Bradford v. Maryland State Board of Education

OpEd published in The Baltimore Sun on September 27, 2021.

Deshawna Bryant, a senior at Baltimore City High School, dreams of becoming a child psychologist. The youngest in her family, all her life Deshawna’s parents opened their home and hearts to many foster children, too. After high school, she plans on going to a university in Florida, and a big reason why is that it’s warm there all year round.

2020 kicked off to a hopeful start for children, teachers, and leaders in Baltimore, as yet another three new 21st Century Schools opened. By 2022, the 21st Century Schools initiative is pushing to replace school buildings in poor conditions by adding 28 new schools. 

Black and Brown students in Baltimore City deserve to reach their dreams without bearing the burden of inequitable education funding. Many of these students already are burdened by a long history of systemic racism, housing segregation, and economic discrimination that have fostered high rates of poverty, violence, and associated trauma in their communities. The State of Maryland must be held accountable for its failure to provide the necessary funding to deliver a quality education to all students.

1. The Heart of the Matter: EquityPutting equity into practice means that state resources must support students and districts impacted by opportunity gaps, achievement lags, and chronic underfunding.Members of the Workgroup must weave equity into every stage of the decision-making process, and students must be at the center of each consideration. This means the state must properly count students so that the Workgroup can design the formula to correctly provide the additional resources that each district needs. Additionally, accountability for the ways the state supports its successful implementation and specific measures for the range of equity factors (i.e. teacher retention practices targeting diverse representation, etc.) is a must. 2. The Richest Counties Are Still Getting the Most Education FundingAccording to Department of Legislative Services (DLS) and the Kirwan Commission’s own analysis, Maryland has a regressive education funding formula. The Maryland Center for Economic Policy found that more than half of students of color in Maryland attend underfunded schools, while the same is true for only 8% of white students. Rich counties receive more education funding than counties with low wealth despite "wealth equalization” measures in the formula. The ability of wealthy districts to contribute more local dollars to their school systems, beyond what is required by st

This piece originally appeared at The Baltimore Sun.Leslie Seid Margolis is managing attorney at Disability Rights Maryland. Contributors to this op-ed include: Cheryl Bost, Maryland State Education Association president; Shannen Coleman-Siciliano, Strong Schools Maryland co-executive director; Kimberly Humphrey, ACLU of Maryland legislative counsel; and Jane Sundius, Attendance Works senior policy fellow.As statewide advocates for education and equity, we were deeply disappointed by the decision to delay consideration to revise Maryland’s school funding formula. This decision has made it all the more important that the General Assembly and the governor make immediate, meaningful progress on committing additional funding to our schools as prescribed by the Kirwan Commission.Our elected leaders must ensure that urgently needed school funding increases are secured in this 2019 legislative session — even though determination of the formulas has been deferred until the 2020 session.Maryland should also learn from its previous experience revamping education funding. In 2002, the legislature and governor approved recommendations of the Thornton Commission but left decisions about how much money to allocate or where to find it until the following year. The result was that expectations for programming and outcomes were consistent with the Thornton Commission’s recommendations, but funding was not. Not only was the reform effort underfunded initially, funding in subsequent years failed to cover inflationary increases, which had a compounding effect over time. By 2016, the state’s own analysis estimated the annual funding deficit at $2.9 billion, or an average of $2 million per school.Class sizes are increasing across the state, sometimes to as many as 40 students. Fewer resources are available for critical supports such as counselors, course offerings are slimmed down, and field trips and other enrichment activities are eliminated. And, at the same time that educators are expected to shoulder the burden of reduced funding, they are also expected to help students to meet increased state and federal education standards — all without the salary increases their profession deserves. A recent survey found that more than four in 10 Maryland educators work a second job to make ends meet.Even worse, an independent analysis by Education Trust revealed that Maryland is shortchanging schools in poor communities more than those in affluent ones. Increasingly strong research shows that the impact of poorly funded schools is much greater for students who lack the home and community resources to make up for public education cuts, who require special educational supports to be successful, who suffer from institutional and individual biases and racism and who are recent arrivals to our nation. Their lack of experienced teachers, up-to-date materials and computer access reveals Maryland’s inequitable educational opportunities.To continue reading this piece at the Baltimore Sun, click here. 

Our children deserve to dream big, but they need resources to back them up.

"Blueprint" Board Must Have Race Equity Expertise

During these unprecedented times, we have endured a quarantine and reshaped how our jobs and school systems operate. You might be wondering how this is all affecting your child, especially their education. While many parents and guardians have had to transform into teachers during this quarantine, Kyla-Marie James, an 11th grader at Mergenthaler Vocational Technical School, describes the new responsibilities that students have had to take on and the struggles she sees other children facing as schools closed out the year remotely because of the COVID-19 pandemic.