Around Maryland

A federal appeals court announced Thursday that it will reconsider a 2016 case challenging Maryland’s handgun qualification law, which the majority of a three-judge panel ruled in November was unconstitutional. The case before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals will be heard en banc, or in front of the full court. According to the court’s order, the case is tentatively scheduled for the oral argument session between March 19 and 22 in Richmond, Virginia.

The Maryland State Board of Education will host a series of virtual town halls to obtain feedback from families, educators, administrators and community members on the State Superintendent of Schools selection process. The town halls will be conducted by executive search firm Hazard, Young and Attea via Zoom on the following dates: Tuesday, Jan. 16 — 9 a.m.; Wednesday, Jan. 17 — 1 p.m.; Thursday, Jan. 18 — 6 p.m.

As Frederick County Public Schools grows faster than any other district in the state, officials are hoping for legislative progress on a persistent sticking point: how schools are funded. Districts receive a certain amount of state funding per student each year. But the state issues that funding based on the district’s enrollment from Sept. 30 of the previous year. So, as FCPS enters next school year, it will only have funding for the number of students who were enrolled in the system on Sept. 30, 2023. Any students enrolled since then will not be accounted for.

Parents and students who attend a virtual learning program rallied outside Baltimore City Public School headquarters Thursday night in protest of the program ending for elementary students. Charm City Virtual — a program started during the coronavirus pandemic that some students and families have continued to use for its flexibility — relies on federal funds and will expire this summer.

It took 178 years, but a woman has taken the helm of the U.S. Naval Academy for the first time. At a Thursday ceremony, Vice Adm. Yvette M. Davids assumed command of the Annapolis military college from Vice Adm. Fred Kacher, the interim superintendent. Davids becomes not only the first woman but, as a Mexican-American, the first person of color to lead the school.

The Maryland Center for School Safety’s annual report found it got a lot more tips and reports to its anonymous tip line during the last school year than it did in the previous school year. But leaders in that small state agency said that’s not necessarily indicative of growing problems and safety issues in schools — but rather the success of its messaging and efforts to raise awareness of what the center does.

Transportation Security Administration officers stopped 20% more guns in 2023 at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport over the previous year. TSA released a statement Wednesday, saying officers stopped 105 handguns at airport security checkpoints in the Baltimore-Washington region last year, which is 16 more than the 89 guns caught in 2022. TSA said its officers discovered each of the firearms during routine screening of carry-on property at airport security checkpoints.