CCBOE QUESTIONNAIRE

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I confirm that the responses provided here are my official positions in seeking local office and I understand that EACC reserves the right to share my responses with members and interested parties.  

Candidates: To be considered for a recommendation, you must indicate your response to each of the questions.  Clarifications, explanations, and other information may be attached, but please be certain to clearly indicate the questions(s) to which you refer.

EDUCATION FUNDING

BACKGROUND POINTS

• With a critical need in closing education gaps, expanding programs and services, community schools, and improving student achievement. In 2020 the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future law was passed to meet the challenges of a changing global economy and prepare Maryland students to be successful citizens in the 21st century.

• The Blueprint revises the state’s school funding formula for the first time in nearly two decades. Over the next decade, the Blueprint calls for billions of dollars of new investment in Maryland schools that would expand career and technical education programs, community schools, and pre-k; provide more resources for students from backgrounds of poverty and students with special needs; increase educator pay; hire more educators and expand and diversify the educator pipeline; and create a new, more rigorous accountability system. These programs are designed to raise achievement and address Maryland’s economic inequality with programs to target concentrated poverty.

• The Board of Education will significantly impact the implementation of the Blueprint, including future funding and success of Charles County Public Schools. The Blueprint is landmark legislation, but there is a continued need for investment in Charles County Public Schools to see that the Blueprint is successfully implemented, and in ensuring that educator voices are heard and respected throughout implementation.

Public Funding for Private Schools  

BACKGROUND POINTS

• The Education Association of Charles County believes any education dollars spent outside of improving public schools makes it harder to make the progress necessary to provide a world-class education for every student.

• Non-public school funding for programs in the budget such as textbooks, technology, school construction, and vouchers reduce the state’s General Fund while subsidizing the cost of private education. Data from the first few years of the BOOST program indicated that more than 70% of voucher recipients already attended and paid for private school before receiving the voucher.

• The Maryland State Department of Education requires a certificate of approval or registration for private schools; it does not accredit or license them. Private schools do not have to report or administer teacher qualifications, class sizes, adherence to College and Career Readiness Standards, student retention rates, graduation rates, demographics, or discipline or suspension policies. Without these measures, it is impossible to effectively evaluate the programs funneling public tax dollars to private schools.

Evaluations and Less Testing, More Learning 

BACKGROUND POINTS

• The Education Association of Charles County (EACC) believes that educator evaluation systems must be educator-informed, research-based, and collaboratively developed. Evaluation systems should be fair, transparent, timely, rigorous, valid, and designed to improve instruction by focusing on teaching and learning.

• Maryland law mandates that student growth is a “significant component” and “one of the multiple measures” in a teacher’s evaluation. No evaluation criterion can account for more than 35%. The law also mandates that evaluation systems must be mutually agreed upon at the local level.

• A key provision of evaluation systems is the requirement for local agreement between school boards, superintendents, and local associations. Such local development allows for the evaluation system to meet the unique needs of each district.

• EACC believes the continued push for high-stakes student assessments undermines educator’s creativity and their ability to respond to the needs of students. Instead of high-stakes assessments, EACC supports high-quality assessments that support student learning from a rich curriculum and with room for educator’s voices in the development of curriculum and assessment.

• Additionally, EACC supports rigorous and relevant professional development through the continued alignment of evaluation systems.

Collective Bargaining  

BACKGROUND POINTS

• The Education Association of Charles County supports efforts to protect and enhance the state’s collective bargaining laws.

• Collective bargaining is the negotiation of a contract – including wages, salary scale, benefits, and working conditions – between employers and employees.  The items agreed to in a ratified collective bargaining agreement apply to all employees in a bargaining unit, providing a benefit to employees and employers in not having to negotiate thousands of individual contracts.

• MSEA opposes right to work laws. Such laws restrict freedom of association and weaken organized labor in Maryland. The strength of organized labor is critical to protecting workers, ensuring quality, and maintaining fairness, safety, and competitive wages in the workplace.

Societal Stressors that Affect Education

BACKGROUND POINTS

• Charles County is currently experiencing a multifaceted societal crisis including unstable incomes, increased housing costs, and the loss of assistance programs such as SNAP.
• These adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have a direct impact on student achievement and success.

Racial and Social Justice 

BACKGROUND POINTS

• The Education Association of Charles County (EACC) unequivocally believes that our diversity makes us stronger. We fundamentally believe that schools should be safe, welcoming, and nurturing learning environments for students of all backgrounds and beliefs, and places where all our students see themselves in the lessons they learn and experiences they enjoy. MSEA is a vocal advocate of the Blueprint for Maryland's Future in part because of our support for training and developing high-quality teachers and education leaders, particularly those from diverse and historically underrepresented backgrounds.
• Every child, regardless of their background or zip code, deserves education justice and equitable access to opportunities, resources, and supports. We believe that the lives of our Black and Brown students matter and that all our students have a fundamental right to be educated in safe, healthy, and supportive learning communities and all our educators deserve safe, healthy, and supportive working environments.
• Maryland and U.S. history are far more diverse than is generally reflected in the content and courses currently taught in our public schools. Far too many Marylanders can progress through their formal primary and secondary education and rarely, if ever, see themselves reflected in the content they are learning or hear about themselves in the stories they read and are told. This lack of inclusivity negatively impacts not only our students' ownership of and agency in their learning, but it also adversely impacts their overall engagement in their learning and portrays an one-sided view of our history for all students. The disconnect is further exacerbated by the dearth of a more diverse field of educators in our schools and by the disproportionate (and sometime inaccurate) representations seen in society and in our culture that ultimately reinforces a sense of "otherness" for the people, communities, and cultures who have been rendered less relevant and less valuable. EACC recognizes the vital importance of ensuring that all students learn about historical figures who not only had a tremendous impact on the forming of our state and our nation but whose actions and sacrifices laid the foundation upon which this nation's pledge of "liberty and justice for all" must be built.
• EACC is committed to developing critical thinking skills in our students because we know that they enable them to better understand the problems our society faces and to develop collective solutions. To that end, we are abundantly clear that truth and honesty are fundamental components of teaching and learning, as are academic integrity and professional responsibility.  Out essential mission is to prepare our students for college, career, and life and to play an active role in our democracy.

LGBTQ+ Community 

BACKGROUND POINTS

• • In 2024, The Trevor Project reported
  • 39% of LGBTQ+ young people seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year.
  • Among transgender and nonbinary youth, 46% seriously considered suicide.
  • 12% of LGBTQ+ young people attempted suicide in the past year.
  • 84% wanted mental health care in the past year.
  • Of those who wanted care, 50% were unable to get it.
  • 66% reported symptoms of anxiety.
  • 53% reported symptoms of depression.
  • 90% reported their well-being was negatively impacted by recent politics/policies.                                               (The Trevor Project, 2024)
  • The Education Association of Charles County (EACC) supports the equal opportunity rights of students and staff who identify as a LGBTQ+.
  • EACC supports providing access to LGBTQ+ resources and to specialized mental health services to students, parents, and staff members.

Community Schools 

BACKGROUND POINTS

Poverty dramatically and negatively affects the well-being of children, particularly in the areas of physical health, mental health, safe housing, access to technology, parental support, family planning services, nutrition, youth employment, and education. Each of these areas plays a large role in whether students can learn and do well in school, making it imperative that these opportunity gaps be closed if we want to provide an equitable education in our communities. According to recent data (2024–25 school year), about 49.6% of Maryland public school students were eligible for free or reduced-price meals.

• The Education Association of Charles County supports the establishment of community schools, where applicable, which are designed to close these opportunity gaps by making the school a hub for essential services that students in disadvantaged communities lack.

• Community schools generally have the following four components: (1) they serve a high concentration of students in poverty; (2) they employ a full-time coordinator to lead community school-related services; (3) they conduct a needs assessment to identify key obstacles to learning and the services needed to close the opportunity gaps; and (4) they work with community partners to bring those needed services into the school building or nearby locations to make them accessible to students and community members.

• The Blueprint phases in community schools, starting with 219 schools with 80% or more of their students enrolled for free and reduced-price meals. Community schools will be added, phased in according to highest levels of poverty first, until FY27, when a predicted 557—nearly one-third of all schools in the state—are projected to become community schools. That makes this one of the largest-scale expansions of community schools in the nation.

• The Education Association of Charles County supports equitable and adequate resources to provide every student with an opportunity to learn in a safe and non-disruptive environment. Establishing and funding community schools is a research-based strategy for closing opportunity gaps and building strong communities.

Parental Involvement and Public Support 

BACKGROUND POINTS

• It is calculated that school-age children spend 70% of their waking hours outside of school (including weekends and holidays).

• Research shows that the most consistent predictors of children’s academic achievement and social adjustment are parental involvement in schools and parental expectations of the child’s academic attainment and satisfaction with their child’s education at school.

• Additionally, research indicates three major factors influence parental involvement in schools:

• Parents believe that they can impact what is important, and necessary on behalf of their children's school.

• The extent to which parents believe that they can have a positive influence on their children’s education; and

• Parents’ perceptions that their children and school want them to be involved.

Privatization 

BACKGROUND POINTS

• The Education Association of Charles County opposes any effort to outsource or privatize education jobs that are part of a bargaining unit. We maintain that any attempt to outsource or privatize jobs of public educators violates collective bargaining agreements because such an effort is in essence terminating or firing bargaining unit positions.

• Outsourcing and privatization efforts have threatened teachers and education support professional (ESP) jobs for years. In recent years, some counties have attempted to outsource teaching services for deaf and blind students, other counties have discussed privatizing transportation services, while others have attempted to privatize custodial services. There have been multi-county efforts on the Eastern Shore to outsource the hiring of occupational therapists and physical therapists to work in the schools.

• When jobs are outsourced, quality control is diminished, and safety is compromised. Public employees are subject to background checks that private employers often do not require. After privatizing, local school boards lose control over the individuals working in schools and have little ability to provide input on job performance.

• Privatizers often use an argument of cost-savings as a means of winning contracts. The amount is often misleading because they intentionally underestimate first-year operating costs. Ultimately, they reduce hours, and health care coverage, or just cut jobs. All these steps lead to an increase in local unemployment and less money in the community overall.