Tez’Ziah Ransford recently marked the end of her elementary school journey with a walk across the stage at John H. Ketcham Elementary School in Southeast and her acceptance of awards for excellence in math, music, socioemotional learning and soccer.
For Tez’Ziah, the road to middle school hasn’t been without its ups and down.
“It’s been a long time [with] different principals, different students, teachers leaving and a lot more,” Tez’Ziah told The Informer. “Every year I have a mentor that I can talk to and tell, and they can help me … explain my feelings.”
Tez’Ziah also reflected on another aspect of her burgeoning academic career: the random, but relevant, Black history facts she learned while sitting at the feet of Emma P. Ward, a substitute teacher who spent much of this school year at Ketcham Elementary.
Ward’s instruction not only came amid a revamp of citywide social studies standards that was scheduled to come into effect during the 2024-2025 school year, but the Washington Substitute Teachers United’s ongoing efforts to combat what leaders described as D.C. Public Schools’ (DCPS) narrowing of coverage opportunities, elimination of compensation for professional development days, and inadequate professional development.
“She’s been a great substitute, and I really like her teaching,” Tez’Ziah said about Ward. “Our teachers don’t teach us this for real, and Black History Month is actually, actually very important. The teachers that’s teaching us about Black history are inspiring us to be a Black history fact in our future.”
A Deeper Look: Emma P. Ward Returns to Ketcham Elementary School on a Mission
On the morning of June 9, Tez’Ziah and 27 other 2025 graduates each received a folder from Ward enclosed with their headshot on the left side and, on the right side, nearly two dozen Black history facts relevant to their week of birth— courtesy of The Washington Informer.
Ward created each folder at the end of a year that reacclimated her to her old stomping grounds of Ketcham Elementary, where she served as a substitute teacher during the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks that claimed the lives of Ketcham fifth grader Rodney Dickens and teacher James Debeuneure, along with four other D.C. Public Schools community members.
“The reason I came back was because I see that the history of Ketcham is not being brought forward,” Ward told The Informer. “So, we need to move forward. I’ve gotten in touch with some of the people who were here during the time that we were here. I want them to come back, and I want them to be a part of the graduation processions that they have every year.”
Until that time comes, Ward said she will continue to make history relevant to young people through The Informer’s Black Facts page.
For more than 20 years, The Informer has commemorated Black history births and other milestones each week in Black Facts — which often appears on Page 6. Ward has collected editions of Black Facts since 2019, sprinkling parts of what she read in her daily instruction, regardless of what she’s teaching or where she’s serving as a DCPS substitute.
She and second-generation Washington Informer publisher Denise Rolark Barnes promoted that tradition on Monday as they passed out folders specifically designed for each elementary school graduate before speaking with their parents and taking photos.
Rolark Barnes, who described Black Facts as part of an arsenal that also includes the annual citywide spelling bee, said that Ward’s use of the weekly column further advances her father Calvin Rolark’s mission to boost Black civic engagement.
“Black Facts is a way to provide positive information to our community about themselves and their history,” Rolark Barnes said. “So when teachers find it valuable enough to share in the classroom, and the students value the teacher and the information, that adds to their whole educational experience. It shows that people really care about what they learn and how they learn.”
As the Trump administration takes the erasure of Black history to the next level, Ward also called The Informer’s Black Facts a tool in circumventing federal policy.
“Every time that Washington Informer is printed, you’ve got your history right there,” Ward said. “I must have over 500 issues. Every school that I’ve gone to, I’ve asked them to do it, and I’ve never given up.”
Students Highlight History: ‘They Need to Know How We Got Our Freedom’
Ketcham’s promotion ceremony started with a processional and greetings by LaCondria Beckwith, Ketcham’s principal.
The ceremony also recognized valedictorian Brielle Toney and salutatorian August Tyson.
From that point on, Tez’Ziah and fellow fifth grade graduate Noah Jones served as mistress and master of ceremony during a program where graduates and community members heard remarks from: Ketcham alumna Trinity Hall, former Laurel, Maryland council member Martin Mitchell, and State Board of Education Student Representative Calique Barnes.
Graduates also sang Michaal Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” (1987) and Bruno Mars’ “Count on Me” (2010), and those filling the auditorium also listened to Lance Smith and Dior Lightfoot perform recitations of Langston Hughes’ “I Too Am America” and Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise,” respectively.
Toward the end of the program, graduates received awards and certificates of completion before valedictorian Brielle passed the torch to fourth grade scholar Malonie Speight.
Raegan Mckie, a 2025 graduate who’s on her way to a KIPP D.C. middle school, said she feels more confident in her talents as a dancer, thanks in part to the knowledge that she accumulated while in class with Ward.
“I can be myself, study about history, and learn new things about it,” Raegan said.
On Monday, Raegan received a folder that contained a cutout of a Black Facts page highlighting the Aug. 4 birthday of former President Barack H. Obama, who, around the time of her birth, was in the middle of his second term as the nation’s first African American president.
As she moves on to middle school, Raegan said she’s ready to make an impact in her own way, especially since, as she recalled, Ward piqued her interest in history and the process of exchanging information with peers.
“That was one of her things to do,” Raegan recounted. “She really liked history. It’s important because you get to know everything. It made me feel good because she told us that when we grow up, we’re going to know a lot of history and we could tell new people new stuff.
While perusing the page inside his folder, Noah expanded his Black history knowledge beyond icons such as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks and Muhammad Ali. That morning, he learned about Adam Clayton Powell Sr., a pioneer of the Abyssinian Baptist Church and father of Congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr., with whom he shares a May 5 birthday.
Noah said that he identified more with Powell, and not others that The Informer’s Black Facts featured for that date — like Chicago Defender founder Robert S. Abbott and the Rev. Eugene Marino, the U.S.’s first Black Roman Catholic archbishop — because of Powell’s ties to Virginia.
Throughout much of the school year, Noah applied the same logic about proximity as he immersed himself in Ward’s Black history lessons.
“It was fun because she showed us pictures of different people she met that’s a part of Black history,” Noah said.
At the promotion ceremony, Noah received awards for reading, math and engagement of the school library. As he prepares for middle school, Noah is expressing plans to bring this information to light for his friends.
“It’s important [to] know where Black people come from,” he told The Informer. “I’m Black and I need to know what my ancestors did. I hope to use [these lessons] by telling people who don’t know and teaching them about it. They need to know how we got freedom.”