Give us a break

With approximately 3,200 students to oversee, the resource staff at Blair is overburdened with duties it would not have to face at other MCPS high schools. MCPS is doing nothing to alleviate the inequality produced by Blair's overcrowding. The county needs to recognize Blair's unique situation and hire more professionals to handle the mammoth workload.

Unlike regular teachers, who are allocated according to projected populations, resource teachers such as media center specialists and department heads are hired in equal numbers per school. Blair's large population makes the school stand as an anomaly among county schools. Robert Lasco, a Blair librarian, is retiring after this year partly because of the frustration of dealing with too many students. "[Media specialist Lisa] Hark and I have 3,000 kids every single day of our lives. In the last ten years, there has been no consideration of a change," Lasco says. Let's do the math: Blair has two media center specialists for 3,200 students. Whitman High School also has two media center specialists, but for 1,800+ students. With such a stark contrast between the two schools, the media center technicians cannot be expected to carry out the same duties at each school.

Like librarians, department heads are overburdened with work, which includes counseling new teachers, organizing necessary materials for each course, outlining new curricula and evaluating each teacher in the department. "The stress on me is tremendous," says social studies resource teacher Cherie McGinn. It's no wonder, considering that the 29 teachers in her department make up the largest social studies department in the county.

An advisory committee formed three years ago failed to address the heavy burden placed on staff in crowded schools. Instead of offering a logical solution—such as dividing up responsibilities or hiring another department head—MCPS gave an increase in stipends that amounted only to $200 to $300 per resource teacher. Blair's large population makes the school unlike all others, and MCPS should equip Blair accordingly. If MCPS refuses to hire more department heads, it must at least allow more assistants to take on some paperwork, leaving the managerial job to resource teachers.

Earlier this year, the teachers' union created another committee that will address changes to resource teachers' job description. Hopefully, MCPS will not find its answer, as it did three years ago, in a small sum of money. As overcrowding continues to worsen, a large school like Blair needs special attention. Another $200 will do nothing to end the long work days filled with paperwork.