Commentary

A group led by students has challenged the Frederick County Board of Education to take ambitious and dramatic actions to help combat climate change in the school system. Maybe the old Bible verse holds true, that a child shall lead them. Sunrise Frederick is the local chapter of the youth-led nonprofit Sunrise Movement. The group encourages organizations to adopt sustainable practices as a local way to battle climate change.

Baltimore County is famous for a number of things. It’s the state’s third most populous county as well as its third largest county geographically, with more than 200 miles of waterfront. It is home to multiple universities, hospitals and historic sites, along with breweries, vineyards, the Maryland State Fair and the Maryland Hunt Cup, with its century-and-a-quarter-old steeplechase traditions.

If the many parties involved can ever reach full agreement, and if enough money can be found, Baltimore could end up with an all-new Pimlico Race Course in four or five years. Pimlico, and not Laurel Park, would end up being Maryland’s best and last year-round thoroughbred track, and the Preakness would forever be held there.

I do not believe there is such a thing as a “born leader.” The phrase is often used to describe someone people want to follow. It does not mean that as the leader evolves, they will possess the skills to identify and unlock human potential in service of a shared goal, something a great leader does. Instead, I believe that great leaders are not born, but built. Their greatness is supported by the building blocks laid through a lifelong journey of continuous improvement.

At a time when prices remain sky-high and local families are scrounging to make ends meet, we should all come together in a sense of common good to deliver relief. Instead, the Anne Arundel County Council took the bait, raising costs on struggling residents in the name of green policy that lines retailers’ pockets. The recently passed ban on plastic retail bags also creates a new tax on paper bags, the latest in a curious trend of Maryland’s retailers linking arms with the activists at the Sierra Club.

The day Sarah E. Carter broke the color barrier in Anne Arundel County nearly a half-century ago, she said she recognized the significance of her achievement. “I had a lot of people helping me and it’s amazing to win,” she told Michael Wentzel, a reporter for The Evening Sun newspaper. “We didn’t do it alone. People told me that I’m with white people too much. They’d tell me they wouldn’t vote for me when the time came. This proves that racism isn’t good from any angle.”

“So do you think that some time this school year, you’ll want to walk by yourself?” I asked my kid. We were unpacking Amazon boxes of notebook paper and No. 2 pencils, and as I envisioned hauling them down to the school building where he’s going to be starting fourth grade today, I suddenly thought, “What if he doesn’t need me to walk him with him anymore?” Then: “What if he doesn’t need me anymore?”

The word futuristic is defined as an “imagined” future. Which is an upbeat way, as schools get ready to reopen, to view the nationwide future of public education. The alternative to an imagined future is the somber present. Public schools are widely viewed as facing a bleak future. Learning loss from the pandemic is getting worse not better; even before the pandemic, nearly 70 percent of schoolchildren were below proficiency in literacy. There’s a growing loss of faith in the political possibility of true education reform.