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Leadership Letter

                                                                                      Wednesday, September 9, 2026

 

Dear facility leaders.

Welcome to the 2026 – 2027 school year!

Thanks to Vin Harkins @ Holton Arms, Marvin Muhat @ Potomac School, and Joseph Clarke @ National Cathedral who, with some modest arm twisting, will host DMV Alliance events on their campuses this season.

Additional details noted below, and on our website. Vin Harkins @ Holton Arms will send additional details as the October date approaches. RSVPs are most appreciated. In the event that something comes up — no problem, although please advise so that we can pivot on lunch. Thank you.

Friday, October 9, 2026 @ 11:30 AM. Vin Harkins @ Holton Arms School. Open Forum & Luncheon. Chiller Replacement: Lessons Learned & Student Commons Tour

Friday, January 15, 2027 @ 11:30 AM. Marvin Mahut @ Potomac School. Open Forum & Luncheon Presentation. Serving students and families with the largest fee-based neighborhood school-owned/operated buses in the region, while also utilizing alternative fuel sourcing

Friday, April 9, 2027 @ 11:30 AM. Joseph Clarke @ National Cathedral School. Open Forum Luncheon. Tour of the Underwood Athletic Center, a state-of-the-art 90,000 SF three-floor underground facility

Many of you will also recall that facility staffers have moved up the ranks. Jose Tavara now leads the facility team at The Heights, while Danillo Espinoza has taken the reigns at McLean, and Tommy Reed is leading the facility team at Landon.

Also had a chance this summer to catch up with a veteran facility manager, Donold Morrison — called back into action — and now the director of facilities @ the Lowell School. Welcome, Donald. Another veteran, Dennis Shores, is leading the charge at the Friends Academy.

Could not have been more impressed, while visiting Beau Hill, who shared that when his is not solving obstacles on campus @ Saint Paul VI, he is rebuilding cars — top to bottom.

That’s a good starting lineup.

Meanwhile, a list of various projects that FMs  championed this summer, while most everyone else on campus was at the beach.

  • William Wivell @ Saint James School reports that the new resident life complex still under construction on campus is nearing completion and will soon be occupied
  • Bill Owens @ Saint Stephens/Saint Anne’s delivered classroom expansions and renovations through Coakley Williams; in-house upper School gym lobby renovation, and the upper school soccer field turf replacement through Spinturf ($460k)
  • Joseph Clarke @ National Cathedral’s major work included field turf on top of the of the athletic center. This work was done by GTR in coordination with KCE structural and Vika. The rest of its summer work was likely similar to everyone else’s: deep cleaning, painting, soft-surface flooring and furniture replacement, etc.
  • Ed Dayhoff @ the Academy of Holy Cross commissioned a new gymnasium. Ruff Roofing installed metal coping over 1,700 LF of aged limestone coping, which was in severe distress; and the school’s exterior envelope restoration. For instance, Chris Glasser, who originally installed Dryvit material years ago, returned with his crew and resurfaced all of the Dryvit and recaulked the entire structure, which looks dynamite; in addition, we further enhanced security by adding an additional thirty cameras to existing array, while also adding card access controls to monitor who arrives and departs campus

Danny Borrer @ Foxcroft knocked out extensive in-house renovations on at least one resident life building on campus

Lee Thompson @ Holy Child managed a host of various summer projects, updates, and renovations including Kolb’s electrical work, Braxx Roofing and skylight installations, Sports Graphics athletic field wall-pad installations, and new soft soft-surface flooring install

Erin May @ Saint Johns College High School, in addition to countless other projects on campus, wrapped up the school’s interior connector student walk project

James McDowell @ Langley scheduled this summer modest work on campus, primarily painting and soft surface flooring replacement in the lower school and administration building along with minor roof replacement

JC Ruano @ The French International School guided Excel Mechanical and Anderson Mechanical are more sizeable work and also hired Dimas Painting for various projects on campus

 

Thanks all for your contribution, and hope to see most of you on Vin’s campus next month.

Neal Helm

Program Chair
DMV Independent School Alliance