The Minority Report - Week 12

The Minority Report 2017 Session Update - Week 12 Greetings from the 437th Legislative Session! We want to connect with you to keep you informed on caucus initiatives and the latest in Annapolis. Please feel free to share this with friends, family, and colleagues, and on your own social media sites. The Clock Is Winding Down... There are 11 days left in the 2017 Legislative Session. The days after Crossover move slowly, as the House and Senate begin to take up bills passed by the opposite chamber. As with the beginning of session, much of the work is happening in Committee, but at a more-concentrated and faster rate. The pace will pick up again next week, as we approach Sine Die on April 10th.  Shielding Failing Schools To “protect” Maryland’s schools against what they call the “Trump/Devos Privatization Agenda”, the Democratic majority in the General Assembly passed HB 978 - Protect Our Schools Act of 2017 - a bill pushed by the state teacher’s union that weakens accountability standards and creates barriers for the state to intervene in failing schools. Under the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the State Board of Education will be devising a new accountability system for school performance. HB 978 ties the hands of the State Board and dictates how it will devise this system. The bill bars the State Board of Education from emphasizing student achievement when it establishes this accountability system. It limits the measures of actual school effectiveness, such as student achievement and graduation rates, to only 65% of a school’s accountability rating.   The bill instead favors factors such as teacher satisfaction, small class sizes, low teacher-to-student ratios, and a healthy and supportive school culture. Such a low accountability rating makes it more difficult to actually identify schools that are failing. Not only that, but with this bill's passage, Maryland will have the weakest accountability system in the entire country.  Maryland could be risking over $248 million per year if these low accountability standards are found to be out of compliance with federal standards. The most troubling aspect of this bill is that it traps children in failing schools. The bill not only makes it harder to identify failing schools by weakening standards, it also ties the hands of the State Board of Education when it comes to taking measures to get failing schools on track. Students in failing schools are trapped in those failing schools for three years before the State and local school districts are permitted to intervene. We have a Constitutional and moral obligation to provide a quality education for every child in our state, regardless of their zip code.  The pattern of allowing children to languish in failing schools for year after year as the powerful teacher’s union continue to protect bad schools and put up smoke screens like HB 978 must end.  The bill passed the House and Senate, but Governor Hogan has promised to veto the bill.  Maryland Day On March 25th of the year 1632, the first European settlers arrived in two ships, The Ark and The Dove, and set foot on St. Clement’s Island off the northern shore of the Potomac River. Soon after their landing, these settlers sailed down the river to make their first permanent settlement at St. Mary’s City and established the Province of Maryland, becoming the third English colony to be settled in British North America. After being granted a charter by Kind Charles I, George Calvert 1st Baron of Baltimore took 150 settlers across the Atlantic to create a refuge for Catholics looking to escape persecution in England. The colony of Maryland was named in honor of Henrietta Maria of France, the wife of Charles I. In 1916, the Maryland General Assembly declared March 25th as Maryland Day, a legal holiday celebrating the anniversary of the landing of the first settlers on St. Clement’s Island. In honor of Maryland Day, the State House Trust commemorated the installation of the historic portraits of the Lords of Baltimore in the Maryland State House on Friday, March 24th, 2017. Four of the oil paintings were installed in the Rotunda while two were installed in the staircase leading to the chamber balconies. The portraits are on loan from the Enoch Pratt Library and were restored by the Maryland State Archives. Now in their new home, visitors to the State House will be able to see these portraits in person as part of an effort to keep Maryland’s rich history alive amongst the future generations of Marylanders to come.