Issue Position: Strong Schools

Issue Position

Focus on our priorities, ease overcrowding, modernize our schools, and secure our fair share of state funding.

We need to step up now to ease overcrowding due to years of enrollment growth. Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) routinely receive less than our fair share of state funding, relative to the size of enrollment and taxes paid. This needs to change.

We also need to encourage the teaching of languages deemed crucial to U.S. national security and economic competitiveness, beginning in elementary school.

More Details:

From 2000-2012, MCPS grew by over 14,500 students -- more than the growth of Anne Arundel, Howard, Frederick, and Baltimore counties combined over the same period. Enrollment at elementary schools has grown by 12,400 students in the past 6 years. We are facing challenges, with currently 335 portables being used at MCPS elementary schools. [See MCPS Press Release, October 28, 2013, "Superintendent Recommends $1.55 Billion Construction Plan."]

While English should remain the official language in the United States, we should encourage MCPS students to learn other languages to help their competitiveness on the job market, including in particular any of the seven languages which are deemed crucial to U.S. national security and economic competitiveness for which the State Department awards bonus points for candidate Foreign Service Officers: Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), Hindi, Persian (Dari and/or Farsi), Pashto, Urdu, and Korean. Languages are most effectively learned in younger years so language learning should be encouraged as early as elementary school.

See also:

Open Schools to Home Schoolers, Rose Li's Letter to the Editor, Baltimore Sun, April 21, 2014

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