WASHINGTON, D.C. (WUSA) -- Education in D.C. has been a hot button issue in recent weeks: President Obama said he didn't think his daughters who attend private school would get the same quality education at a D.C. public school. Schools chancellor Michelle Rhee resigned.

But there are some bright lights in a troubled city like Washington. Julia King is a young woman who was recently named Teach For America's elementary school teacher of the year. She increased reading and math test scores dramatically at her former school in Indiana and now she's teaching here at DC Prep, a public charter school.

In a former warehouse in an economically struggling quadrant of the city, 24 year-old King teaches lessons that will last a lifetime.

"She tells us to always try and never give up," said Orie Ulu, one of King's 5th grade students.

At DC Prep, character and compassion are as important as academics.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (WUSA) -- As DC prepares to join more than a dozen states that allow the use of medicinal marijuana, some patients here say other laws will have to change in order for it to work.

One patient who says she needs medicinal marijuana raises the issue of drug tests.

If medicinal marijuana is legal, she asks, how can an employer deny you a job or fire you for failing a drug test because it shows you have used marijuana?

"I have been H-I-V positive over 20 years. I've been denied employment over numerous times due to drug testing, and I just refuse to tell an employer I'm H-I-V positive, this is the reason I can't pass the drug test," she told 9NewsNow, which agreed to protect her identity.

It's not the only problem she forsees as DC implements the new law next year.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (WUSA) -- A plan to help DC voters who are in the military and stationed abroad, and other voters who are working abroad ,has just been de-railed by student hackers who have demonstrated security weaknesses in a computer program designed to allow those voters to cast their ballots online.

The DC Board of Elections and Ethics is testing a process that would allow absentee voters to download a ballot, fill it out, and file it, all online.