The Montgomery County school board decided it isn’t ready to take a position on Gov. Wes Moore’s proposed education reform bill even though Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) staff recommended opposing many of its provisions and warned the board could lose its opportunity to provide input, according to a recent board discussion.
The board tabled a vote on taking a position at its Feb. 19 meeting, with members expressing hesitancy on making a decision without fully considering the provisions of Moore’s Excellence in Maryland Public Schools Act, introduced Jan. 22 in the Maryland General Assembly. The legislation aims to delay implementation or cut parts of the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, the state’s 2021 landmark education reform bill.
With the state facing a $3 billion budget deficit for fiscal year 2026, which begins July 1, Moore’s bill would decrease public education funding by $52.6 million in the upcoming fiscal year, and by $727 million by 2030, according to the bill’s fiscal and policy note.
“This is a big thing to digest, and to have a lot of unknowns for us to say that we will support the unknown — I’d rather support the known than the unknown,” board Vice President Grace Rivera-Oven said at the Feb. 19 meeting.
MCPS, along with the state’s other school districts, has begun implementing reforms mandated by the Blueprint. Superintendent Thomas Taylor told Bethesda Today on Feb. 19 that if Moore’s bill passes, it would pause initiatives that have built momentum.
“There’s always the push and pull between our local board’s ability to direct funds where we know it’s going to have a high impact on students versus what Annapolis says we should be doing,” Taylor said. “That’s a pain point for sure.”
What does Moore’s education bill propose?
Moore’s bill proposes pushing back the implementation date of providing funding to districts to expand collaborative time for teachers. That funding would go toward hiring more teachers so that all teachers could have more time outside of the classroom for activities such as training and working with struggling students, according to the Blueprint’s implementation board.
Maryland teachers spend about 80% of their time in the classroom and 20% on planning, according to the implementation board. The Blueprint calls for teachers to shift the ratio to 60% teaching and 40% planning over an eight-year period. That change, however, would require 12,000 to 15,000 additional teachers, amid a teacher shortage that has already strained schools, according to the Blueprint’s implementation board.
Under the current Blueprint plans, collaborative time funding is scheduled to kick in fiscal year 2026 and last until 2033. Moore’s bill would delay the funding until fiscal years 2030 through 2037.
Delaying that funding would decrease the per pupil “foundation” funding provided by the state, which was scheduled to increase by $163 per student in fiscal year 2026, MCPS Legislative Affairs Coordinator Patricia Ursprung, explained during the board’s Feb. 19 meeting. With the delay, per pupil spending would increase from $8,789 per student to $9,063 the next fiscal year, instead of $9,226.
“It’s just smaller than what we were anticipating,” Ursprung, who helps represent the school system’s interests in Annapolis, said.
Considering that the funding could be reduced, Ursprung said, there are several teacher recruitment initiatives such as grant programs included in the bill aimed at increasing the number of teachers and teacher retention in schools. There are also leadership training initiatives for school systems and an additional statewide leadership training program for school-based staff included in the bill.
The decrease in per pupil foundation funding would also impact funding for emergent multilingual learners and students receiving recovery education services if they haven’t already received the special education services they require. That’s because those funds are calculated based on a percentage of that foundational funding, Ursprung said.
The bill proposes freezing funding for personnel and per pupil grant funding for schools designated as community schools at fiscal year 2026 levels. Community schools receive a high concentration of poverty-based grants that provide a variety of “wraparound” resources and services for families and students, according to the Blueprint website.
Freezing the community school funding would mean that districts could not identify additional schools as community schools and those previously identified would continue to receive fiscal year 2026 funding levels for two years, Ursprung said.
Moore’s bill also includes a provision that would create flexibility in how community schools spend funds, increase funding for the Maryland State Department of Education community school staff and create a special education funding study, Ursprung said.
District, board’s responses to the bills
While there are some aspects of the 63-page bill that MCPS supports, Ursprung said the district recommends opposing the majority of the bill’s proposals. Still, Ursprung recommended the board support the bill with amendments.
When providing testimony to the state legislature regarding the bill, Ursprung said the board can choose to say it supports the legislation, supports it with recommended amendments or opposes it.
Ursprung said district staff recommended supporting flexibility for community school funds, increasing state education department staffing for community schools and the special education funding study.
Board member Brenda Wolff asked what the district opposes in the bill.
“Everything else,” Ursprung said. “It is largely a bill that, in its current form, schools are not happy with.”
The legislation drew criticism from lawmakers, education advocates and students from across the state at a recent hearing, Maryland Matters reported. Lawmakers and activists particularly didn’t agree with the proposal to freeze community school funds.
Most county board members expressed hesitancy over taking on a position on Moore’s education bill, primarily because of the number and variety of issues it covers. Board members also noted the state legislature is early in the bill approval process, and lawmakers could make amendments to change the bill.
Board member Natalie Zimmerman said she’d find it difficult to agree to support the bill with amendments, given that the legislation could result in less money for the district. What the legislation means for MCPS is particularly challenging given that the district has implemented or has prepared for implementing several requirements related to the Blueprint, several board members said.
“MCPS has put some efforts in place in anticipation of these requirements, and that’s one of the big challenges that we’re having,” board member Rita Montoya said. “[We’ve] started to do what we need to do to comply, and now we’re being told never mind, but we can’t really then go back and tell our staff never mind.”
Ursprung noted the board meeting won’t meet again until March 18. Meanwhile, legislators will continue to work on the bill without the school board’s input, she said.
“If we take no position right now … we don’t have a voice … so the amendments happen without us being an active participant,” Ursprung said.
Ursprung and several board members noted the board can still engage with the legislative process through the Maryland Associations of Boards of Education or through county board members individually.
The board tabled the decision on whether to support the bill, noting members would be working with Ursprung to give her direction on the board’s position.
