Baltimore County Schools

State Comptroller Peter Franchot criticized Baltimore County leaders Wednesday for failing to use $7 million in school construction funds to air-condition schools. Franchot, who welcomed a group of Middleborough Elementary children and their parents to Annapolis to testify before the Board of Public Works, asked the board to force the county to spend at least half of the money, which has come from the state alcohol tax, on air-conditioning. But Gov. Martin O'Malley and Treasurer Nancy K. Kopp, the other board members, said that while they were sympathetic to the pleas from children and parents, they would not interfere with local decisions on school construction spending.

Baltimore City's schools are Maryland's oldest, and Baltimore County's are the second-oldest. The problems posed by the aging facilities in the two jurisdictions are different — the city has an overabundance of underused buildings, while the county has for years been dealing with overcrowding in one region or another — but the first step toward a solution, county schools officials hope, may be the same: developing a comprehensive modernization plan....

Baltimore County school board president Lawrence Schmidt's assertion that "the board makes no apology for the selection or the process utilized" to name S. Dallas Dance as our new superintendent ("Selection of Dance involved extensive public input," April 21) is just one more in the lengthening list of displays of arrogance by the leaders of our school system. True, the search agency provided a link to a survey on the school system's website. However, the primary input citizens were invited to give was to consider the agency's laundry list of descriptors and then select, from that list, a limited number of what we felt were the most important qualities the next superintendent should possess.

Of the 11 Baltimore County public high schools rated among the nation's 2,000 top schools, according to the third annual Newsweek/Daily Beast survey of "America's Best High Schools," Hereford High School ranks No. 1 in the county. The list, published online May 6 by Newsweek and its corporate owner, The Daily Beast, ranks schools based on six weighted criteria. "For the third time this spring, BCPS high schools have shown they are among the nation's top tier," said schools superintendent Dallas Dance.

State Comptroller Peter Franchot plans to post an online petition on his agency's web site Thursday to help Baltimore County parents put pressure on the county school administration to take action to put air-conditioning into schools that now offer no relief to sweltering students. Franchot vowed to post the "Cool Schools" petition after hearing a presentation Wednesday  from the school administration on school construction priorities during the annual Board of Public Works ritual that Gov. Martin O'Malley calls the "Hope-a-Thon" but that virtually everyone else knows as the "Beg-a-Thon.

Baltimore County schools Superintendent Joe A. Hairston formally announced Friday that he will leave his post this June, saying he has a record of success. Speaking at a news conference, Hairston pointed to improved academic achievement of African-American students, a rise in test scores and the graduation rate, greater participation in Advanced Placement classes and more students going on to two- and four-year colleges. Hairston also talked about feeling embattled by critics.

The Baltimore Sun received a tip recently that high-ranking school administrators had gotten contracts from Superintendent Joe A. Hairston before he retired on July 1. The newspaper filed a public information act request in the last days of Hairston's tenure asking for contracts of Phyllis Reese, the chief communications officer, and Donald Peccia, the assistant superintendent for human resources. The contracts, while not specifying a salary figure, say that Reese and Peccia will be paid their full salary and benefits after July 1 if the superintendent wants to fire them.

Class size increases have been a significant issue for Baltimore County's high schools this year. Nearly 200 teaching positions were cut from the high schools, even as administrative positions were left nearly untouched. So when The Baltimore Sun learned that principals had been told last month what their staffing levels would be next year, a reporter asked the school system for the specifics. The Sun wanted to know how many positions each high school would gain or lose next year.

Students who commit serious acts of violence at school rarely do so suddenly or impulsively, experts said Friday during an annual safety conference for Baltimore County educators, held just weeks after two gun incidents unnerved the school community. People usually know about attacks ahead of time — and most students who commit violence raise red flags for their teachers and others to see, said Detective Steve Jackson of the county Police Department. "They've been on somebody's radar," Jackson told a group of teachers, administrators and counselors.

As the clock ticked toward midnight Monday, school boards in Howard and Baltimore County were scrambling to make job offers to their next superintendents. The timing was not a coincidence. The school boards in the adjoining districts knew they were in an intense and unusual fight for the same finalists — S. Dallas Dance, a middle schools chief from Houston, and Renee Foose, the deputy superintendent in Baltimore County — and that they might have the same first choice. School board leaders in both districts say they got their top candidate: Foose went to Howard and Dance went to Baltimore County, but the public may never know what happened behind closed doors.

I hope you have child-care plans lined up because Baltimore County Public Schools said today that the last day of classes will be Friday, June 14, instead of Tuesday, June 18. More information here: http://www.bcps.org/news/articles/article3220.html

In the wake of the deadly bombings in Boston and the fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas, the Maryland State Board of Education on Tuesday approved new emergency planning guidelines meant to help local school systems better prepare for disaster. "It's very timely that we're here today, given the events that occurred last week," said Chuck Buckler, executive director of the student services and strategic planning branch of the Maryland State Department of Education. The 218-page document updates safety guidelines developed a decade ago and emphasizes the creation of individualized plans that address multiple hazards, from school shootings to tornadoes.

A Baltimore County Council member has withdrawn a controversial bill that sought to bar protests near public and private schools in the county — a measure that drew wide criticism from organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union, the county teachers union and the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, a national anti-abortion organization. Councilman Todd Huff, a Lutherville Republican, said Tuesday he has asked county attorneys to pull the bill so he could sit down with the teachers' union and "try to see how we can work through this issue, and see what their thought process is" in opposing it. Huff's measure would have barred protests within 300 feet of schools in Baltimore County during the hour before and after school, and while classes are in session.

The Baltimore County school board voted Tuesday to close its smallest elementary school in order to accommodate a plan that would allow county officials to sell property for development. The unanimous vote, with two members abstaining, will close the Eastwood Center Elementary Magnet Program, where 191 students study environmental science, at the end of this school year and merge it with Norwood Elementary and Holabird Middle School. The schools will become one school on two campuses, organized as a K-8 magnet program focused on science, technology, engineering and math (STEM)

Dallas Dance has been superintendent of Baltimore County Public Schools for less than half an academic year, but he is proving himself a quick study. The $1.3 billion budget he has proposed for the next fiscal year strikes the kind of balance that county leaders generally love best: progress with penny-pinching. The usual penurious critics may latch onto the fact that he is seeking a substantial budget increase - $41.9 million, or 3.3 percent - at a time of continued economic challenges for the county (including the closing of the Sparrows Point steel mill)

Four Baltimore-area schools are among the six that have earned state Blue Ribbon honors, Maryland Department of Education officials said on Thursday. Baltimore County's Chadwick Elementary in the Woodlawn area and Charlesmont Elementary in Dundalk were the two elementary schools named on the list, which also included Folly Quarter Middle in Howard County, Robert Frost Middle in Montgomery County, Century High School in Carroll County and Boonsboro High School in Washington County.

Beginning this week, the Baltimore County school system will begin live-streaming its bi-weekly school board meetings on its website, in part for the public's convenience but also to continue fulfilling a pledge to be more transparent, officials said.  The meetings, normally held the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month, can be watched here.  The first meeting of the month starts at 7:00 p.m. The second meeting each month, typically a...

Dallas Dance, Baltimore County's soon-to-be superintendent of schools, won't officially take the job until July 1, but the school board approved a contract Tuesday night that will allow him to begin working as a consultant for the month of June. The school board will pay Dance a salary of $21,250 for the month, or one-twelfth of his annual salary, as well as some relocation costs and health insurance. School board chair Lawrence Schmidt said the board wanted Dance to have a month to get to know the people in the county, visit some schools and work for a week with Superintendent Joe Hairston, whose contract expires at the end of June.

Children clutching onto each other as they are hustled out of an elementary school. Parents weeping together in a school parking lot, police cars and ambulances flashing behind them. Police brandishing machine guns racing to a school. While the images from Friday's school shooting in Newtown, Conn., will haunt many, it is children - those who attend elementary schools much like the one where 20 students and six adults were killed - who may be the most profoundly affected, experts say. "Children are going to be shaken by this because it was at a school, a place that is supposed to be safe and comforting," said Dr. Patrick Kelly, a psychiatrist at the Johns Hopkins Children's Center.

Baltimore County residents and lawmakers who want to add elected members to the county school board are gearing up for a familiar push as the legislative session nears, and they say they are better organized this time around. With state lawmakers set to meet in January, supporters of changing the all-appointed school board say they're stepping up outreach efforts to legislators and county residents. County Executive Kevin Kamenetz, who last session lobbied hard against changing the board's structure, has signaled that he may be willing to compromise this time around.