Issue Position: Education

Issue Position

The first in my family to graduate from college, I know the value and utility of a quality education and understand first-hand how education can open doors to opportunity and success. Education has been and will always be the gateway to upward mobility in our community. This is truer today than ever before as our economy demands a highly skilled labor force.
The Montgomery County public school system, with more than 150,000 students, is home to 17% of the State's school children. Despite the size of our school system, only 17%, of Montgomery County Public Schools' annual budget comes from the State. While this may seem significant, all but two of Maryland's 23 counties (Talbot and Worcester) get at least 45% of their public school systems annual budget from the State. Montgomery County's tax base provides a substantial amount of money to the State and I will advocate ensuring more of that money is spent in our community on early education and English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) initiatives.
Keeping Our Schools the Best in the Nation
Maintaining our status as the best public school system in the country will require maintaining our ability to recruit, retain and train the best and brightest teachers for our community. With just 17% of school funding coming from the State, I will advocate for Montgomery County's fair share of educational funding in Annapolis to ensure smaller class sizes, modern facilities, competitive teacher compensation and support for early education programs.
The demographic makeup of the schools in District 20 is changing fast. Today, our classrooms are enriched with more ethnic diversity than ever before. Our district is also home to more children for whom English is not their first language and more of our community's children require special accommodations. All of these changes require strong investments in early childhood education, advanced English as a second language programs, and support programs for special needs children. That's why I plan to advocate for stronger state support of these programs in Annapolis.
Closing the Achievement Gap
Today, in our top-ranking Montgomery County Public Schools, there exists a 45.4% achievement gap between African-American students and White and Asian students for scores on the 8th Grade Math Maryland School Assessment (MSA) test. Today, in our top-ranking public school system almost 20% of African-American students fail to graduate from high school.
Excellence in education means excellence for all. Addressing pervasive challenges in the achievement gap and ensuring all of our children "have a clear path toward laudable pursuit, and are afforded an unfettered start and a fair chance, in the race of life" will require investments in early education programs geared at getting students on the right track early.
Supporting our grant-based and non-profit institutions:
I support and will advocate for the requisite funding for early childhood education and grant-funded institutions designed to close the achievement gap, like the GapBuster Learning Center and Judy Centers. Based in Silver Spring, the GapBuster Learning Center is a not for profit organization premised on raising academic standards and promotes higher levels of achievement for socio-economically disadvantaged students. Judy Centers are also locally based grant-funded institutions that focus on early childhood services aimed at getting children on the right track early. Supporting innovative community-based programs such as these is a critical element in addressing the achievement gap, and I plan to advocate for increased state support of similar institutions through initiatives like the Maryland Afterschool Opportunity Fund.
Universal Pre-K:
Our children and our society at-large benefit tremendously when students have access to high quality pre-k. Kindergarteners who participated in pre-k programs perform far better academically and exemplify fewer behavioral problems than their counterparts who did not attend. Universal pre-k in Maryland will help close the achievement gap, and has long term effects that last far beyond childhood. Students who attend pre-k have been shown to complete high school at higher rates, score higher on college entrance exams, and are less likely to be incarcerated.
However, today our Maryland schools only offers pre-k to families whose incomes are less than 185 percent of the federal poverty line. This leaves almost a third of the approximately 75,000 pre-k eligible students without access. As your delegate I will advocate for the requisite funding to support universal pre-k in Maryland.
Authorized unpaid leave to attend parent-teacher conferences
When parents are engaged students thrive. Students with involved parents score higher on tests, achieve higher grades, behave better in school, and are more likely to pursue post secondary education. While there is no way to legislate parental involvement I believe we should do all we can to ensure parents have the opportunity to be active participants in the education of their children. That's why I support allowing an employee to use unpaid leave to attend parent-teacher meetings.
Helping students IEP Students:
Allowing parents with disabilities to take unpaid leave to attend parent-teacher meetings is an essential component to understanding the unique challenges and needs of their children and will help ensure they are able to thrive in our schools.
Ensuring Access to Postsecondary Education
As the first in my family to graduate from college, I know how important postsecondary education is to compete in today's workforce. I am passionate about keeping in-state tuition for our public colleges and universities affordable and I will work in the legislature to prevent costly increases. I also support and will advocate for more robust financial support of critical local institutions like Montgomery College, which provide stellar academic and vocational training at an affordable cost.

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