With Montgomery County now on record as supporting raising the age at which Maryland students can legally drop out if school, Baltimore state Sen. Catherine E. Pugh says the city has gained a powerful ally in its push to require students to continue their education until they reach 18. Sen. Pugh, a Democrat from the 40th District, says that by joining Prince George's County and the city in pushing to raise the drop-out age, Montgomery County will add a large bloc of delegates supporting new legislation in the General Assembly next year, making passage of some kind of reform more likely.

"I see a continued groundswell of support around the issue," Pugh said Monday, adding the "we are hoping to focus this year on moving compulsory attendence to 17, and then raising it to 18 the following year."

 The argument against raising the minimum age at which students can legally leave school has long been that it would cost the state more to educate the additional kids who otherwise would have dropped out -- up to $40 million a year more a year, according one estimate by the state legislative services department.

"What that amounts to is planning for our kids' failure," Ms. Pugh charges. "Instead of planning for them to succeed in school, the state is basically projecting a certain number will drop out each year and then calculating how much it will save by not having to educate them."

But does allowing students to drop out at age 16 really save the state money?

When you count up all the other costs associated with high school dropouts -- higher rates of unemployment and incarceration, physical and mental health problems, lower lifetime earnings and tax contributions -- it's not at all clear that Maryland comes out ahead by letting kids drop out. For example, it costs about $10,000 to keep a kid in school for one year, but it costs more than $40,000 to keep that same kid in a drug teatment facility, juvenile detention center or prison for a year.

Nor is it certain that kids who drop out would spoil their classmates' chance to get an education  by being disruptive. Baltimore, P.G. and most other jurisdictions already have programs to deal with disruptive students. In Baltimore, for example, students on short-term suspension are required to attend an alternative school in the department's North Avenue headquarters until they are deemed ready to be returned to the classroom.

The bill Ms. Pugh and her colleagues are contemplating won't prevent educators from removing a disruptive student from the classroom, nor will it prevent teachers and principals from suspending or otherwising sanctioning students with serious behavior issues. On the other hand, it recognizes that in a knowledge-based global economy that depends heavily on having a well-educated work force, it makes no sense to enshrine in stone a legacy of the state's rural past when teenagers typically left school at 16 to work on the farm.

As Ms. Pugh noted dryly, "there are no farms in Baltimore City."

Posted by Glenn McNatt at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
Categories: Education
        

State education officials are reporting Maryland elementary and middle school students scored significantly higher on this year's standardized achievement tests in reading and math, a sign that long-term school reform efforts are beginning to bear fruit.

Some of the most dramatic gains were in Baltimore, long the state's poorest-performing district, where seven elementary and middle schools scored well enough to win release from state supervision as schools in need of improvement.

Whether the improved test scores mean Maryland students are becoming more competitive with their peers across the country and globally remains in question, however. Until a national standard is established, it's difficult to compare the overall proficiency of students here with those in other states, and there's still concern that even students who achieve the minimum proficiency the tests measure aren't adequately prepared for college.

In an era when a well-educated workforce is the key to economic growth, Maryland's standards -- and those of the other 49 states -- still may not be high enough to ensure students are prepared to compete in a global marketplace.

The most recent scores suggest Maryland is making steady progress toward meeting the goals of the federal No Child Left Behind Act, which mandates that 100 percent of students achieve minimum proficiency in reading and math by 2014. But that should only be the starting point. If the goal is excellence, school reform must prepare students not just to meet the minimum standards but to far exceed them as a matter of course. 

Posted by Glenn McNatt at 2:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Education
        

Liz Bowie reports today that the Baltimore Teachers Union has effectively forced layoffs and schedule changes at the city's highly successful KIPP Ujima Village Academy in an effort to make the charter middle school conform to the same salary scale for teachers in the rest of the system. KIPP teachers work nine hours and 15 minutes a day, plus every other Saturday, compared to seven hours and five minutes (and no Saturdays) for teachers at other schools. KIPP teachers are paid 18 percent more than the normal salary scale, but the union insists (seven years after the school started) that they should be paid 33 percent more. KIPP can't afford that, so it's cutting staff and hours instead.

That is the worst possible outcome for the students, and it's not great for the teachers either. Students at KIPP have been highly successful -- it ranks at the top of city middle schools in test scores, and some 80 percent of its alumni go on to college -- and it's hard to imagine that fewer hours and less opportunity for arts and music education, among other things, won't hinder that. As far as the teachers go, the union says it's responding to some complaints. But many other teachers at the school are more than happy with the tradeoff -- they get more money for more hours (if perhaps not proportionately as much as the union wants) and work in a functioning school. I'd bet if you offered that chance to all city middle school teachers -- work longer than seven hours a day (which most probably do already), get paid a little more and know you're really making a difference in kids' lives -- you'd be stampeded with applicants.

The issue speaks to a broad question about the purpose of charter schools and the extent to which they should be freed from the same rules that apply to other schools. That's something the legislature should take up. But in the meantime, how about this: Find opportunities elsewhere in the system for any KIPP teachers who are dissatisfied with the tradeoff, and open a door for good teachers elsewhere in the system who want to work there. But don't mess with a model that's actually working.

(Sun photo)

Posted by Andy Green at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)
Categories: Education
        

The archdiocese has been warning for months that the finances of Catholic schools in Baltimore are perilous and that some will close. But the abrupt announcement this week that Towson Catholic High School will shut its doors after this year is still something of a shock. Alumni report that they had no idea that the school was in trouble, though it seems the situation must not have been a total secret given the exodous of a third of the school's students in the last few weeks.

Closing elementary schools is one thing, but Baltimoreans are famously attached to their high schools. It's hard to imagine that Towson Catholic's alumni -- including NBA superstar Carmelo Anthony, among others who have achieved great success -- wouldn't have been willing to help. Maybe they couldn't have raised enough to secure the finances of a relatively small school, but surely it would have been worth a shot.

Posted by Andy Green at 12:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (83)
Categories: Education
        

After the Brian Morris fiasco last month, in which a former Baltimore city school board president was forced to resign from a high-paying, unadvertised job as a school administrator after it was discovered he had a long history of bad debts, foreclosures and other financial problems, the state school board says that from now on it will take responsibiity for vetting applicants for such posts.

 Among the questions the state panel expects to ask prospective city school board members are whether they've paid their taxes, been convicted of a crime, have a civil judgment against them or been barred from practicing law or had a professional license revoked.

That would seem to cover most of the important bases, but just to be sure The Sun's Liz Bowie reports the panel will also include a more general question: "Is there anything that the state board should know about you that has the potential for causing embarrassment to the citizens of Baltimore City if you were selected?"

That's the kind of catch-all question intended to elicit a multitude of sins, but it also makes it far to easy for ethically challenged applicants to prevaricate with such artful dodges as "can't recall," "not to my knowledge" or the classic "it depends on what you mean by the word 'embarrass.'"

So to ensure there's no room for evasion, we think the panel needs to get down to the knitty gritty of the vetting process:

1) Have you ever rented out a house you didn't own and then collected rent on it until the real owners showed up?

2) Been to Argentina lately?

3) Played footsie in an airport men's bathroom?

4) Organized a $60 billion ponzi scheme that ruined your family and friends?

5) Dated a hooker during an out-of-town junket? 

6) Used gift cards meant for needy children or accepted a fur coat from a developer doing business with the city and not reported it?

Answer each question separately; if your answer is "yes" to any of the above, explain on the line below. Failure to answer truthfully is a violation of state law and may subject you to a fine, imprisonment or both. Thank you for your interest in the Baltimore City School Board.

Posted by Glenn McNatt at 8:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Education
        

Liz Bowie on the Inside Ed blog just posted Baltimore Schools CEO Andres Alonso's apology for the hiring of former School Board Chairman Brian D. Morris as his top deputy. Not only did the schools chief negotiate a $175,000, unadvertised position with someone who was still, effectively, his boss, but Alonso didn't ask enough questions to uncover what it took Sun reporters Bob Little, Melissa Harris and Bowie about two minutes to find with a simple computer search -- Morris' 15-year history of bad debts and legal judgments. On Sunday, we printed an editorial urging Alonso to apologize and demonstrate that he understands what he did wrong so that the community might begin to regain trust in his administration. His statement comes about as close as you can expect:

"In retrospect, considering the nature of the allegations that surfaced, I made a real mistake. Outcomes matter above everything, and here the outcome has been to erode some of the public trust in our school system that is essential to our success on behalf of kids. I take responsibility for rebuilding that trust."

Alonso engages in a fairly lengthy round of explanation and justification. He explains that he wanted Morris in the job because, as school board chairman, he was intimately familiar with the schools chief's restructuring plans. No doubt that's true. I'm sure Alonso believed he was doing the right thing and that the matter was urgent.

(Sun photo)

Continue reading "Alonso apologizes (mostly)" »

Posted by Andy Green at 4:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
Categories: Education
        

One day, Baltimore schools chief Andres Alonso hires school board chairman Brian Morris -- a man who helped hire him and set his compensation -- to an unadvertised $175,000 job that did not previously exist in which he will be in charge of managing a half-dozen departments in the system. Alonso blithely dismisses concerns that the process -- using the word "process" loosely here -- was inadequate and insufficiently transparent, saying a search for candidates was unnecessary because he knew Morris so well.

Now, we learn that Morris has a decade-long string of dozens of lawsuits and bad debt claims. His house has been sold at foreclosure, his wages have been garnished -- in fact, some creditors greeted news of his sudden six-figure salary with considerable interest. Morris chalks the problems up to the vicissitudes of entrepreneurship. But that doesn't explain the unpaid rents, the philosophical disagreeent over whether he was supposed to be paying homeowners association dues, the time he rented out his house after it was sold at foreclosure -- and stuck the tenants with an unpaid water bill. 

The problems run up through last year, and Morris has said in court that he is in dire finanical straits, a position that makes his backdoor negotiations with Alonso all the more questionable.

Alonso says he didn't know about Morris' financial problems and doesn't care. The important thing, Alonso says, is Morris' dedication to the school system and his knowledge about the reforms Alono is making.

Saying this history of financial problems is irrelevant is just doubling down on the arrogance that led to Morris' questionable hiring in the first place. Maybe Alonso feels personally comfortable taking a risk on Morris, but he's taking a big public risk on the man. He's paying Morris with taxpayer money and putting him in charge of managing a $1 billion agency. We need more than his say-so.

Posted by Andy Green at 8:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (18)
Categories: Education
        

Loyola's decision to make the SAT optional for its prospective students has sparked a backlash among alumni who believe it will devalue their degrees by making the North Baltimore university into a safety school. We're planning to print a letter Wednesday from a recent graduate who's upset about the change, but in the meantime, I'll post it here in case any other alums or current Loyola students might want to comment.

I write to express my displeasure, in the strongest terms possible, at Loyola’s decision to no longer require standardized testing for undergraduate prospects (“Loyola joins SAT-optional colleges,” June 7). This decision threatens to directly undermine, financially depreciate and otherwise academically devalue the bachelor’s degrees granted by Loyola.

Continue reading "Backlash to Loyola's SAT-optional policy" »

Posted by Andy Green at 1:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (29)
Categories: Education
        

Back in the days when we walked to and from school 20 miles through the snow, uphill both ways, we didn't have any cushy air conditioning in the buildings. But we did have windows that opened, and that's more than can be said for Ridgely Middle School in Timonium. Mary Gail Hare reports Tuesday that the school was renovated three years ago in such a way as to make it more energy efficient for air conditioning -- tighter windows, an insulated roof and lower ceilings. But no air conditioning was installed, probably as a last-minute cost-saving decision. Now the place is sweltering, and the windows either don't open at all or open a few inches.

Anybody want to guess whether the people who decided the school could do without air conditioning work in an office with air conditioning?

Officials estimate it will cost the county $900,000 to install the air conditioning system now. Granted, given the budget troubles all over the state, the timing isn't great, but that's too bad. It's not right for students and teachers to suffer for someone else's boneheaded error.

(Sun photo: Barbara Haddock Taylor)

Posted by Andy Green at 11:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
Categories: Education
        

It's hard enough suffering through Algebra II without somebody's cell phone going off in the middle of class. Could you shut that thing off, Pu-leeze? No wonder most area school systems ban cell phones while classes are in session.

But that's just driven the nuisance underground: Instead of yakking out loud, kids are now silently text-messaging each other -- sometimes hundreds of times a day -- while their teachers drone on about quadratic equations and graphing inequalities in two variables.

As far as learning anything goes, the kids may as well not be there.

What to do? A Montgomery county student leader suggests changing the rules to let kids text-message during lunch period. That way kids would at least have a way to satisfy the texting urge. Quratul-Ann Malik, a senior at Watkins Mill High School in Gaithersburg who is also the student representive on the county school board, has introduced a resolution to that effect. She says high schools got rid of rid of pay phones years ago after cell phones became popular, but now that students can't use them what was the point?. Ms. Malik wants a designated time during the day when students can text to their hearts' content without fear of having their phones confiscated.

Hold on, say teachers and administrators: Give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile. Educators  point to a spike in student-teacher spats over appropriate behavior after a ban on iPods at a Silver Spring high school was partially lifted recently. Others think scoflaw students will just take advantage of any loosening of the restrictions. Even some parents admit their kids would text 24/7 given half a chance.

We'll be watching to see how Montgomery County and other local school distecits handle this. It's an open secret the present cell phone bans are widely violated. So there's the rule, and then there's the reality. Bottom line is, should officials loosen the restriction slightly in hopes of channeling compliance to the permitted times -- or keep the rule in place despite the fact hardly anyone is paying it the slightest attention?

Posted by Glenn McNatt at 8:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Education
        

With all the attention given pornography at the University of Maryland last week, one might think that the College Park campus was filled entirely with debauched heathens. Turns out, that's no more than half right. University President C.D. Mote Jr. has stood up for the power of prayer -- choosing to preserve the tradition of an invocation at commencement ceremonies and overruling the wishes of the school Senate.

The Senate had voted last Monday to abolish the prayer on the recommendation of its human relations committee. The group found that peer institutions including the state universities in Michigan, Illinois, and North Carolina don't have a prayer at graduation ceremonies and expressed a need to be "more sensitive" to nonbelievers.

Nonbelievers can't tolerate a two-minute invocation? How far is that going to get them in life? So much for ever attending a session of Congress, a city council meeting or even the local Kiwanis Club luncheon. This isn't like daily prayer in public school or posting biblical passages on the courthouse wall, where the state is endorsing certain religious beliefs. These are supposed to be well-educated grown-ups ready to go out in the world where -- yikes -- some people do believe in a higher power.

Continue reading "They already pray for passing grades, so..." »

Posted by Peter Jensen at 4:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Education
        

After lawmakers threatened Thursday to cut funding for the University of Maryland College Park if its student union showed the adult film Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge, university officials quickly pulled the plug on the movie. UM president C.D. Mote Jr. announced that Saturday's scheduled screening of the triple X-rated film  had been cancelled.  

Critics argued that such so-called adult entertainment is inappropriate at a state-supported university and that porn is degrading to women. All very true. "That's really not what Maryland residents send their young students to college campus for, to view pornography," said state Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, an avid supporter of UM.

But while it's disturbing to contemplate the harmful effects of pornography on young minds -- even acknowledging that college students have First Amendment rights too -- it was nearly as unsettling to watch the legislature's ham-fisted intervention into what was, at bottom, a campus kerfluffle. Do we really want lawmakers in Annapolis dictating what movies can be shown or what books can be read? Maryland once had its own film censor board and rightly got rid of it.

The lawmakers' show of indignation smacked of grandstanding, even demagoguery. Their charge is broad oversight, not micro-management. After they've set funding levels and authorized a long-term strategic plan, the better part of wisdom for them might be to adopt a hands-off approach to the minutiae of student life. What's your view?

Posted by Glenn McNatt at 4:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Education
        

At a time when we could all use a refresher course in financial literacy, 220 seventh- and eighth-graders in Baltimore City, Baltimore County and Washington, D.C., are determining which health food company will be added to their investment portfolio during the next school year. The young investors are participating in Stocks in the Future, a three-year middle school program that uses financial life skills to capture students' attention, reinforces their academic fundamentals and raises school attendance for those needing motivation.

It's just the kind of educational innovation we need in these economically challenging times. Developed by education researchers at the Johns Hopkins University, Stocks in the Future teaches strategies for earning, preserving and investing money.

While academics are strengthened throughout the exercises, students earn money through regular weekly attendance and improved grades. They invest their earnings in publicly traded stocks and receive those shares at high school graduation and on turning 18. Stocks in the Future is a nonprofit organization. The program's Web site is www.stocksinthefuture.org.

Posted by Larry Williams at 6:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Education