Dear Queen Anne's County Public Schools Families,

It is with great concern that I am reaching out to you to share that several racially motivated incidents have occurred in our schools involving Queen Anne's County students over the past few weeks. As the leader of this school system I take full responsibility for the climate and culture in each of our schools. It is my highest priority to ensure both the physical and emotional wellbeing of all our children. To be clear, it is evident to me that institutional racism and cultural bias exists within the Queen Anne's County School system.

Over these past few days I have personally met with some of the students who have been the targets of these hateful acts. After meeting with these students …show more content…
A summary of the findings described a “Climate of Silence” regarding racial issues in Queen Anne's County. The report outlined how issues of racial equity in the Queen Anne’s County School system were often “Swept under the rug”, and not addressed adequately, if at all. Although we have made some progress since 1994, we have still fallen short of our goal to provide an an equitable educational environment for all students. Last year, I requested a curriculum audit of our school system with a focus on education that is multicultural. The audit was completed by Curriculum Management Solutions, Inc. Once again the results, shared what many already knew. Minority students in our schools are often times not given the same educational opportunities as white students, in areas such as placement in honors level and AP courses and post-secondary opportunities. The report also shared that minority students are suspended from our schools in disproportionate numbers as compared to white …show more content…
One major step was to contract with Franklin and Brenda Campbell-Jones to provide training to the Board of Education, Central Office supervisors, building principals and school staff in the area of cultural proficiency. This will help us be as prepared as we’ve ever been to address these issues and make progress against hate and intolerance. For the past year under the direction of our Community Liaison for Educational Equity, Mr. Ed Modell , the school system has partnered with the Local Management Board to develop and coordinate five “Conversations on Race”, bringing hundreds of people together to discuss issues of racial and cultural bias in a collaborative, diverse and respectful setting. The Northern County Multi-Cultural Proficiency Committee was launched three years under the direction of Mr. Eric Daniels to work directly with our three northern county schools to address issues of inequity. Janet Pauls our Interim Assistant Superintendent has developed an action plan to address the findings of the race equity audit of 1994 and aligned the plan with our Education that is Multicultural Plan. And finally, three years ago we began to develop a partnership with Bowie State University in order to bring more diversity to our teaching and administrative staff. These are all promising trends, but we need to do