School Board Votes to Delay Middle School Decision

After nearly two and a half hours of discussions, clarifications and additional information from Howard County Public School System officials, Board of Education members on Thursday failed to decide the fate of proposed changes to the middle school instructional program.

A final vote was postponed until next month.

School system administrators told the board the proposal is in the best interest of students, will best serve to prepare them for college and careers, and puts schools in line with pending national curriculum changes.

But members still had questions and concerns about the proposal, which would change the schedule from eight daily periods to seven, eliminate freestanding reading classes, increase physical education class time and add world language to the sixth-grade curriculum.

Of major concern to several board members is the chasm that seems to exist between administrators and frontline educators.

Board member Cindy Vaillancourt said she would like to see the program go forward because there are a "lot of exciting things about it."

But, she added, she is concerned about the lack of support for the proposal on the part of the teaching staff, which has come to the board in a "unified way" to say there are too many problems with the proposal.

"I'd like to try to work in the next week or so and try to bridge the remaining gaps," she said.

Board chairwoman Sandra French said it particularly pained her to consider the elimination of dedicated reading classes, given that she was one of the board members who pressed for the creation of such classes more than 10 years ago.

But more modern problems, like childhood obesity, have forced the system to make some changes in the program, French said.

Board members as a whole agree that changes are needed in the middle school program.

Member Janet Siddiqui said the board has been exploring middle school changes since she joined the group in 2007.

She said the process has been "a difficult journey."

After a motion to approve the proposal with some amendments failed, members voted to delay their decision until a Feb. 9 meeting to give school administrators and educators time to continue working on a compromise.