,” Hannapel tells DCist/WAMU. Now a labor union lawyer, the Northwest D.C. native majored in history in college — a decision he credits to Jackson.

“She didn’t give you the answers, she made you think,” he says.

Hannapel says there was similarly strong support in the community to honor Reed, who became principal at the school in the tumultuous year of 1968. He’s thought to have been the first Black principal of any D.C. public school west of Rock Creek Park. Reed went on to have a long career in communications at the Washington Post. He is survived by his widow, Frances Bullitt Reed, who still lives in the District.

Hannapel co-founded a group called the DC History & Justice Collective, which has been pushing for the renaming for almost four years. Tuesday, the collective declared victory after the D.C. Council granted initial approval to the new Jackson-Reed name. Lawmakers must take a second vote at a later date to make it official, but the outcome is not likely to change.

“Today is a good day,” Hannapel said Tuesday. “This is a very powerful opportunity to learn about these two giants.”