The kinds of serious outbreaks that legislators pointed to happening in other states before school started this year appear to have been largely avoided, thanks to a statewide mandatory masking mandate, as well as testing, social distancing and other safety measures.

Critics warn the monitoring might be used for disciplinary purposes, unintentionally out LGBTQ students or squash student expression.

Elijah Gorham, a football player at Baltimore’s Mergenthaler Vocational Technical High School known for his charisma and support of his fellow students, has died at age 17, officials said Monday.

After returning to classrooms in the spring with a testing program that drew national praise, attempts to scale up Baltimore City’s weekly testing program now that all students are back in class has left some families and teachers frustrated. The result is the loss of precious classroom days after 18 months learning online.

The cases of students quarantined still represented a small portion of the more than 882,000 students enrolled in Maryland public schools, but it brought into sharp focus the large numbers of students who must learn from home during a school year that is still far from normal.

High school seniors across Maryland are among the 16,000 National Merit semi-finalists announced Wednesday.

More than half of Maryland school systems may soon institute routine testing for unvaccinated students or staff in an effort to tamp down the spread of the coronavirus among schoolchildren and the surrounding communities.

Students in 27 Baltimore City schools without air conditioning will be dismissed at noon today because temperatures are expected to rise to 88 degrees by 1 p.m.

A two-year Baltimore City school system investigation has found that administrators at one city high school schemed to inflate enrollment, pressured teachers to change grades and scheduled students into classes that didn’t exist.