Posted on 12/03/2013 12:10:08 PM PST by Welchie25
Seeking to put the brakes on a five-year decline in enrollment that saw the number of students in Maryland’s nonpublic schools shrink by 22 percent, nonpublic school advocates are pushing state lawmakers to pass a business tax credit they believe will help stabilize their schools.
The proposed Maryland Education Credit would provide companies and individual businesses a 60 percent tax credit on donations to nonprofit “student assistance organizations.” Those organizations would then help with student expenses such as tuition, supplies, tutoring, transportation and special needs services.
Approximately 60 area parents, students and educators attended a Nov. 13 open house at Mount St. Joseph High School in Irvington to discuss the measure with lawmakers,
All three participating Baltimore legislators – Del. Keiffer Mitchell Jr., Del. Keith Haynes and Del. Samuel Rosenberg – said they favored the measure.
Mitchell, one of the bill’s sponsors, noted that Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings Blake has made it her mission to attract 10,000 new families to the city. The cornerstone to attracting those families, Mitchell said, is education. Last year, he said, the state approved nearly $1 billion to build and renovate public schools in Baltimore.
“That’s a huge step,” Mitchell said, “but many of us recognize that it’s not just the public schools. We need to attract all students and all families to look at other schools also.”
Mitchell noted that there are 25 business tax credits in Maryland, but none is allocated to education.
“This is a very important mechanism to attract business support and also help sustain our nonpublic schools,” he said.
The bill would provide a maximum of $15 million annually for the tax credit. Sixty percent of credits will be designated for nonpublic school students and 40 percent for students attending public schools.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicreview.org ...
A friend of mine works at United Airlines and his medical just went up $400 a month. Now he has some excess income so he coined that as "a family trip to Disney World," but if your family didn't have that extra money............
It would make sense to give them a tax credit,
Of course, the private schools could just cut their costs and pass the savings on to students’ families, but that would be too easy.
Maryland “Freak State” PING!
Do you think Welchie is the editor of the Catholic Review or some such?
...Blake has made it her mission to attract 10,000 new families to the city. The cornerstone to attracting those families, Mitchell said, is education.
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No, Mitchell, the cornerstone is stopping the huge crime epidemic in Baltimore. Take care of that first, you idiot.
Consider your child’s $6K tuition against the $10K that my school was asking when I retired from there as a teacher in 2005. And this school was among those toward the lower end of the private school tuition scale.
Of course, the private schools could just cut their costs and pass the savings on to students’ families, but that would be too easy.
***
Not too easy, actually. Private schools need to hire and pay qualified teachers, and parents paying tuition expect to get a superior education for their students.
There is no way that a private school can compete in terms of salary and benefits, so you will almost never see a private school teacher as the sole breadwinner for a family. Yet the salary must be just enough to keep qualified individuals on staff. So where can the cuts be made?
On the surface, this looks like a good idea, but, considering who is behind it, I have my doubts about it.
What is the deal with this item of NewSpeak, "nonpublic schools"? Second time I've read it lately. Are the First Among Equals trying to stigmatize private, non-indoctrinating education? It's spin, like calling baby murder "pro-choice."
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