I attended last night’s packed-house Cecil County Budget Hearing. In essence, budgets are about setting priorities. The purpose of the hearing was to give the citizens an opportunity to air their views on these priorities. By an overwhelming majority, some 45 people testified to their dissatisfaction with the education piece of the budget which provides the very lowest standard – “maintenance of effort” floor – set by state law. This is the third year in a row the County has taken this minimum as the Cecil County ceiling. There was an abundance of testimony from parents, teachers, and administrators on how this detrimentally affects our schools. Our children are in a failing system moving towards a second or third-rate education.
The purpose of a hearing, of course, is to be heard. But what if no one is listening? Our County Executive was absent again this year, so despite the many voices of our community, it falls on deaf ears.
There is ample money to address this downward spiral, but our County Executive has her own priorities to address. Namely, to be re-elected. So instead of turning around our schools, she will be buying votes by looting the County treasury for tax rebates (coincidentally, just in time for her re-election campaign). She is cynically trading your children’s future for a political strategy to gain re-election, her number one priority. What are your priorities?
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-Kennard R. Wiggins, Jr.
Elkton
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The School Union mob "Red Shirts" should all be ashamed of themselves for their mob behavior. Of course Superintendent Lawson was in the crowd directing them when to jeer and cheer. It is not surprising the liberal sect of the school and the left political mouthpieces were in full mob mode when asked to use the default increase of $1000.00 per student for their funding. Currently schools receive $15,946 (per student) and if you multiply this by 28 kids per classroom you get $446,488 per year. This far exceeds the salary of 2 teachers, books, etc (per classroom).
SOURCE: https://www.usnews.com/education/k12/maryland/districts/cecil-county-public-schools-106187 *data is based on the 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 school years. MOE (Maintenance of Effort) goes up each year by default so they receive even more than noted here.
The Cecil Whig reporter was on site and reported:
"With the majority of speakers providing testimony in support of more funding for CCPS, the few speakers that spoke against additional funding were met with derisive comments, laughter and heckling from the sea of attendees, many of whom wore red shirts in support of school funding."
"When asked numerous times by Cecil County Council President Jackie Gregory to keep applause to a minimum, the crowd went into an uproar of laughter and applause and continued to do so after each speaker in support of additional funding for the remainder of the meeting."
In closing, citizens should understand the facts and not just blowhards who are trying to paint their political foe as a daemon. Danielle Hornberger is doing s great job on holding the line on accountability that is never popular. Superintendent should spend more time managing his resources vs wasting them on political stunts as he did the other night. Remember Lawson uses the tax paid email system to spread his propaganda to these teachers to get them wild up. Math never lies, the amount of money per pupil the public school system is more than double what one would pay for PRIVATE SCHOOL. I suggest parents have the right to take it to a more productive private school vs the bloated ones we are forced in supporting. #Freedom, #FreeMarkets #EducationNotPolitics
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The School Union mob "Red Shirts" should all be ashamed of themselves for their mob behavior. Of course Superintendent Lawson was in the crowd directing them when to jeer and cheer. It is not surprising the liberal sect of the school and the left political mouthpieces were in full mob mode when asked to use the default increase of $1000.00 per student for their funding. Currently schools receive $15,946 (per student) and if you multiply this by 28 kids per classroom you get $446,488 per year. This far exceeds the salary of 2 teachers, books, etc (per classroom).
SOURCE: https://www.usnews.com/education/k12/maryland/districts/cecil-county-public-schools-106187 *data is based on the 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 school years. MOE (Maintenance of Effort) goes up each year by default so they receive even more than noted here.
The Cecil Whig reporter was on site and reported:
"With the majority of speakers providing testimony in support of more funding for CCPS, the few speakers that spoke against additional funding were met with derisive comments, laughter and heckling from the sea of attendees, many of whom wore red shirts in support of school funding."
"When asked numerous times by Cecil County Council President Jackie Gregory to keep applause to a minimum, the crowd went into an uproar of laughter and applause and continued to do so after each speaker in support of additional funding for the remainder of the meeting."
In closing, citizens should understand the facts and not just blowhards who are trying to paint their political foe as a daemon. Danielle Hornberger is doing s great job on holding the line on accountability that is never popular. Superintendent should spend more time managing his resources vs wasting them on political stunts as he did the other night. Remember Lawson uses the tax paid email system to spread his propaganda to these teachers to get them wild up. Math never lies, the amount of money per pupil the public school system is more than double what one would pay for PRIVATE SCHOOL. I suggest parents have the right to take it to a more productive private school vs the bloated ones we are forced in supporting. #Freedom, #FreeMarkets #EducationNotPolitics
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Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Don't Threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be Truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism that is degrading to another person.
Be Proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
Share with Us. We'd love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article.