Montgomery County Public Schools, like many of the public schools in the Washington, D.C., metro area, have now been closed to in-person instruction for more than 300 days. The Jan. 12 Board of Education vote to keep county school buildings closed for public education continues the leadership failure that could very well send the district and county into a death spiral. The notion that students lost to private or home school will reenter the public system is foolish and shows how out-of-touch administrators have become: Parents want to limit the disruption to their children’s lives and offer consistency; they will not yank them away from new friends or teachers with whom they have developed a relationship. On a county level, tolerance for high tax rates is tied to quality education. Maintaining the former without the latter will lead to not only declining enrollment but also an exodus: Think California or New Jersey but on a county level.

Parents are angry. The closure flies in the face of recommendations by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Center for Disease Control, and, on a political level, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan. While the Montgomery County Education Association, the local teachers union, has resisted reopening, many Montgomery County summer camps took sensible precautions in both their facilities and buses and suffered no incidents. Nor have there been major outbreaks in the many private schools operating in the region or pods, some in public school buildings, operated by private before- and after-care providers. Each screens temperatures, requires masks, and conducts COVID-19 tests when necessary. Administration rhetoric about equity proved less a sincere desire to increase diversity and more a cover for political agendas: Why else would they pursue a closure policy that widened the county’s equity gap?