Hogan Issues Order for School Accountability

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Completely election year gimmick (like widening the beltway and I270). If any of this was important to him (and MC isnt important to Hogan at all), he would have done it months or years earlier.

I think Smith is moving, albeit slowly, in the right direction. People are mad when predators have been 'hidden' and are still mad now that MCPS is transparent when they are found. He has gotten rid of/reorganozed some people out of central office, and gotten rid of others (Capital Planning).

It's a big machine and it takes time to make course corrections. They did a quick/hard stop when they found improprieties with the new curriculum search. And I think turned it around pretty quickly.

Am I happy with mcps and our overcrowded schools? No. Do I think they're moving in the right direction, maybe. But a big part of the problem is funding. Some schools need smaller class sizes and more support. Others need more facilities because of overcrowding or improved facilities because they haven't been touched since the 1950s. To make all these changes, the schools need money. They raise the property taxes for the first time in 9 years, and people went ballistic. So how do we expect all these changes we want, without increasing the funds? There just isn't millions/billions of bloat left to cut.

+1 Hogan can take his toothless "order" and shove it. He's the one who cut the extra funding in 2015 for MoCo and HoCo that accounted for the higher staffing costs due to higher costs of living in those areas. He's just trying to make nice now that it's election season and then will go back to doing his Ocean City welfare programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Completely election year gimmick (like widening the beltway and I270). If any of this was important to him (and MC isnt important to Hogan at all), he would have done it months or years earlier.

I think Smith is moving, albeit slowly, in the right direction. People are mad when predators have been 'hidden' and are still mad now that MCPS is transparent when they are found. He has gotten rid of/reorganozed some people out of central office, and gotten rid of others (Capital Planning).

It's a big machine and it takes time to make course corrections. They did a quick/hard stop when they found improprieties with the new curriculum search. And I think turned it around pretty quickly.

Am I happy with mcps and our overcrowded schools? No. Do I think they're moving in the right direction, maybe. But a big part of the problem is funding. Some schools need smaller class sizes and more support. Others need more facilities because of overcrowding or improved facilities because they haven't been touched since the 1950s. To make all these changes, the schools need money. They raise the property taxes for the first time in 9 years, and people went ballistic. So how do we expect all these changes we want, without increasing the funds? There just isn't millions/billions of bloat left to cut.

+1 Hogan can take his toothless "order" and shove it. He's the one who cut the extra funding in 2015 for MoCo and HoCo that accounted for the higher staffing costs due to higher costs of living in those areas. He's just trying to make nice now that it's election season and then will go back to doing his Ocean City welfare programs.

Have you looked at what MCPS its budget on? that's where the priorities to educated all the children dissolve right out the door in favor or retirement benefits (40% of budget), bloated central office (20% of budget), the speciality programs then faculty. Love it when sometimes they put the union benefits in as salary, trying to confuse $60k salary + $3M retirement annuity pension. yeah.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Did Erick Lang lose his pension for causing 250,000 students to delay the curriculum adoption process for one year? No, instead Maria Navarro wrote a fawning email, praising Discovery Education for their "ethics" in reporting the situation to MCPS. As if anyone with half a brain wouldn't be able to see that the manager in charge of curriculum at MCPS who they were trying to hire would be somehow involved in the RFP they were bidding on.

What would be the legal basis for doing this?

[Anonymous]

Ah, I see. They probably stole the money, over there in that colored school system.
It couldn't have anything to do with inequitable funding of resources.
Hogan having a 504 million budget surplus and poor children in schools with faulty heat and ac is a shanda.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Have you looked at what MCPS its budget on? that's where the priorities to educated all the children dissolve right out the door in favor or retirement benefits (40% of budget), bloated central office (20% of budget), the speciality programs then faculty. Love it when sometimes they put the union benefits in as salary, trying to confuse $60k salary + $3M retirement annuity pension. yeah.

Yes. Instruction 81.2%, school support services 13.6%, system-wide support 2.6%, self-suporting enterprise funds and special revenue fund, 2.6%.

Benefits are included in compensation - that's a standard practice.

https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/departments/budget/fy2018/FY2018_OperatingBudgetSummary_FINALforWeb.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Baltimore is a sad sad case. Money is thrown at them and they miss use it. There is a huge culture of corruption that puts the interest of corrupt politicians before the interest of the kids. The fact that they don’t have any air-conditioning is an excusable. Before we throw more money at them let’s find out where the corruption is and let’s have accountability.
I don’t think anybody here can pretend this is the Hogan issue. Baltimore has been corrupt for decades. It’s finally time for somebody to take charge and investigate that .

"Corrupt" and "corruption" have become words that can mean basically anything.

Also, who is "we", and what is the difference between "throwing money at" and "funding"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Completely election year gimmick (like widening the beltway and I270). If any of this was important to him (and MC isnt important to Hogan at all), he would have done it months or years earlier.

I think Smith is moving, albeit slowly, in the right direction. People are mad when predators have been 'hidden' and are still mad now that MCPS is transparent when they are found. He has gotten rid of/reorganozed some people out of central office, and gotten rid of others (Capital Planning).

It's a big machine and it takes time to make course corrections. They did a quick/hard stop when they found improprieties with the new curriculum search. And I think turned it around pretty quickly.

Am I happy with mcps and our overcrowded schools? No. Do I think they're moving in the right direction, maybe. But a big part of the problem is funding. Some schools need smaller class sizes and more support. Others need more facilities because of overcrowding or improved facilities because they haven't been touched since the 1950s. To make all these changes, the schools need money. They raise the property taxes for the first time in 9 years, and people went ballistic. So how do we expect all these changes we want, without increasing the funds? There just isn't millions/billions of bloat left to cut.

Are you kidding?

I'd be willing to pay more in property taxes if it meant ACTUAL improvement in the schools. No, that's not what happens.

MCPS chooses to spend money on a huge, bloated, inefficient central office and ridiculous administrative positions. It CHOSE to waste money on ridiculous, unproven initiatives, and a useless curriculum instead of choosing a proven, tested curriculum. MCPS chose to spend money to increase tech, such as Chromebooks and Promethean boards, instead of pushing for smaller class sizes and increasing the number of teachers.

I think most parents would be willing to pay more to a school system that is well-run. MCPS is so dysfunctional. Giving more money to an already dysfunctional system is not going to help. That's why people go ballistic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Are you kidding?

I'd be willing to pay more in property taxes if it meant ACTUAL improvement in the schools. No, that's not what happens.

MCPS chooses to spend money on a huge, bloated, inefficient central office and ridiculous administrative positions. It CHOSE to waste money on ridiculous, unproven initiatives, and a useless curriculum instead of choosing a proven, tested curriculum. MCPS chose to spend money to increase tech, such as Chromebooks and Promethean boards, instead of pushing for smaller class sizes and increasing the number of teachers.

I think most parents would be willing to pay more to a school system that is well-run. MCPS is so dysfunctional. Giving more money to an already dysfunctional system is not going to help. That's why people go ballistic.

Could you please list 10 things in the MCPS operating budget that you want to reallocate for other purposes, and how much that would add up to?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Completely election year gimmick (like widening the beltway and I270). If any of this was important to him (and MC isnt important to Hogan at all), he would have done it months or years earlier.

I think Smith is moving, albeit slowly, in the right direction. People are mad when predators have been 'hidden' and are still mad now that MCPS is transparent when they are found. He has gotten rid of/reorganozed some people out of central office, and gotten rid of others (Capital Planning).

It's a big machine and it takes time to make course corrections. They did a quick/hard stop when they found improprieties with the new curriculum search. And I think turned it around pretty quickly.

Am I happy with mcps and our overcrowded schools? No. Do I think they're moving in the right direction, maybe. But a big part of the problem is funding. Some schools need smaller class sizes and more support. Others need more facilities because of overcrowding or improved facilities because they haven't been touched since the 1950s. To make all these changes, the schools need money. They raise the property taxes for the first time in 9 years, and people went ballistic. So how do we expect all these changes we want, without increasing the funds? There just isn't millions/billions of bloat left to cut.

Are you kidding?

I'd be willing to pay more in property taxes if it meant ACTUAL improvement in the schools. No, that's not what happens.

MCPS chooses to spend money on a huge, bloated, inefficient central office and ridiculous administrative positions. It CHOSE to waste money on ridiculous, unproven initiatives, and a useless curriculum instead of choosing a proven, tested curriculum. MCPS chose to spend money to increase tech, such as Chromebooks and Promethean boards, instead of pushing for smaller class sizes and increasing the number of teachers.

I think most parents would be willing to pay more to a school system that is well-run. MCPS is so dysfunctional. Giving more money to an already dysfunctional system is not going to help. That's why people go ballistic.

Maryland is choosing to offer Amazon $7bn in tax revenues to come here. No other jurisdiction is offering that much (or if they have, they haven't said so publicly.) Maryland gave Marriott 40$ in tax breaks to move down the road by a half a mile (and not create any jobs). One can argue over the merits of these decisions to the broader economy, but it's certain that when Maryland government wants to spend money on something, it does.

[Anonymous]

I thought Rs were into smaller government and local accountability? What happened here?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I thought Rs were into smaller government and local accountability? What happened here?

I've heard that too but never seen it in practice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:


Did Erick Lang lose his pension for causing 250,000 students to delay the curriculum adoption process for one year? No, instead Maria Navarro wrote a fawning email, praising Discovery Education for their "ethics" in reporting the situation to MCPS. As if anyone with half a brain wouldn't be able to see that the manager in charge of curriculum at MCPS who they were trying to hire would be somehow involved in the RFP they were bidding on.

What would be the legal basis for doing this?

I'm not the PP but I would like to see Discovery barred from submitting an RFP. It is corrupt how MCPS staff are still pushing for Discovery so they can hold onto what they know, support their co-workers and not give up 2.0. The JHU audit found that the curriculum created by Lang and the staff that had already moved over to Discovery was one of the worst they had ever seen yet MCPD staff don't want to cling on. Discovery Ed is a small company and there is no way that they did not know they were hiring Lang and bidding on one of the only potential county systems. Maria's fawning note about Discovery was a complete lie. Its beyond ridiculous and it would be good if the state intervened on this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Are you kidding?

I'd be willing to pay more in property taxes if it meant ACTUAL improvement in the schools. No, that's not what happens.

MCPS chooses to spend money on a huge, bloated, inefficient central office and ridiculous administrative positions. It CHOSE to waste money on ridiculous, unproven initiatives, and a useless curriculum instead of choosing a proven, tested curriculum. MCPS chose to spend money to increase tech, such as Chromebooks and Promethean boards, instead of pushing for smaller class sizes and increasing the number of teachers.

I think most parents would be willing to pay more to a school system that is well-run. MCPS is so dysfunctional. Giving more money to an already dysfunctional system is not going to help. That's why people go ballistic.

Could you please list 10 things in the MCPS operating budget that you want to reallocate for other purposes, and how much that would add up to?

Yes, start by making the entire budget public. Every. Dollar.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Yes, start by making the entire budget public. Every. Dollar.

Have you seen this website? https://data.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/Budget/FY2018-MCPS-Operating-Budget/jctj-yd6u

[Anonymous]

The curriculum office that was expanded to provide 2.0 should go. The technology office is spending too much and on antiquated technologies. They need to modernize and slim down considerably but they don't have the internal talent or leadership to do it.

HR benefits are interesting 4M a year on tuition reimbursement? Is that common on top of MCPS benefits?

If you drill into any of the budgets you see lots of little divisions. This is where waste comes from in a government system. In a 2B budget, the internal thinking is the a few million spread across many units will not stand out and will be safe. Its a self protective mechanism. It also bloats the overhead costs because each unit has a higher level manager even if its small. System wide consolidation and reduction would make more sense.