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["Susan Allison" <sueallison@comcast.net>]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/31/AR2006033101793_2.html

Lawmakers Vote to Block Md. Schools Takeover

By Nick Anderson and John Wagner
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, April 1, 2006; B01



The Maryland General Assembly voted yesterday to block a state move to seize control of long-struggling Baltimore schools, highlighting political uncertainty behind efforts to carry out the No Child Left Behind law.

The Democratic-led legislature's lightning action, on lopsided majority votes, came just two days after the Maryland State Board of Education voted to order new management for 11 Baltimore schools. Lawmakers argued that the state should have more respect for local control. The issue now moves toward a veto fight with Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R).

The developments in Annapolis illuminated a potential vulnerability in the federal education law: Enforcement of rules on testing and achievement in the schoolhouse often hinges on politics in the statehouse.

For that reason, the outcome of the Baltimore schools clash has consequences for the entire Maryland framework for rating schools and leveraging improvement. That system has drawn praise from the Bush administration and independent monitors.

Yesterday, incoming Prince George's County schools chief John E. Deasy alluded to these stakes in his first appearance in Upper Marlboro since he was hired to lead the state's second-largest and second-lowest-achieving school system.

"Prince George's County is not Baltimore City," Deasy declared, drawing an outburst of applause from a large crowd in the school board chamber. He said the county, with dozens of schools on a state watch list for persistently low test scores, is on "a different trajectory." Its student achievement, he said, is on the rise.

Deasy, who takes office May 1, added that one of his top priorities would be turning around eight Prince George's schools that could be next in line for a state takeover. "Are we worried about this issue? Absolutely."

In many ways, Deasy's goal is exactly what authors of the federal law intended. Raising student achievement helps local school officials escape the humiliation of receiving the ultimate penalty in public education -- state takeover.

Maryland has brandished the threat of a state takeover for more than a dozen years. Six years ago, state officials seized control of three low-performing elementary schools in Baltimore and hired Edison Schools Inc. to run them. Those schools have fared well on state reading and mathematics tests in recent years.

Maryland is just one of 14 states, according to the newspaper Education Week, that include state takeover as a possible penalty for low-performing schools. Virginia does not. The District's school accountability system varies from state models.

This week, Maryland set a precedent for enforcement of No Child Left Behind, according to experts who track the law. The state board voted to seize control of four high schools and force Baltimore to find new management for seven middle schools. All of the targeted schools had been on one state watch list or another for at least nine years.

The U.S. Education Department praised the state board for "taking historic and decisive action on the side of Baltimore's students."

But Baltimore officials said the state board had ignored efforts underway to reshape the city's secondary schools. They also noted that test scores have risen in elementary schools and that graduation rates have improved. And they said State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick and the state board had not consulted with them.

The city's arguments drove fast legislative action to halt state intervention. The Senate passed the measure on a vote of 30 to 17, followed soon after by a House vote of 100 to 34. Both margins indicated the measure, with solid Democratic support, had enough backing to override an expected Ehrlich veto.

Few lawmakers defended the performance of the state-targeted schools.

Senate Minority Whip Andrew P. Harris (R-Baltimore County) pointed to Thurgood Marshall Middle School. Only 4.3 percent of its students last year were proficient in math.

"You could fit them in a large phone booth!" Harris shouted. "It should be a large auditorium."

Sen. Nathaniel J. McFadden (D-Baltimore), a leader of the effort to block state intervention, conceded that in many schools, the track records are "abysmal."

"I admit to you I am not pleased, and the system is not pleased with the performance," McFadden said.

In the House, delegates expressed outrage at state education officials they said had acted unilaterally.

"It could be Prince George's County next, who knows?" said Del. Melony G. Griffith (D-Prince George's).

Del. Norman H. Conway (D-Wicomico) said, "If it were my county, I'd bust a gut."

Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, a Democratic candidate for governor, said he was "heartened" by the legislature's action. But Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell criticized the legislature's "apparent disregard for state and federal law."

The fallout for the state board, which is bipartisan and includes members appointed by both Democratic and Republican governors, is unclear.

Board President Edward L. Root (Cumberland) said the clash had implications for schools statewide. "Any time you take away the authority of the state board, you're weakening the educational system of the state of Maryland, and worse, you're putting kids in jeopardy," Root said. "The kids are in the middle."

The stakes are mounting. By 2009, Maryland will require students to pass graduation tests. Many in Baltimore and elsewhere are failing them. "States are going to have to decide how seriously they are committed to ensuring that all students get a quality education," said Ross Wiener of the Education Trust in Washington. "That's what Maryland is confronting right now."

© 2006 The Washington Post Company