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As school ends, Katrina evacuees face choices

For many Katrina evacuees, the end of school will bring fresh uncertainty because school helped anchor students who have been living with friends or relatives in temporary quarters and unfamiliar cities since the fall.
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Jasmyn Palmer, left, and Marcus Nance during an interview Wednesday afternoon at Charles H. Flowers in Springdale, Md.Kevin Clark / The Washington Post
/ Source: a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/front.htm" linktype="External" resizable="true" status="true" scrollbars="true">The Washington Post</a

Hung Tran began eighth grade in flight from the hurricane that flooded his New Orleans home. He finished the school year 1,000 miles away in Prince George's County. Now he faces another move, to Virginia, one more ripple in the demographic and educational upheaval unleashed by Katrina.

During his sojourn at Greenbelt Middle School, Hung made a name for himself as a spelling ace. The 14-year-old clinched victory in the county bee with "eupepsia" (definition: good digestion).

He was even profiled on ABC's "World News Tonight" the day he misspelled "entelechy" last week at the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Anchor Charles Gibson said the word (a philosophy term) had stumped him, too. "But that young man still has a lot to be proud of," Gibson said.

As the school year draws to a close -- yesterday was the final day in Prince George's -- hundreds of students who landed in the Washington area after Hurricane Katrina are beginning their first summer break since the disaster uprooted their families.

For many, the end of school will bring fresh uncertainty. School helped anchor students who have been living with friends or relatives in temporary quarters and unfamiliar cities since the fall. Some thrived in their adopted schools, and some struggled to acclimate. But most took comfort in the structure of an academic routine. Now their parents are weighing whether to stay in the area, move back to the Gulf Coast or attempt to start a new life elsewhere.

At the height of the Gulf Coast exodus, about 950 hurricane-displaced students were enrolled in Maryland and about 1,300 in Virginia. D.C. public schools reported a peak enrollment of 72 hurricane evacuees. Roman Catholic schools in the area counted about 100.

Most had fled Katrina, which hammered southeast Louisiana and Mississippi in late August. The totals also include students forced to leave the Texas-Louisiana border region when Hurricane Rita hit in late September.

Many displaced students drifted out of the Washington area soon after arriving. Maryland now has 518. Virginia counted 815 on March 31. The District's count dropped sharply as well.

"A lot of students came in for the first semester, when there really wasn't a home [for them] and families were trying to figure out what the next steps were," said Susan Gibbs, a spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Washington. Many Catholic school students, she said, returned to the New Orleans area. "Not all of them did. Not all of them could."

Mixed emotions about leaving
Since September, Hung, his parents and his sister, Mary, have lived at the home of his older brother Elvis in Greenbelt. But the entire family expects to move to Richmond soon. There, Hung's father will search for work. It's unclear when the family will move back to New Orleans, if ever.

Hung said he still hungers for Louisiana gumbo and jambalaya. But he'll miss Greenbelt, too. "I made some great friends," he said. "I had awesome teachers."

At Charles H. Flowers High School in Springdale, two Katrina evacuees remained at year's end out of 12 who had arrived in September. Marcus Nance, 16, and Jasmyne Palmer, 17, both finished 11th grade at Flowers. He plans to stay in Prince George's and graduate next year; she is headed back to Louisiana.

After Katrina, Marcus and his family endured harsh days and nights outside the Superdome before escaping flooded New Orleans. He and his mother, younger sister and two younger brothers wound up in a Lanham apartment.

Except for troubles with chemistry, Marcus had a decent year academically. He joined the football team and played in a couple of games. He made several tackles as a defender on kickoffs and hopes to compete for a starting position as a defensive back in his senior year.

"I adjusted real quick," Marcus said. "The education here is better than down south."

The post-Katrina chaos in New Orleans left a mark on the quiet teenager. "I'm not worried about anything anymore," Marcus said. "I've been through that. It made me stronger."

His mother, Nadir Nance, is a business student at a Maryland branch of the University of Phoenix and supports her family with government aid and a tutoring job. She is thinking of moving to Georgia after Marcus graduates. "I say my prayers. I believe in God. I know He's going to see us all through this," she said.

Jasmyne came to Prince George's with her grandmother, two dogs and two cats after fleeing Slidell, La. They first stayed in a relative's home. Then her grandmother landed a special education job at a middle school, and they moved into a Bowie townhouse. But Jasmyne plans to return to the Slidell area next week and finish high school there. She said she'll live with her grandfather, who has a house, or her father, who lives in an emergency-assistance trailer.

Of her year at Flowers, Jasmyne said: "It was okay. I adjusted to it eventually." But she said she often felt out of place and had some academic struggles. "It was such a drastic change for her," said her grandmother, Danielle Hinton. Flowers, with 2,500 students, was four times as large as Jasmyne's previous high school.

At Scotchtown Hills Elementary School in Laurel, teachers said goodbye this week to two brothers who had fled New Orleans with their mother and two older siblings. Phillip Davis, 10, and Travis Davis, 11, completed fourth grade at the Prince George's school and are apparently returning to Louisiana.

Sabrina Davis, their mother, said she is trying to scrape together bus fares to take her children to a family reunion near Baton Rouge, La., in July. She has had ulcers and other health problems and is surviving on government assistance. Her plans for the coming year in Louisiana are unclear. But she said she is grateful to Scotchtown Hills.

"The school has been tremendous," she said. "I wish I could take the whole land with the school and put it on a trailer. I wish I could take the school with me."

Katrina echoed in Phillip's classroom for most of the year. Students crafted a hurricane-shaped mobile with cardboard rectangles, string and wire hooks. It still hung from the ceiling during the last days of school, a question written on each rectangle. "How do hurricanes make floods?" one read. Another: "How do hurricanes hurt people?"