Textbooks

All textbooks recommended for first-time use in Howard County public schools will be on display from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Mondays-Fridays through Tuesday in the lobby at the Department of Education, 10910 Route 108 in Ellicott City. Forms for approval or requests for re-evaluation of any of the proposed materials will be available. Call 410-313-5634 for more information.

ANNAPOLIS - A bill being sponsored by eight Republicans in the House of Delegates to exempt college textbooks from the sales tax had its first hearing this past week in Annapolis. House Bill 38 calls for no sales tax on textbooks purchased in Maryland by part- or full-time students attending a college or university. It's initial hearing was held Jan. 25. "The price of textbooks of $500 for a semester is not unusual, and this is a tremendous burden, especially on middle-income families," said Del. Wade Kach, who represents District 5B and is a co-sponsor of the bill.

It's about time The Sun reported on the millions of dollars spent on unused textbooks in the Baltimore County school system ("Officials question millions spent on Balto. Co. tests and curriculum," Nov. 12). This is something that has been going on for a long time. I retired as a classroom teacher and mentor for Baltimore County in 2001. While in my last position, mentors often discussed the many books on various ability levels and subjects that were left in their original packaging in the book room.

Saying that money had been wasted and school system policies had not been followed in the purchases of books and writing of curriculum, Baltimore County school board members asked administrators Tuesday night for reassurances that similar mistakes would not be made in the future. The school board's questions came after reports in The Baltimore Sun this month that detailed the school system's spending of millions of dollars to rewrite language arts curriculum that has been shelved and to purchase a 27-year-old grammar textbook that sat in a warehouse for nearly a year before being distributed recently.

ANNAPOLIS - A bill being sponsored by eight Republicans in the House of Delegates to exempt college textbooks from the sales tax had its first hearing this past week in Annapolis. House Bill 38 calls for no sales tax on textbooks purchased in Maryland by part- or full-time students attending a college or university. It's initial hearing was held Jan. 25. "The price of textbooks of $500 for a semester is not unusual, and this is a tremendous burden, especially on middle-income families," said Del. Wade Kach, who represents District 5B and is a co-sponsor of the bill.

Baltimore County school leaders disregarded advice from state officials and forged ahead to overhaul the teaching of English, spending more than $5 million over the past few years to buy textbooks that mostly sit unused and to rewrite a curriculum that has been shelved. The system spent about $2.2 million on a 27-year-old grammar textbook with outdated references to encyclopedias and almanacs, both barely used by today's students, according to school system documents. The textbook and accompanying workbooks remained in a warehouse for nearly a year, and school officials acknowledged they are just now being delivered.

Lori Gray hid her social studies book in her bedroom closet rather than take it to class: The 11-year-old, in seventh grade at Marley Middle School, was ashamed of the way it looked."

Washington.-- LYNNE CHENEY said a mouthful last month. To be sure, it was a mouthful many others have voiced before, but as chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, she speaks from a prestigious rostrum. Listen in:''Many of the textbooks used in American schools are so dull that no one would read them voluntarily. We continue to teach reading with basal readers that make the very idea of books seem boring. We continue to teach history with textbooks that drain all drama out of the past.

ERRORS have been creeping into the school history textbooks American children use.The people who run schools, in response, have been demanding that textbook publishers correct their mistakes.This is a terrible situation, requiring eternal vigilance as the price of accuracy, and I am prepared to help. After all, I have devoted my journalistic career to the pursuit of accuracy -- or at least to not making up more facts than I have to.To help you evaluate the veracity of what you find in textbooks, I have drawn up an incomplete but instructive list of information to be suspicious of if you run across it in a book.

Woe to Carroll's social studies, political science and geography teachers.These are turbulent times we live in. With events changing daily in the Soviet Union (not to mention elsewhere in the world), teachers have had to discard long-used textbooks and maps for more up-to-date materials.The day-to-day changes have made the district's textbooks and teaching guides obsolete. And there's no point buying new textbooks and maps until life in the Soviet Union becomes stable.Consider the dilemma for educators.

It's about time The Sun reported on the millions of dollars spent on unused textbooks in the Baltimore County school system ("Officials question millions spent on Balto. Co. tests and curriculum," Nov. 12). This is something that has been going on for a long time. I retired as a classroom teacher and mentor for Baltimore County in 2001. While in my last position, mentors often discussed the many books on various ability levels and subjects that were left in their original packaging in the book room.

I was quoted in Liz Bowie's recent article on Baltimore County's ill-advised textbook purchase ("Millions for textbooks that went used," Nov. 11) and would like to supplement those remarks. Superintendent Joe A. Hairston ignored the advice of the Maryland State Department of Education and wasted $5 million of taxpayer money on obsolete textbooks. That's money the county schools could have used to retain many great teachers who were laid off last year, That's $5 million the county could have used to avoid eliminating classes in many high schools.

Baltimore County leaders expressed concern Friday that the school system may have wasted as much as $5 million on textbooks and a curriculum that are not being widely used, calling on school officials to more closely monitor spending. "When you find out that millions of dollars were directed toward textbooks that are sitting in a warehouse, that is a serious concern," said Donald Mohler, chief of staff for County Executive Kevin Kamenetz. "It is important that every dollar we spend be spent wisely.

Baltimore County school leaders disregarded advice from state officials and forged ahead to overhaul the teaching of English, spending more than $5 million over the past few years to buy textbooks that mostly sit unused and to rewrite a curriculum that has been shelved. The system spent about $2.2 million on a 27-year-old grammar textbook with outdated references to encyclopedias and almanacs, both barely used by today's students, according to school system documents. The textbook and accompanying workbooks remained in a warehouse for nearly a year, and school officials acknowledged they are just now being delivered.

Weeks after his office and home were raided by federal agents, attorney Stanley Needleman is in trouble again — this time for allegedly stealing a judicial clerk's school textbook from a Baltimore County courtroom. Needleman, 68, has been charged with one count of theft under $100 after police say a check of court surveillance cameras showed him on May 9 flipping through the textbook, "Understanding White Collar Crime," walking away with it and resuming his spot behind the defense table to represent a client.

The Texas State Board of Education recently recommended sweeping alterations for the textbooks it buys, casting American history in a more conservative light. As Texas is the largest single consumer of textbooks because of the nature of its statewide book ordering system, its standards are adopted by the publishing companies, and thus any changes it makes are made to the textbooks that 80 percent of American students read. The changes are typical of Fox News/Glenn Beck extreme-right bias, which is to be expected from a board dominated by ultraconservatives.

Colleges and state legislatures across the country have been grappling with a problem that's not going away: the soaring price of textbooks. Last year, 21 states, including Maryland, considered legislation or policies to rein in book costs, according to the National Association of College Stores. And at least in Maryland, the issue will be coming up again this year. Two years ago, the Maryland legislature asked the university system to come up with a consortium through which public institutions, on a voluntary basis, could use their buying power to get lower prices on books.

All textbooks recommended for first-time use in Howard County public schools will be on display from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Mondays-Fridays through Tuesday in the lobby at the Department of Education, 10910 Route 108 in Ellicott City. Forms for approval or requests for re-evaluation of any of the proposed materials will be available. Call 410-313-5634 for more information.