Parents may barely have heard of the Blueprint for Maryland鈥檚 Future, but the expansive changes to public education are already shaping their children鈥檚 lives in school.
Parents are seeing more spots available in public prekindergarten, putting thousands of dollars back in their pockets. Their children鈥檚 teachers are better paid. They soon may see class sizes rise or fall dramatically, depending on where their kids go to school. And their high schoolers are being held to a higher standard, but have more opportunities to take college-level classes and pursue careers.
Two years into the popular $4.4 billion-a-year plan, educators in every school district are finding their priorities reordered, sometimes in ways they hadn鈥檛 expected. The new money 鈥 a $3.7 billion increase in state funding and the remainder in local increases 鈥 is funding a local wish list of improvements, but it is also forcing them to cut things parents often like.
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