State School

Maryland officials have told Baltimore to overhaul 35 low-achieving schools -- close to a fifth of the school system -- or lose control of them."It's not a final list," Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke said yesterday, confirming that Baltimore is negotiating to reduce the number of poor-quality schools to be added to the state's school-reform program.State Schools Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick is scheduled Friday to identify in public the Maryland public schools with poor and declining test scores and attendance.

Baltimore City and fast-growing Frederick County joined Howard yesterday as big winners in next year's $295 million school construction budget as Gov. Parris N. Glendening announced his spending priorities across the state. The money brings total spending on school construction since Glendening took office to nearly $1.5 billion - putting him within easy striking distance of the $1.6 billion goal he set early in his administration. "We're going to absolutely shatter that goal," the governor said.

Fifty-one Anne Arundel County elementary and middle schools have reaped more than $155,000 in cash prizes from the state for doing well on last year's standardized tests - a final bounty from a rewards program that is fizzling out because of a lack of funds. No matter how well pupils did on the Maryland School Assessments last month, most schools won't see a penny for those efforts next year. There will be no new federal funds to support the state's School Performance Recognition Program, which began in 1997.

In a move that the school system's construction supervisor asked to have clarified, the Carroll County Board of Education said it will proceed with plans for the new Gateway alternative school - while also considering an option to scrap that proposal and convert an existing elementary school into a building for the students. The county commissioners have pledged $2.5 million toward construction of the $4.9 million Gateway School, and state school construction planners have approved the project.

After prodding from the state school board, Baltimore backed off yesterday from its earlier resistance to a state order to fix three low-achieving schools.Baltimore "is fully committed to the goals" of school reform "and to setting high standards for all the schools," said Phillip H. Farfel, president of Baltimore's school board. But city officials want to improve the schools in their own way and more state money "is a critical need so the children of Baltimore will get an educational opportunity comparable to that in the suburbs," he said.

When it comes to Maryland educational policy, there are two schools of thought -- Glendening's and Grasmick's. Throughout Gov. Parris N. Glendening's six years in office, he and state school Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick have maintained an uneasy relationship -- never friendly and often competitive. Glendening, for instance, used this year's General Assembly session to push a landmark measure to raise teacher salaries. Grasmick stressed funding for a remedial education plan. The year before, Glendening fought for smaller reading classes, while Grasmick focused on a new teacher-recruitment effort.

If the reform of public education were an event at a school "field day," it wouldn't be a relay race so much as an often unruly tug-of-war. Conservatives yank one way. Liberals another. Teachers' unions exert muscle pull against administrators. Parents are in there tugging in many directions, too.But one proposal behind which consensus will likely queue up rapidly is the state school board's idea to drop the student promotion rate from its list of criteria for measuring school performance.

State school Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick discounted the need yesterday for major new spending for the Prince George's County school system, declaring instead that more stringent accountability standards are needed to lift student achievement.Addressing a task force studying education funding in Maryland, Grasmick proposed giving state education officials greater oversight of the Prince George's system, the state's largest.Grasmick proposed a modest financial aid package for Prince George's, where some officials have called on the state and the county to spend about $100 million more annually on the system.

Former Northeast High School teacher Laurie S. Cook had a sexual relationship with one of her students and should not be allowed back in the classroom, a state hearing examiner has ruled.The decision by Guy J. Avery, an administrative law judge, is a victory for the Anne Arundel County school board, which voted 5-2 three years ago to fire Cook, even though she was acquitted of sexual child abuse charges during a criminal trial."The administrative law judge made the right decision, and we hope that the state school board upholds it," said P. Tyson Bennett, the school board attorney.

The Greater Baltimore Committee favors a state takeover of Baltimore schools, unless major improvements are made in the next few years.The business group outlined its views to the state school board yesterday, part of an overall briefing on education.The GBC stance reflects the business community's impatience with the pace of school reforms in Baltimore, said Bob Keller, president of the group."There's got to be fundamental radical reform, and is that happening? Certainly not to our satisfaction," said Keller, speaking after the briefing.