charter schools

The new Baltimore schools CEO, Gregory Thornton, starts work Tuesday. His first-day assignments are a heavy load. To name just a few: budget shortfalls; the $1 billion school construction program; fiscal and authority disputes with charter schools; the controversial teacher evaluation system; and perhaps most fateful, implementation of the rigorous Common Core academic standards and tests.

If I consider the span of my 59 years, there is an obvious theme: I don't deal well with authority. As a Baltimore City teacher, I left two schools because of my inability to accept what I considered to be overbearing principals. A third principal, spotting this characteristic, sent me packing before I could quit. Then I met Mike Chalupa, who changed everything for me.

Misunderstanding charter schools

MarylandCAN isn't interested in kids but in pushing an anti-public school agenda

There are steps that could help both charters and traditional schools in Baltimore.

High-achieving city schools' success masks the effects of concentrated poverty

City must reconsider school funding and how traditional schools compare to charter

Funding charter schools is vital to give students a choice in their future

The Anne Arundel County Schools System will launch its next school year on Aug. 25, but parents seeking to enroll their children in the district's new contract school should also pay attention to another date – June 18.

The Baltimore school board voted Tuesday to fully fund gifted programs that were originally slated for cuts next year and to tap its rainy-day fund to stave off reductions at the central office.

A group of Patterson High School students were invited to the White House Science Fair to share solar-powered hovercrafts they built through the school's Project Lead the Way program.

The Baltimore school board will vote Tuesday on a $1.3 billion budget that has drawn backlash from schools and lawmakers for its cuts to programs and has led the board to consider a possible overhaul of the district's funding formula as some high schools face up to $450,000 in cuts.

The Baltimore school board will vote Tuesday on a $1.3 billion budget that has drawn backlash from schools and lawmakers for its cuts to programs and has led the board to consider a possible overhaul of the district's funding formula as some high schools face up to $450,000 in cuts.

There is widespread belief among teachers and principals that traditional public schools are subsidizing charters. This should trouble parents in traditional schools, especially parents helping School Family Councils make ends meet during budget season. It should trouble responsible charter parents and staff who do not want to succeed at the expense of children attending a traditional school.

Most education research suggests Hamilton Elementary and Thomas Johnson Middle School would be handicapped by the socioeconomic status of their students, most of whom are poor.

What's good for charters should be good for traditional schools.

More than 11,000 students attend charter schools in Baltimore — roughly 14 percent of the district — and thousands of families are on waiting lists trying to get into them. But as we mark the 10-year milestone, we are deeply concerned about the future of charters in Baltimore for two reasons: funding and autonomy from the central office.

Walter Amprey, former Baltimore schools superintendent who served from 1991 to 1997, died of complications of a heart transplant Tuesday afternoon at the University of Maryland Medical Center. He was 69.

City must provide educational opportunities for all and not just the college-bound

Approval of two apartment buildings and two parks by he city's urban design and architecture review panel is one of the first steps forward since ambitious plans to overhaul a 14-acre portion of the Poppleton neighborhood were announced almost a decade ago.

Recent gun scares show schools are quick on the lockdown draw

Archaeologists this week have been probing Patterson Park with radar and other technology for signs the a War of 1812 Battle of Baltimore in preparation for digs in April and May.

School board decisions shouldn't be driven by the political winds

Nicole Musgrave, President of Sustainable Futures, announced March 12 at the Board of Education meeting that the organization planned to resubmit its application April 1.

Chesapeake Science Point Public Charter School officials entered a recent Anne Arundel County school board meeting eager too discover whether their new high school program would be allowed to continue.

It is clear from all the trumpeting of "We're No. 1" that Maryland's political-educational establishment is tone deaf to its own confusion, all the more reason not to leave education reform to the politicians.

University of Maryland President Wallace Loh says proposals to connect innovation with commerce play to the state's strengths.

Charter school savings

Stoneleigh collage artist Nancy Scheinman, heads up NS Studios, a team of young designers, as they transform school settings into multisensory, imaginative spaces. The latest project, sponsored by The Children's Guild, is taking place at Monach Academy in Baltimore.

The two boys from St. James & John School have a firm grip on conflict resolution.

Randallstown's Chris Manning has enjoyed the lead role in two school productions, sang plenty of solos in the choir and played four different instruments in the band on top of being one of the stars on the basketball team. But he still has something left to do before he leaves Randallstown: Win a state championship.

Stubbornly high poverty rates and increasing income inequality have turned upside down the long-held belief of education being a pathway to the middle class.

When a representative from Cristo Rey Jesuit High School visited Danielle Cook's class, the eighth-grader thought she fit the criteria for the rigorous, college preparatory high school in Baltimore.