A last-minute addition to the agenda for Monday’s Fredericksburg City School Board meeting could have lasting effects for the division’s students.
Deputy Superintendent Matt Eberhardt announced that local developer Larry D. Silver, a James Monroe High School graduate, will donate $1 million toward the expansion of Career and Technical Education (CTE) and the eventual construction of a CTE center.
Eberhardt said that the legal agreement between the Silver Foundation and FCPS had been in the works “for some time now,” and that the building will carry Silver’s name “for all time.” The board unanimously approved the agreement.
According to FCPS spokesperson Katie Hornung, Silver’s gift is the largest donation the division has ever received. The school board plans to honor Silver at its March meeting.
The donation will take the form of annual $100,000 payments over the next 10 years and will be held at the Fredericksburg Education Foundation, as school boards cannot carry over funds from fiscal year to year.
According to Eberhardt, the division has discussed upgrading its CTE offerings since 2019, accelerating its efforts over the past six months.
In 2023, FCPS began theory-crafting a program at James Monroe High School that would offer instruction in criminal justice, culinary, drafting, early childhood, emergency medicine, energy, geospatial, JROTC, manufacturing, mechatronics and trades such as HVAC, electricity, and plumbing. The division’s new middle school, set to open next fall, was designed with CTE spaces in mind, and FCPS also held two superintendent’s roundtables on CTE in recent years.
In thanking Silver, school board member Malvina Rollins Kay (Ward 4), a fellow James Monroe graduate, noted that while he was several years ahead of her in school, “this is indicative of how we were taught in the city. It’s the status of giving back… This CTE program is needed in our school system. We are so far behind.”
School board member Jarvis Bailey (at-large), himself a CTE teacher in Stafford County, said he believes that Silver’s investment in CTE “will have a snowball effect. I’m excited about CTE in Fredericksburg. We’re going to shock the world.”
Disclosure: The Silver Companies are a major donor to the Free Press.
