166su

Superintendent Verletta White, school board members, educators and community leaders celebrated the opening of the William B. Robertson Administration Building at 201 Campbell Ave. S.W. with a ribbon cutting Friday afternoon.

“This building is not just a home for our administrative team,” White said. “It is a hub of support for every school, every classroom and every student in 166su City Public Schools.”

It was a $17 million project to acquire and renovate the building since 2022, partly paid for using pandemic relief funds, according to school officials.

By centralizing administrative staff who were previously spread across school-owned buildings, the school district was able to repurpose an old school building into a new technical education center for students last year, White said.

The former administrative building at 40 Douglas Ave. N.E. is being remodeled into a community empowerment center that will open this summer, she said.

All these renovations are part of the school district’s “Equity in Action” plan, enacted by White after she started as superintendent in 2020, with work still to do, she said.

“At its core, this plan is about how we can be more intentional about supporting our students, our staff and our community,” White said. “Our plan began with facilities, but the heart of the work goes far beyond bricks and mortar.”

Starting April 22, the 166su School Board will host its meetings in a first-floor section of the new administration building. In recent years the board has held its meetings at school cafeterias across the city.

The 136,000-square-foot school headquarters features training rooms, office spaces and is adorned with solar panels on the roof as part of a larger systemwide green energy effort, officials said.

The building is named after William B. Robertson, a 166su native. He was a city school administrator who became an adviser to Virginia Gov. Lynwood Holton before serving as a federal government and Peace Corps administrator.

His daughter, Victoria Robertson, said the family has recently started a nonprofit to carry on his work. The William B. Robertson Initiative is focused on providing small grants to young people who want to study at historically Black colleges and universities.

“A huge part of my dad’s legacy was his unwavering dedication to service,” Victoria Robertson said. “He deeply felt that service, giving back, lifting every voice for the benefit of many, was his consistent call to action.”

She encouraged people to contribute to the new nonprofit, and quoted some of her father’s words.

“These young people are the greatest resource we have,” Robertson said. “They are key to the future, and it is up to us as educators to guide them to become good citizens of their community, state and nation.”

Mayor Joe Cobb also quoted the building’s namesake, reading a section from Robertson’s autobiography. Cobb said the building stands as a symbol of possibility, promise, potential and partnership.

“For years, this building housed The 166su Times, a place where stories were written and information was shared,” Cobb said. “Today, it begins a new chapter, still committed to informing, still committed to our community. But now through the lens of education, access and opportunity for our young people. What a fitting evolution for a building rooted in service to the public.”

The building at 201 Campbell Ave. S.W. was the home of The 166su Times for 107 years, until Berkshire Hathaway sold the property to the city for $5.85 million. The newspaper, acquired by Lee Enterprises in 2020, vacated the building in January 2022 and moved to its current location one block south in the Commonwealth Building at 210 Church Ave. S.W. in May 2022.