It must be lost in the jumbled priorities of Washington. And it’s a real shame. Because with a little help, cities like Baltimore could bail out the entire country. Everyone seems to agree that America needs to become energy independent. And that we need to find a way to lower energy prices. And that we […]
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The audacity of simplicity: Baltimore needs higher wages
Monday, October 06, 2008For many decades, Baltimore was a great engine of the American Dream – a blue-collar city, where residents without a college degree could find a good, family-supporting job. But over the past generation, most of those mostly manufacturing jobs were replaced by lower-paying service sector jobs – with disastrous results for many Baltimoreans. But why […]
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Let’s confront child sexual abuse
Monday, September 29, 2008What if I told you that as a city we could reduce the incidents of sexual child abuse by 48%? Consider the fact that last year, the Baltimore Child Abuse Center interviewed 793 children about allegations of sexual child abuse; now consider national estimates that only one in 10 children report the abuse. Baltimore City […]
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Let’s stop rewarding truant students with more time off from school
Monday, September 22, 2008It’s good news that communities and schools are starting to pay serious attention to the problem of student absence and truancy. After all, teachers can’t teach children who simply aren’t there. Students who miss a lot of school are very likely to fail, drop out and struggle throughout their lives. Some of the renewed emphasis […]
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On the responsibilities of universities
Monday, September 15, 2008Baltimore City public schools are underperforming. The Baltimore City Data Collaborative showed that between 2006-2007, just over 44% of 8th graders were proficient in state reading assessments, and just 24.4% were proficient in math. We know that while high-school graduation rates have improved from over six years ago, still nearly 9.6% of our 9th-12th graders […]
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Art-filled spaces dedicated to issues, art and community
Monday, September 08, 2008Visual art has the potential to play a more vital role in the life of our community than has yet been fully realized. There are a few local models out there hinting at possibilities. Coming up in November is the Baltimore Bioneers ’08 Conference, weaving issue-related art into an event all about innovative thinking on […]
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Slash the city’s property tax rate by more than 50 percent over the next 25 years
Tuesday, September 02, 2008The City of Baltimore finds itself mired in a classic Catch-22. Property taxes in Baltimore City are more than twice as high as any county rate in Maryland. That’s because to balance its budget each year, Baltimore City must levy disproportionately high taxes on its citizenry, which in turn induces more people to leave the […]
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Learn from others
Monday, July 14, 2008If we took the best ideas from across the world to Maryland, our state would be the best place for children and families in America. But this isn’t happening. For example, Missouri has developed the best model for rehabilitating delinquent youth. Youth are served in small, regional facilities; families are involved from the beginning. Recidivism […]
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Have you had your arts today?
Monday, July 07, 2008High-performing schools have strong arts programs. Low-performing schools do not. This fact remains true regardless of the demographics. In fact, in challenging circumstances schools show the greatest improvement when the arts are strong. My audacious idea: at the end of each school day, each Baltimore City Public School student can answer “Yes!” to the question: […]
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The really big idea
Monday, June 30, 2008Is it audacious of us to believe that a single civic action can change Baltimore? In the 1960’s, construction of The Highway to Nowhere (The Highway, Route 40 East & West) displaced thousands of West Baltimore residents. The Highway is 1.5 miles long—a two minute ride with 3.5 miles of blank, 30-foot walls that block […]
