County school board appoints eight to new MCPS leadership posts

The Montgomery County school board unanimously approved appointments of eight high-level administrators Tuesday, reassigning some staff and adding new hires under a restructuring of Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) leadership.  

MCPS Superintendent Thomas Taylor is reorganizing the district’s central office at the leadership and general staffing levels. Taylor said Thursday the restructuring of the central office, which includes cutting about 81 positions, would provide more support to schools through the reassignment of some staff members.  

MCPS began making changes to its leadership structure in November, after it announced eight chief-level positions. The posts include the chiefs of school leadership, talent management, student support, equity and development, technology, academics, and operations. The district also listed the post of general counsel, or the head of the district’s in-house legal team, as an open position. All positions were filled by Tuesday’s appointments and report to Taylor...

  County school board appoints eight to new MCPS leadership posts   - Bethesda Magazine

.@MCPS Letter: Extended School Year (ESY) FAILURE. No teachers for students with special education needs. What are over 400 ADMINISTRATORS doing this summer?? Put 'em in classrooms!

What are MCPS' over 400 educational specialist administrators and managers doing this summer? It's time to call them back into the classroom. 

Parents and guardians with children needing special education classes this summer have suddenly received the letter shown below.  Families were given approximately 10 days notice that their child would not be in school this summer and that THE FAMILIES had to quickly find someone to sit with their child each school day for virtual, at home instruction.  

Who is in charge of this failure?  Gwendolyn Mason, brought back from the Superintendent Jerry Weast years in MCPS.  Superintendent Monifa McKnight has been bringing back a lot of administrators from the years of Superintendent Jerry Weast.  Monifa McKnight is a Jerry Weast reboot.  

The failure to plan for students needing special education services over the summer is, therefore, no surprise but a return to the MCPS attitude that students with special education services don't deserve services at all. Superintendent Jerry Weast took a family with a student with special education needs all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2005 to make his case. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

June 29, 2022

Dear Parents/Guardians:

On Friday, June XX, 2022, the Office of Special Education (OSE) invited you to a meeting to discuss Extended School Year (ESY) services for your child beginning, July 5, 2022. The purpose of the meeting was to share some very urgent and important information regarding the impact of the special education teacher shortage on delivering in-person ESY services in Summer 2022.

Due to the significant teacher shortage, Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) OSE has been unable to hire special education teachers to serve a select group of ESY eligible students in-person. Also, MCPS offered incentive pay to special education teachers in an effort to encourage and attract teachers to work in the ESY program this summer. Unfortunately, not enough teachers indicated an interest in the opportunity.

As a result, MCPS will provide virtual ESY services for your child. To support your child during virtual instruction, MCPS will pay a person that you identify $19 per hour. This person may be a parent/guardian, relative or childcare provider. The person will be paid for working 4 hours daily, with the exception of July 19, 2022, when schools are closed. In order to pay your selected person, please complete the ESY survey by July 5, 2022.

Your child will be attending the morning ESY session that will be held from 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. You will be sent a link that will enable you to access virtual ESY services at the time referenced in this letter. If there are any concerns about your child’s session or the ESY Provider Survey, please contact Anna_E_Szilagyi-Weichbrod@mcpsmd.org.

You are invited to pick up your child’s Chromebook from their school of enrollment during the 2021–2022 school year from 9:00 a.m. through 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, June 30, 2022, or Friday, July 1, 2022. Chromebooks are expected to be returned to the school from which it was picked up from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. on Monday, August 1, 2022.

Please contact me at Gwendoyn_J_Mason@mcpsmd.org if you have any questions.

Sincerely,


Gwendolyn J. Mason, Ed.D.
Acting Associate Superintendent

MD Education Support jobs have declined while district leader and supervisor jobs have grown at 10 times the rate of teacher positions.

Since 2007, Maryland Has Added Just 385 Teachers Despite Gaining 40,500 Students

...That important students-to-teacher ratio? It grew from 14.3 to 14.8. During the last decade, Maryland schools only added one teacher for every 105 students gained in enrollment.

But teachers only make up about half of all school employees in Maryland schools. What about school counselors? There are 44 fewer school counselors now than there were in 2007. That’s not the only important position that has seen real declines despite the state school system taking on 40,500 more students. There are 1,915 fewer support staff positions — building managers, secretaries, food service workers, bus drivers, and many other important roles that make our schools function — in public schools now than a decade ago.

Meanwhile, district central office staff continued to grow while school-level staff stagnated and declined. The number of superintendents, deputy superintendents, program directors, and supervisors in the 24 district offices increased by 109 from 2007 to 2016 — or 10 times the percent increase of teachers during the last decade...

https://mseanewsfeed.com/since-2007-maryland-has-added-just-385-teachers-despite-gaining-40-500-students-eff72ab8d510

7 ON YOUR SIDE: DC-area schools spend most in U.S. on administrators

 Newly released numbers showing how much money school districts spend on administration is creating calls for change in Prince William County.

The U.S. Census Bureau numbers break down per student spending on administration, including principal and superintendent salaries...

...Montgomery County ranks 8th nationwide, spending $1,099 per student on administration...

In 2013, MCPS had 1,697 Non-School Based Positions, Fairfax has 1,648

We are behind on making the annual WABE Guide's available. Let's catch up by starting with the 2013 WABE Guide.

Below is the 2013 Washington Area Boards of Education (WABE) Guide.  The WABE Guide compares data from 10 public school systems around Washington, D.C.  The WABE Guide compares enrollment, class sizes, staffing, revenue, salary and benefits information from each of the 10 counties.

It usually compares data from all 10 counties, except there was the year that MCPS refused to participate.

   2013 by Parents' Coalition of Montgomery County, Maryland

Maxwell hires Shawn Joseph [former MCPS Director] as deputy school superintendent in Prince George’s County

“As you know, my family has not been able to relocate with me to the Seaford community, and I have resided in Seaford and Gaithersburg over the past two years,”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/maxwell-hires-shawn-joseph-as-another-deputy-school-superintendent-in-prgeos/2014/02/25/1b657ae6-9daa-11e3-b8d8-94577ff66b28_story.html

Foose moves to Balt. Co and $214,000 salary

The Baltimore Sun is reporting that the salary for Baltimore County Public Schools' new deputy superintendent Renee Foose is $214,000. Foose left her position as associate superintendent of the Office of Shared Accountability in MCPS where her salary was $162,623, to move to the Baltimore County position. 

..."In these days of fiscal constraints, there are ways to be creative and spend dollars wisely," Boser said. In general, he said, when school systems make cuts in education, "we tend not to do it in particularly thoughtful ways."
Baltimore County principals have been ordered to cut 196 teaching positions by telling select teachers that they will be "excessed." ...
...The school system released Foose's salary Wednesday night, a month after The Baltimore Sun first requested it. Salaries for government employees in Maryland are public information under state law, and school officials in Baltimore City, Anne Arundel County and other area municipalities typically disclose them immediately over the phone. When asked for Foose's salary the week of Feb. 28, a spokeswoman for the Baltimore County school system said the agency has implemented a policy requiring formal, written requests under the Maryland Public Information Act before salary information is released...

Percent of MCPS Budget Spent on Administration

Combining the percent of the Montgomery County Public School budget spent on Central Administration and Mid Level Administration (school management) we see that Administration has not been seriously cut, despite the rhetoric from the current Superintendent. 

Not really any lower than it was under Superintendent Vance in the 1990's

Bob A.

Administration