Education Week, a national education newspaper that has given Maryland schools the top mark for the past five years, has stopped ranking the states in its annual Quality Counts report.

Maryland's superintendent of schools has no plans to take down dozens of signs in the windows of her agency's headquarters that proclaim Maryland No. 1 in education. Likewise, Gov. Martin O'Malley is unlikely to stop bragging that Maryland is No. 1 in the nation, a point he made again Wednesday on Twitter.

But technically, Maryland cannot claim that distinction anymore. Education Week, a national education newspaper that has given Maryland schools the top mark for the past five years, has stopped ranking the states in its annual Quality Counts report. It was considered the most comprehensive ranking of the nation's schools.

Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/education/blog/bs-md-number-one-ranking-20140108,0,2900778.story#ixzz3CGNlWxLH