Montgomery Blair High School!Montgomery Blair HS is only charging illegal curricular fees in 5 classes this year!
Students can ALMOST get a free public education at Montgomery Blair HS in Silver Spring!
From the just released list of Curricular Fees (yes, they are still illegal) here are the runners up showing the high school and the number of classes where each school is charging students a fee for the 2009-10 school year.
Once again, a student can take a class at one school and the class is free, but at another school a fee is charged. Is that equitable?
Remember - in reality there are no curricular fees this year because all will be waived. A free public education is available for your child for the asking!If you ask to have a curricular fee waived it will be waived, no questions asked, no forms to fill out. Why? Because curricular fees are illegal in the State of Maryland. MCPS won't fight you if you don't pay because they have no legal right to collect curricular fees.
Here is the list of MCPS high schools with the number of courses where they are charging curricular fees.
How can Blair HS only be charging curricular fees in 5 classes but Watkins Mill HS is charging curricular fees in 79?
Blair 5
Seneca Valley 7
Quince Orchard 9
Wheaton 14
Blake & Poolesville 17
Magruder & Northwood 21
Clarksburg & Springbrook 24
Kennedy 26
Sherwood & Walter Johnson 27
Churchill & Wootton 28
Einstein 31
Damascus 33
Rockville 35
Gaithersburg 36
Northwest 37
Whitman 42
Richard Montgomery 44
Paint Branch 46
BCC 48
Edison 58
Watkins Mill 79
RICA has only 2 classes with fees, however it is a much smaller school than those above.
Does anyone know of any MCPS program, event, or activity that has been cancelled or curtailed because of updated school fee rules? I like the idea of voluntary fees, and understand that some parents may not be able to afford them.
ReplyDeleteYes, there are many things that have been cut. For example, Churchill staff (all staff members) used to get 3 pieces of Churchill Logo Wear every summer (sweatshirts, polo shirts). Now those staff clothing purchases have been eliminated. The staff clothing was being purchased using "mandatory" illegal fees collected from students. Churchill High School used to collect almost $2 million in fees from students each year.
ReplyDeleteAt many schools staff parties and retreats have been eliminated.
The golf cart that was bought for Richard Montgomery High School's former principal has been sold.
Thanks Janis. Were the fees collected under false pretense? i.e. collect fees for a field trip or for costumes for a play, but then use them to buy clothing and pay for staff retreats?
ReplyDeleteAre you aware of any academic activities, clubs, student trips, school plays, etc. that have directly or indirectly been affected by the new rules?
As an aside, was there an effort to eliminate the kinds of purchases you mentioned (golf carts, school wear for staff, etc) by requiring more stringent accounting standards? In other words, still allow the fees, but maintain records to show that the money was spent as intended?
The lists of curricular fees collected by all high schools for the 2008-09 and 2009-10 school years are available on the Parents' Coalition website:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.parentscoalitionmc.com/Guide_to_Fees.html
You can search those lists and see if "staff parties" or "staff retreats" is listed as a fee. I don't think you will find that fee listed.
Superintendent Jerry Weast has always allowed principals to collect a profit on all fees charged. So while parents paid for field trips, for example, the actual cost of the field trip would be inflated to permit the local school to make a profit on the event.
The Washington Post had an article about a $14,000 profit on a field trip that occured at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/19/AR2007091901110.html
The profits create a slush fund at each local school. The money in these accounts is spent at the discretion of the local principal and does not flow back into the MCPS Operating Budget.
Audits of local MCPS schools obtained by the Parents' Coalition reveal how those slush funds are used.
WTOP covered this issue on September 18, 2009:
http://parentscoalitionmc.blogspot.com/2009/09/parents-on-school-fees-show-us-money.html
The MCPS Board of Education has taken no action to provide any oversight over how student funds are being used at local schools in light of the issues exposed in the audits that have been made public.
Curricular fees are illegal in the State of Maryland. No amount of accounting procedures can change that.
From page 2 of the IAF audit of the Richard Montgomery HS report on Audit of Independent Activity Funds for the period January 1, 2007 through March 31, 2008:
ReplyDelete$9,372 in IAF student funds were used, without COO approval, to pay for 17 staff members to attend an administration leadership retreat at a resort in Cambridge, MD, in July 2007. Of this amount, $4,264 was spent on breakfast, lunch, and meeting refreshments at the resort. Except for $451 that was reimbursed to one staff member for evening meals for herself and several others, the remaining charges were for lodging.
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STUDENT FUNDS. The RM principal & staff used STUDENT FUNDS to go to a resort. The rules prohibited this, and it happened anyway.
Why doesn't anyone else care?
I must be missing something. Why can't they collect fees for, say, a field trip, account for legitimate costs, then return extra funds to the parents. Keep records for transparency. What has been the BOE response?
ReplyDeleteFor clarity, I think that a distinction should be made between the charging/requesting of voluntary fees, which many parents might support, versus the use of "profits" from the fees collected for other purposes, which I would assume the vast majority of parents would disapprove.