Amplified: The Chesapeake Public Schools Podcast
Our podcast serves as a platform to share the voices and stories of our people - our learners and employees - who shape the vision of Chesapeake Public Schools. This podcast provides our community with a unique insight into district operations, demonstrating how the division creates opportunities, prioritizes innovation, and elevates potential. New episodes are released monthly and feature a wide range of topics, including student achievements, innovative teaching practices, community partnerships, and important district initiatives. You can listen to the stories behind our story by subscribing on your favorite podcast platforms or by visiting cpschools.com/amplified.
Amplified: The Chesapeake Public Schools Podcast
Local Voices & Continued Lessons
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A quiet walk can carry a lot of history. We bring together Dr. Ella Ward—longtime educator, school board alum, and current Chesapeake City Council member—and Principal Wade Sloan of Portlock Primary to explore how a one-room schoolhouse on Benefit Road still shapes how our students learn, hope, and lead today.
Dr. Ward traces a lifetime of service that began with a simple neighborhood need and grew into decades of educational leadership. Her memories of segregated classrooms, long walks to school, and scarce resources set the stage for the Cornland School’s powerful legacy. That small building, once heated by a potbelly stove and filled with seven grades under one teacher, launched students who became engineers, educators, and civic leaders. Hearing her connect policy, preservation, and personal grit turns history from a static display into an invitation to act.
Principal Sloan shares how he brings that invitation into a school of five-to-eight-year-olds with sensitivity and intention. Portlock’s silent peace walk echoes Dr. King’s vision in kid-sized form, and daily bite‑size stories highlight Black innovators from the neighborhood as much as from textbooks. The throughline is identity: when children see local role models and hear tangible stories of perseverance, they claim pride in who they are and gratitude for what they have—buses, warm classrooms, and access previous generations were denied. We also point listeners to the Chesapeake African American Heritage Trail and the newly preserved Cornland School as living classrooms families can visit to keep the learning alive year-round.
If you care about culturally responsive teaching, community history, and giving kids the tools to say “I can,” this conversation will stay with you. Subscribe, share this episode with a friend who loves local history, and leave a review telling us the hometown story that shaped you.
The Stories Behind Our Story
You're listening to Amplify, the Chesapeake Public Schools podcast. Your front row seat to the stories behind our story.
Jay Lewter:Hi everyone, and welcome back to Amplified. This is Jay Looter here with Matt Graham. Matt, welcome to our February episode. I am so excited to be back with you and to have our Black History Month episode of Amplified.
Matt Graham:Yes, it's definitely been a little cold out. So it's nice to come in here into the studio and tell these incredible stories that we have here in Chesapeake and with Chesapeake Public Schools.
Jay Lewter:And two awesome guests to be with us this month, Matt, right? We have from Portlock Primary School, Mr. Wade Sloan. And I know that Wade does a lot of great projects with his primary school students to celebrate Black History Month and really does so with a lot of intention and a lot of sensitivity around that topic. So when we got ready to sit down and talk about Black History Month, I knew that Wade was going to be a great resource to talk to our community about Black History Month. And we're also really excited to have Dr. Ella Ward with us, Matt.
Matt Graham:Oh, yeah. Dr. Ella Ward, a current city council member, she has done so much for Chesapeake Public Schools and the entire Chesapeake community. I mean, she has five degrees. Incredible. Yeah. Yeah. And one of the things that we're excited to talk with her about is the Cornland School. Yes. Yeah. And it's now a museum. She spearheaded this whole effort to basically save the school that was established way back when. But you're going to find out about it. I don't want to tell you when. No spoilers, Matt. No spoilers.
Jay Lewter:No spoilers. No. Dr. Ella Ward is a huge resource for Chesapeake, former school board member, current city council member, and great to have her on the show today.
Matt Graham:That's right. And the unique thing about this episode that I find really awesome is that it is dropping the second week of February, which happens to be when Black History Month initially started, was the second week of February to honor both Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass's birthdays.
Jay Lewter:And Matt, I think this year is a really special milestone for Black History Month. Is that right?
Matt Graham:Yes, that is. It is the 100th anniversary of Black History Month.
Jay Lewter:Awesome. Awesome. Well, Matt, let's get right to it. I can't wait to hear from Mr. Sloan and Dr. Ward.
Matt Graham:Well, welcome, listeners. We are here with Dr. Ella Ward and Mr. Wade Sloan. Mr. Wade Sloan's a principal at Portlock Primary. Dr. Ward is, oh my goodness, has been a staple of the Chesapeake Public Schools community for many years. If you could take a moment and tell us a little bit about yourself and your connection with Chesapeake.
SPEAKER_01:Hello, everybody. And first of all, I'm just glad to be here. My husband and I built in Chesapeake in 1972. And believe it or not, I started working that year trying to help the people of Chesapeake, including myself. I started having some conversations with city council members because once we got in the house, the street was not paved. So I was pretty upset about that because people are, you know, the big trucks were coming by and they got a lot of dirt in my house on my white cockpit before the street was paved, and I was really upset. But anyway, so I think that kind of started a little bit of my political kind of career. I've been very active for years, the entire 53 years that I've lived in Chesapeake. It seems as though I was always working or fighting to get something done, some changes made, not just the street getting paid, but I was concerned about the fact that we didn't have a school, an elementary school in the neighborhood of Camelot, which is where we built. And my son and a lot of the other kids, especially the young ones, had to go across the street to Trico to get an educ elementary education. Education and schools, that's my baby. That's just my thing. But I worked up, tried to get that, we need a school in Camelot. So I started again going down to City Council. And I think I made a few speeches at school board before I was ever elected because I wanted some changes for my community. Still a member of the Camelot Civic League. I still work for them. And my son entered that first, he was in the first class to ever go to the Camelot Elementary School. And that was exciting. And I was teaching. I was raised in uh Suffolk, Virginia, born in North Carolina, but lived in Chesapeake all of our adult wise. I was teaching at uh Wilson High School since 1969, before most of you were born. And I was hired to teach English, and I taught English and journalism at the high school level, and I taught some of the best. My Bishop Kim Brown and former mayor of Portsmouth and the current sheriff of Portsmouth, and a lot of teachers and administrators in Chesapeake during my 35 years in the Portsmouth school system. And while I was an administration, very, very interested in that. And I decided, hmm, schools, that's my thing. I'm going to run for Chesapeake School Board. But I was very active in Chesapeake. You know, I served on the Fine Arts Commission and the Library Board. You know, I kept getting appointed and it was all good. I got appointed to the State Board of Education by Mark Warner in 2003. It was all about education, all about the kids, all about students. And I guess that's why I'm here and so interested in the Corneland School, because of my experience started on the school board in 2000, just seeing how the changes were and comparing them and thinking about how they were for me as an elementary student. So between politics and the school and my interest in children and education and trying to make a change for people, and that's been my life story. And it's a long, busy life, but it's all good because it was always my goal to help people, help others, help kids get an education. Such an inspiration. I know.
Matt Graham:Absolutely, 100%. Mr. Sloan, can you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself and your connection here with Chesapeake?
SPEAKER_03:I am originally from Lexington, Kentucky. And I came to this area because I attended Norfolk State University in 1997. And I graduated with undergraduate in early childhood education. And I started my educational career in Norfolk, Virginia. I taught kindergarten first grade for five years. And then I was living in Chesapeake. I said, why not work in Chesapeake instead of driving with that traffic going toward that base every morning? I was out near the airport working. And came to Chesapeake, taught five years at Carver Intermediate School, and then I taught eight years at Georgetown Primary School between third grade and kindergarten, first grade, back and forth. And then was the assistant principal at BM Williams Primary School for two years. The assistant principal at Portlock Primary for two years, and in my second year of principal at Portlock Primary now. So that has been my experience here in Chesapeake. Dr. Ward, I don't have the experience that you've had. But my passion, just like hers, is education. That's where my heart is with young children and just watching them grow. What you can see happen to a child over time is what makes me push forward and makes me do what I do. That's where the passion is.
Jay Lewter:Absolutely. And guys, the reason that we asked you to join us today is that February is Black History Month, and we've got so much to talk about. Black History Month started in 1926. So we're in our hundredth anniversary of this celebration. Wait, let's start with you. How do you approach Black History Month at the school level? And are there any specific themes or projects or voices that you guys prioritize?
SPEAKER_03:I would say I approach Black History Month with sensitivity and intentionality. I think it's very important for my student population. My school is about 50% African American. And it's important that they see positive African Americans in their everyday life, whether they be famous, like nationally famous, or if they're locally famous. And some of the things that I think need to be highlighted at a primary level are those positive aspects of the people who have made a difference in our community and in our world when it comes to African Americans and those who are highlighted in black history. They need to be able to see that positive aspect and aspire to be that positive person. So one thing that we do at Portlock that means a lot to me is we have a peace walk, a peace march, and it kind of replicates what Dr. Martin Luther King wanted to do to show peace in our country. And they make signs, and our peace walk is silent. We don't talk, we don't cheer, we play some silent music, and they through writing and through illustrations, they show what peace means to them. And we line the hallways and we just walk silently through the hallways and we show love and care for each other during that peace walk. I think that's how I I would highlight black history with my students the best because they're so young. My age group, we're five, maybe up to eight years old, maybe by the end of the school year. So you have to find very intentional ways and very sensitive ways to to highlight black history because it can be an insensitive area if you go too deep with little kids, you know. Sure. Anything could uh be a little bit much for a kindergartner. Sure. So you just have to be real intentional about your your how you approach your teaching or your your exposure to the subject in the school.
Jay Lewter:Absolutely. And and Mr. Sloan, I think part of your intentionality, just like you said, is is not only highlighting those people that we see on the magazine covers, absolutely, but also highlighting those that are right here in our community that are making a tremendous impact on our schools and on our lives and on all the things that are happening in Chesapeake. Dr. Ward, I know as a lifelong Chesapeake resident, I spent many trips in southern Chesapeake driving down Benefit Road.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, you did.
Jay Lewter:And and drove right past that little white building on Benefit Road and often said to myself, I wonder what that is. I wonder, I wonder. Come to find out that that building has a tremendous history in the city of Chesapeake and in Norfolk County.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
Jay Lewter:Uh will you tell us a little bit more about the Cornland School?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, absolutely. And I want to thank you too for remembering me and for inviting me to your school for your 100th anniversary of Hickory Elementary School. And I I talk about it frequently, just as they're latest this week, because you invited me, and it was Black History Month, I'm sure you remember, but I was invited to talk to the fourth graders all at one time in their auditorium, and then the fifth graders. But I was so impressed when I got there and I saw the Bulletin boys with Cornland School and the young people the kids were so excited and they knew so much about Corneland School.
Jay Lewter:Well, it's such an important story to that community. We we can't let our younger generation of students we can't let that opportunity go by without reminding them of that history. Exactly. Well, as a The Cornland School started post-Civil War, during segregation, as an opportunity for African American children to go to school in a one-room schoolhouse and then s Norfolk County. Norfolk County, yes. And so students typically walked to school down those country roads to go to school in that one room schoolhouse and spent the day there and then walked home that afternoon and did that well into the 1950s until about 1952. So from about 1902 to 1952, that was schools.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. And many of them walked eight miles one way and eight miles back home. There was no, you know, there was no electricity, there were outhouses, four bathrooms, and then those were the kind of facilities that they had. So in that one teacher taught all seven grades, which was amazing. But again, interesting to me because on their former teacher and all of that, how did they do it? But they managed. I can't imagine. Yeah, I can't imagine.
Matt Graham:And there was a stove. I heard there's a big pot belly.
SPEAKER_01:Wow. Yeah. No running water, you know. So they had a big pail and there was a pump outside. And I can relate to that because growing up in Nancement County, we had one too.
Jay Lewter:So, Mr. Sloan, we don't have those kind of facilities at Portlock Primary School. We've got full facilities at Portlock. But let me ask you, how are you incorporating stories like the Cornland School into what happens day to day into your Black History Month celebrations at Portlock Primary?
SPEAKER_03:Well, I'm glad you asked that. What we do to incorporate those types of things because our instructional schedule is so tight. You know, we stick to this pace, and you know what it's like. You've all been educated. And so things that are outside of the curriculum, you have to kind of insert other places or you have to incorporate them into your lessons through intentional read alouds at the primary level. But then also in our morning announcements and in videos, we during Black History Month, we uh distribute like these slides and video clips that the teachers can use in their room. And they're short, they're just really short videos about history and different aspects of uh black history that they can show every day during the month. It's something that is, I think, very important for the students to see and to hear. It gives them a sense of pride almost, you know, and a sense of worth. At that age, it's hard for them to understand that. But if you plant the seed of I can do, I see somebody doing what I want to do, it ignites some some fire in our students, I believe. You plant almost a seed, you know, and in that student in this brochure. It says that the school, the Cornland School, gave students the opportunity to become important leaders. And I think that's important for us to, for our students to see that they can become important leaders. So that's how we do it. We just do it with with the time that we do have, we insert those uh bits of information there.
Jay Lewter:Yeah, and I know for me, when we had Dr. Ward come visit at Hickory Elementary School to talk to our students about about Cornland, the way that they were able to connect with something that was happening right in their own backyard and recognizing that all these really important moments happened so close to home really resonated with them. You know, often like I said earlier about, you know, recognizing folks on magazine covers and things like that, being able to see them right here in your backyard, seeing folks like like Dr. Ward on City Council really resonates with young people to know that that those things are happening right here. Right.
SPEAKER_03:I think it's important that they know that it's happening right here. So much history is in this area that the young people don't know about. So it's very important that we keep that history alive because it does. If you don't know where you've been, then you go, you don't know where you can go. And so I think it's important to instill that history into our our students, whether no matter what their nationality is, there's a a strong sense of history, even here in this area of Virginia, that even being from just a couple states over, that I've learned that has opened my eyes to the possibilities. And and and children, all children, have to know that they're there are possibilities out there. And if you don't know where you've been, you don't know the possibilities of where you could be.
Matt Graham:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And one of the lessons from Cornland School, do you hope we can instill in our students today?
SPEAKER_01:And I think one of the most valuable things is something that you have said is just to let students know, young people, middle people, elderly people too, even, but yet you can do things to learn about what's going on, but you can also become whatever it is you want. I mean, you think about the fact that these students walked eight miles, you know, one way and eight miles home, didn't have any electric light, didn't have inside bathroom, didn't have, you know, adequate water except through a pump, but they became Randy Sneed, the owner of the land where the school was, who confronted me, you know, finished the seventh grade there, but became one of the best top engineers in uh not only Chesapeake, well, it was Norfolk County then, but in Chesapeake, and it's just amazing. Uh, we have teachers now who went to that school and got us directors and nurses and doctors. There's no limit to what you can do. And even with my, you know, coming up in Nasman County, didn't have the privileges that, you know, our students now have, but still look at where they are. And that really is amazing to me. And it's encouraging too. I use it in, used it in classrooms when I was teaching, you know, that you can be whatever it is you want to be if you set your mind to it and work hard. And the students there, they really are, I think the former students, just the epitome of dedication, hard work, and see where you can go. Study, work hard, and you can be whatever it is. I think that is to me so important. Dr. Ward, that message is timeless.
Jay Lewter:Uh, Mr. Sloan, same question for you. What lessons from Cornland School do you hope that your students are able to instill today?
SPEAKER_03:The lesson that I want them to learn is just that the value of what you have. I want them to be able to hold on to uh what you have. We we have it easy today. We have very easy. We have buildings that we can go into where education is free and we're we're able to get on the bus and ride the school bus to school every day. And and just what is the if you just grab on to what you have, you know, that wasn't always there for you. You have the opportunity to learn in an environment where it's welcoming, where it's warm, where you don't have to put wood in the pot belly stove, where you don't have to sit in a classroom with others learning other things. Everybody's learning the same thing. You have your own teacher in your own grade. And for the most part, it's all free. And to stop taking education for granted, we're a generation away from people who were touched by the way school was. She wasn't integrated until high school. So familiar through stories of that. I went to a high school that was rebirthed, the same high school my mother went to that was segregated, was rebirthed into a school. And I didn't have to endure what she had to endure as a student. So it made me appreciate education. It made me appreciate what I had. And if we could just take the lesson of appreciation of what we have, if we could just gain a sense of pride in what we have today and how times have made it accessible to everyone. I thank you for re rebirthing the Cornland School because I think it's some it's a part of history that never needs to be forgotten.
SPEAKER_01:And I can relate to so much of that because I went to segregated schools all of my life until I was in college. But it still that was segregated to Norfolk State. But I mean, it really was in Nesmick County in grades one through twelve. And didn't have a bus, you know, had to walk to, yeah, to marry E. S. But yeah, it can relate so well. And I think that that's another reason why I'm just so dedicated to this, because I really know what it was like. I had to walk all the way until we got to be. We didn't have a bus until I was in ninth grade. And before that, I was walking two miles to school. My husband had a bus because they lived 20 miles from the school. But I had to walk. Rain, snow, yeah, a sleet. And yeah, it's amazing, but still, but God, you know, and dedication. Oh, yeah, it just made me and I remember that. So I think that's part of my passion for this. I can make to all of those people who are on there because really I was basically almost just like him. It was just a little shorter distance. It wasn't 10 miles or eight miles, but two miles as a child. Yeah.
Jay Lewter:Yeah, I did. What a great conversation today. I think all of us need to get out and make a visit to the Chesapeake African American Heritage Trail as we're able. Maybe not in February when it's cold, but obviously in the spring, maybe when, or summer when students are home. Get out there and see what's happening at the new home of the Cornland School and the African American Heritage Trail. It's a great resource for our students. Students so that they can remember Black History Month all year round.
Matt Graham:That's right. Thank you so much for coming in and informing us about the Corneland School, highlighting Black History Month. It means a lot to not just us, but for our entire community. And we thank you so much.
Jay Lewter:Thank you. Thank you. And everyone, we'll see you next time on Amplified.
Matt Graham:We hope you enjoyed the stories behind our story on this episode of Amplified, the Chesapeake Public Schools podcast. Connect with us at cpschools.com forward slash amplified, and be sure to subscribe or follow us wherever you get your podcasts.
