Pearson - MCPS Curriculum 2.0 Deal Tanking. No Royalties until after 2014.

On Monday, September 24, 2012 at 9:30 AM, the Montgomery County Council's Education committee will hold a hearing on the Pearson-MCPS Curriculum 2.0 deal that was pushed through in 48 hours by Superintendent Jerry Weast.

MCPS parents should pay close attention to this hearing.  Parents can attend the hearing in person, watch the hearing on the county cable channel or the Council's website, or parents can call in to the Council and listen to the hearing over their phones. 

The Council's Education committee released a packet for the hearing.  The packet is shown below.  What is notable about this packet is that it contains two memos from Superintendent Joshua Starr to the Board of Education that have not been made available to the public prior to today.  Why was the BOE and the Superintendent hiding these important Pearson-MCPS Curriculum 2.0 updates?

Also, noted in the Council's packet is that MCPS has received no royalties from the sale of the Pearson-MCPS Curriculum 2.0, and no royalties are even expected until after 2014.  MCPS staff have already been on the convention circuit hawking this Pearson-MCPS product.  Yet, no buyers so far? 

The bottom line on the Pearson-MCPS-Curriculum 2.0 project is that it is just about out of cash.  This is the last year of the U.S. Department of Education grant funding, and the Pearson payment to MCPS was dramatically slashed from Superintendent Weast's original proposal.

Hope everyone likes the new curriculum, because the funding for the new curriculum is just about gone.

20120924_ED1 Pearson Curriculum