Farewell Appearance of the Blair HS Gym Towel - MCPS Operating Budget Testimony 1/14/2009

Testimony of
Rosanne A. Hurwitz
Before the Montgomery County Board of Education
On the MCPS Proposed Operating Budget for FY 2010
January 14, 2009

Good evening. My name is Rosanne Hurwitz. I am a parent of two children, a resident of Rockville Maryland and a founding member of the Parents Coalition. Thank you for this opportunity to address the issue of the Montgomery County Operating Budget.

The first time I testified before the Board of Education was in April, 2001. The subject was the math curriculum, and math textbooks. At the time, those of us involved thought we had won the battle when we began to see math textbooks in classrooms around the county. What we didn’t realize was that we also needed to specify who picks up the tab for these curricular expenses.

Tonight, I bring to you what I hope is the last appearance of the Blair HS Gym Towel. In this budget, and as noted in a memo last week from Dr. Weast, the BOE has finally acknowledged that expenditures for curricular items, including textbooks and this towel, are the responsibility of the school system and not parents. I welcome additional information and look forward to those amendments to the budget that will bring MCPS practice in line with the state mandate for a free public education.

I am concerned, however, whether the current budget in its proposed and amended form, will provide our children with the necessary materials they need for their education. Is the $1.5 million dollars sufficient? I can’t tell by reading the budget for two reasons: 1. The budget does not include curricular fees as a source of income/revenue to the school, so it is impossible to determine the dollar figures needed to replace the curricular fees if eliminated; and 2. We don’t have an accounting of what these fees really purchased. The Operating Budget needs to specifically provide for curricular items, such as textbooks and supplies, in a manner that the taxpaying public can comprehend.

The Maryland State Constitution and statutory authority clearly provide for a free public education, with textbooks and materials of instruction available to students free of charge. The terms are entitled to their plain meaning. We all know what a textbook is, and by now we are sufficiently familiar with online resources to identify electronic textbooks - to paraphrase Supreme Court Justice Potter Stuart - we know what it is when we see it. The categorization that some materials, like workbooks, owl eyes, and chicken wings, become the property of the student and thus the costs should be borne by the families is without merit. Whether consumed in a cooking lab or dissected in a biology lab, a chicken wing by any other name is still a chicken wing.

It is time for the Board of Education and the school system to face its obligations, make appropriate provisions to use the money they are allocated, obey the law, and fund those curricular items that are an integral part of the school program. The school system can not claim that it is justified by a tough economy. You can’t rob a bank merely because you are short of funds and want to go out to eat. If the law needs to be changed, change it, but don’t break it and hope no one will notice. Parents throughout Montgomery County teach their children to be law abiding and moral citizens; we expect no less of the public servants in charge of our school system.