Number of school officials making $100K doubles

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The point is... - 2008-09-11 07:09:03

The heartburn and discourse is not about the teachers getting a raise, which they deserve, the problem is the huge benefits increase the bureaucrats received. The people paying for those benefits have no say in how the AACPS is run or who runs it. Teachers earn their pay-raise by educating our kids. AACPS bureaucrats ?earn? their pay-raise by educating themselves.

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Dave D. - Pasadena, MD - Karma: Excellent

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$'s For Teachers - 2008-09-10 19:08:19

Let me see, get a college degree, go on to get masters degree and people are worried about paying a salary of $100K? Ok, maybe AA Schools should not have raised the salaries so fast to catch up, but I think most teachers; especially the Math and Science types are WAY underpaid and are only teaching because they want to contribute to society. I'd like to see how our teachers can even make it owning a home and living in the county they work (for), I applaud them for their dedication. (And I'm not even a teacher!)

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Bob Lindsay - Annapolis, MD - Karma: Neutral

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OUTRAGED - 2008-09-08 12:44:51

If the people at the Board only saw what goes on at a daily school or in the classroom. They have yet to get out of their seats and leave their cubicle to see what education is about. We have schools without air conditioning, portables, crammed classes, no special education support in some schools, lack of supplies due to the budget cuts and now longer school days. I barely can pay my car bills or mortgage as a teacher and I still have to take out of pocket money for school supplies! What has AACPS come to??? The people at the Board need to take a walk in some of these teacher's shoes and see how money is truly earned. All I know is that some of them sit at their desk, send out over 50 pointless, junk emails to teachers and coworkers and they make over 100K??? Not to mention they sit in air conditioning with working computers and have an hour lunch break! Something is definitely wrong with this picture.

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Michael E. - Annapolis, MD - Karma: Neutral

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Old School - 2008-09-08 12:28:06

I did not have either of my children educated in Anne Arundel County Schools. My wife and I have paid dearly to try and supply the best education possible. The sad part of this situation is that the county does not even care how many students don't participate in their system! It actually is rewarded for sub par performance by not having to educate children whose parents demand quality education and are forced to pay into the system! If vouchers were utilized, the school system would be forced to compete, thus raising the quality of eduation or closing schools due to failure.

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Robin S. - Churchton, MD - Karma: Excellent

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Unconscionable - 2008-09-08 11:46:50

Kids are crammed into portable classrooms throughout the county while the fat cats on Riva Road continue to line their pockets with taxpayer $$. Three cheers to County Exec Leopold for not caving into the Board of Ed's budgetary demands!
On a separate note, the fact that Speaker of the House Busch received the largest county raise reeks of impropriety. In addition to serving as Speaker of the House, he holds a big time title position within the Anne Arundel County Dept. of Parks and Recreation which apparently accommodates his time-off to serve as Speaker of the House. Think that title doesn't put a little pressure on the County Exec come raise time?


A $12,000+ raise over two years when you're not even working a full calendar year ain't bad. Not to mention the fact that I'm sure a significant amount of his time is spent functioning as a State Legislator while the House isn't in session. And when would that be? One would have to imagine during the same time period he's apparently doing all of his exemplary work for the Dept. of Parks and Recreation. Want to kill the snake of impropriety? Start with the head.

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Jay F. - Arnold, MD - Karma: Neutral

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AACPS Needs and Overhaul - 2008-09-08 11:43:26

There seem to be a lot of people who've pulled their kids from AACPS based on their pattern of ineptitude. AACPS refuses to discuss plans for improving performance at specific schools. They refuse to provide information on how much they spend per school (both dollars and resources). Two adminstrators (Lorna Leone and Lynn Whittington) told us there were too many minorities in my children's prior school to have an improvement plan and one can't compare schools with high levels of minorities with high performing schools. Lynn Whittington, acknowledging how bad the school was, offered us a transfer, then reneged. Mr. Maxwell and Ms. Tricia Johnson refuse to meet with parents. The Citizen Advisory Council has been made a mockery after board members chastised them at their February meeting saying that parents have no rights for their opinions to be heard. The school board nominating commission process has become a failure, with the chairman promising everyone that Ms. Johnson would not be reappointed by the Governor because she got the least number of votes in the process, then a back room deal was cut to reappoint her. Council Chairman Vitale has said in private conversations that they routinely move money around -- for example, taking money for teaching positions and not filling them, but applying them to non-classroom raises. And, if your kid has special needs or is not in one of the schools in the BRAC zone, then resources have been consistently shifted AWAY from your kids' schools and to other schools and raises like this for non-educators. Like many, we too pulled our kids from AACPS this year due to mediocre management, dishonest school officials, and, we did not want to subject our seven year old to verbally abusive teachers. Its time for Mike Busch and the county's legislative delegation to wake up, smell the coffee and reform our board of education so they are held accountable both financially and in terms of performance.

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Chris Doherty - Harwood, MD - Karma: Excellent

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Yet another reason - 2008-09-08 10:51:17

I am so glad to be out of AA Co! I have a special needs child and AA provided nothing for him, I actually needed to hire lawyers and look into persuing leagal action against the county before I could get any results and even then the results were minimal. Instead of all these fat raises the county needs to put more money into special education and other programs that actually benefit the children.

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Kristina P. - Easton, MD - Karma: Neutral

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Is anyone listening? - 2008-09-08 10:27:56

I agree with Peter D. nobama for me!My daughter recently graduated in the top 2% from an AACPS. She worked very hard but really had little support from faculty,coaches or administrators.They did not nurture a love of learning or intellectual curiosity and the science program is an embarrassment--it is so poor. It was a very disappointing experience and I would not recommend AACPS. I'm not sure what they do... but they alienate a great deal of parents and children that are putting in the effort to achieve.Our tax dollars are not being used wisely.

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Lyn S. - davidsonville, MD - Karma: Neutral

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The real problem - 2008-09-08 09:44:20

The school district needs to be broken up. There is no need to have a county-wide school district. This is the real problem. As long as the school district is county-wide you will continue to have a large bureaucracy to manage it. That is the nature of the beast. The larger the bureaucracy, the more you have to pay someone to manage that bureaucracy. Sooooo...take a look at what they do in the midwest and allow multiple school districts within one county, each with their own elected non-partisan school board.

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R. Black - Churchton, MD - Karma: Neutral

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Odd - 2008-09-08 09:42:03

Is it just me or does it seem strange that the largest portion of the county tax-payer contributions go to support two separate unelected entities, the superintendent and the board of education. Why do the residents of Anne Arundel County tolerate this condition? Apathy? Ignorance? Name another school district where the tax-payers have absolutely no input in how the school system is run. Tyranny triumphs again.

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Dave D. - Pasadena, MD - Karma: Excellent

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Now Find The Tax Money - 2008-09-07 22:00:59

The salaries paid to these individuals all come from tax revenues. Tax revenues, state and local, are running approximately $1 billion short of what is necessary to pay salaries, including the raises mentioned in this article. Something has to give, the state cannot print more money and business income is not about to miraculously recover any time soon. Jobs will need to be cut and salary cuts will soon be required. It is only a matter of weeks, perhaps months before reality kicks in for these over-paid school administrators and many other state and local workers. Maybes the teachers themselves will lose their jobs. Things cannot continue as they are for much longer.

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T. Williams - Virginia Beach, VA - Karma: Excellent

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Outrageous. - 2008-09-07 19:21:47

Not much Leopold can do, the county council voted on more control of the school district and it went down. A very clear example how big government doesn't work. Unfortunately the people of Maryland keep blindly voting to make a non-working big government even bigger. The Obama campaign is nothing less than stunning also. Owe'Bama keeps arguing that government doesn't work, that it is broken. His solution, raise taxes and make it bigger???? The NEA, the union, is one of those big lobby groups that O'Bama said he was going to take out of Washington, that was way back when he said he wasn't taking private money. The soultion is to take TAAC "leaders" off the county payroll. Just another example how unions are out dated. If you don't believe they are, I can give you phone numbers to ten of thousands of people in Detroit who became victims of run-away unions.

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Peter D. - Annapolis, MD - Karma: Terrible

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Good Money If...... - 2008-09-07 16:53:56

Great job if you can get it. No wonder the Democrat controlled Statehouse and many A.A. representatives are beholden to the NEA and vice versa. Did you think when O'Malley raised taxes "For Education" it went to towards the students/our children?
Time for that huge problem to go away. When I was in school there was a Principal, a vice, a school secretary and a nurse. Today you have ten times that number. You listening Mr. Leopold?

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Paul Flanagan - Shady Side, MD - Karma: Neutral

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Corruption on Riva Road - 2008-09-07 08:32:21

Its time for the Board and Kevin Maxwell to stop treating the public trust like a personal piggy bank. First, separate raises for educators in the classroom -- those are needed. But hiding behind that rationale to enrich the bureaucracy doesn't pass the straight face test, and Mr. Mosier knows it. The schools have a consistent pattern of resisting information requests under Maryland law regarding their spending policies. Name one private or public company in this state that hands out 30% raises when a role is reorganized, and one company that gives raises and bonuses when performance is below standard. Plus, our bureaucrats use the artificially high increase in recent test scores as a result of the state changing the test to point to their progress, but take the case of the administrator cited in the report, Chris Truffer. Nice guy, but a 30% raise and Southern Middle hasn't made adequate yearly progress two years in a row. That 30% raise would fund half a teacher or 25 smart boards in the classroom. Last year's bonus to Mr. Maxwell and Johnson's comment "she would have given him more" shows that the corruption and violation of the public trust starts at the top of our school system when it comes to the use of public dollars. Our state delegation and county council and executive can either do something about it, or continue to accept that Anne Arundel schools will never achieve what neighboring jurisidictions can while its culture of non-accountability remains in place.

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Chris Doherty - Harwood, MD - Karma: Excellent