About two dozen proud staff members, parents and students from Richmond’s Carver Elementary School stood to be acknowledged at last week’s School Board meeting at City Hall.

They were applauded because, for the second consecutive year, the school earned the distinction as a Title I Highly Distinguished School by the Virginia Department of Education.

Only nine schools across Virginia earned the distinction. To qualify, schools must exceed all state and federal accountability benchmarks for two consecutive years and achieve pass rates on reading and mathematics Standards of Learning tests at or above the 85th percentile.

This year’s awards are based on students achieving those benchmarks during the 2013-2014 and 2014-15 school years.

Carver Elementary also is a nominee for the National Blue Ribbon Award, which is based on a school’s overall academic excellence or its progress in closing achievement gaps among student subgroups.

Blue Ribbon award winners are usually announced in September and recognized at an awards ceremony in Washington.

Carver Principal Kiwana Yates praised all involved for the school’s successes.

“It takes a special person to light that fire, to raise our children’s expectations for themselves and never give up on them, no matter how challenging it might be,” she told the Free Press. “All of us are here because, at some point, somebody did that for us. The staff at G.W. Carver are trailblazers, always ready to guide our students to the beacon light of their true destiny — success!”

Carver Elementary has 500 students in kindergarten through fifth grade. About 95 percent of the students are African-American.

“Public schools don’t get to select their students, but division superintendents, principals, teachers and other public school educators do decide how they respond to the challenges economically disadvantaged children bring to the classroom,” Billy K. Cannaday Jr., president of the state Board of Education, stated in a news release.

Carver Elementary and the other eight schools honored “combine effective instruction with the non-instructional support that inspires many children in poverty to focus and succeed,” he said.

Each school and the school division will receive a certificate of recognition.

Carver Elementary is among 17 of the 45 public schools in Richmond to earn full accreditation from the Virginia Department of Education after surpassing state standards in four core SOL tests administered last spring.