As of last night, Baltimore County Public Schools
drastically changed a major piece of their administration by electing six new
members to the BCPS Board of Education. This new system—electing a majority of
members rather than having them appointed—is the result of a 2014 state law intended
to increase stakeholder voice and board accountability to the community. Because
of this new system, the breakdown of the BCPS Board of Education will now be
made of seven elected members, four appointed (by the governor), and one
student member.
Of the seven positions up for election, only one incumbent
member was able to return—leaving the Board of Education with six new members
set to take office in December. Of these six new members a shocking four of them
have worked in public education, either at the k-12 or community college level.
The (somehow) revolutionary idea that perhaps educators should have a voice in
policies regarding education seems to have taken off—in Baltimore County,
anyway.
According to the Baltimore Sun, the major decision facing
this new Board of Education will be to find and hire a new Superintendent of
Schools. (The current superintendent is acting as an interim superintendent
since our last permanent hire, Dr. Dallas Dance, was convicted of four counts
of perjury and was only recently released from jail.) The current interim
superintendent was a previous colleague of Dr. Dance and has seemed to align
most of her priorities and policies with his.
It seems that—based on the previous actions of the leaders
of Baltimore County Public Schools—the fresh start provided by a new Board of
Education might be just what we need.
Article Link: https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/politics/bs-md-baltimore-county-school-board-20181105-story.html
BCPS BOE Candidate Information: https://elections2018.news.baltimoresun.com/baltimore-county/board-of-education/
2 comments:
Lindsay,
Both you and Priyanka cared about the new members of the BCPS Board of Education. I can understand your feeling that true educators finally join into politics and voices of teachers in Baltimore can be heard. One of my classmates in another class had the same opinions as you. But she was disappointed with the situation and left her school, even stayed far from education. Honestly speaking, teachers are treated worse than what I think about in Baltimore. So I am glad that the Board of Education made the decision.
I did not realize that BCPS previously had an appointed board. That is a pretty foreign concept to me, as the Fairfax Board and the Arlington Board I grew up with are all fully elected. An appointed board means there is no one with local accountability to students, teachers, and families. FCPS has nine members elected by their subregions within the county, and three at-large members voted on by the entire county. I can see how a fully-appointed board would lead to both rubber-stamping and political in-fighting, as mentioned in the article. Certainly the lack of a superintendent will not help the stability of governance while this brand new body learns to work together. It sounds like there are some pretty contentious issues on the table, and I hope these new folks are able to work together effectively.
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