Post Office Box 10911
Rockville, Maryland
STATEMENT BY THE BLACK MINISTERS CONFERENCE
ON THE FISCAL YEAR 1999 MCPS BUDGET
APRIL 6,1998
PRESIDENT LEGGETT AND MEMBERS OF THE COUNTY COUNCIL:
I am the Rev. Chester L. Burke, President of the Black Ministers'Conference of Montgomery County, and Pastor of Pilgrim Baptist Church in Silver Spring. I appear tonight on behalf of the Conference.
Our testimony will focus on two articles of faith which are basic to our ministerial beliefs, both of which are relevant to the fundamental concepts with which we are urging the County Council to approach its decisions on the FY'99 school budget. Those beliefs center on commitment - and on sense of self. Both of these elements are closely woven into the faith which we seek to inspire among our congregations -- and both are equally applicable to the judgments which we all must make as we seek for moral guidance in our daily lives.
A commitment is at the core of our system of beliefs -- because it establishes the base upon which and from which our values are constructed. We have given our word -- and we move forward with that sense of integrity.
And so should it be with our actions in compiling the FY'99. MCPS budget. One of the first commitments this year was the virtually unanimous endorsement which greeted the Superintendent's proposal for focused small-class instruction in reading in Grades 1 and 2, and for intensive preparation for algebra in Grades 8 or 9. It was not only the funding -- a modest $9.2 million -- but equally the expansion of our education horizons. Once accepted by the educational and by the political communities, such a commitment should not have been made a bargaining chip. That kind of gamesmanship undermines the proposal -- and diminishes the stature of those who seek to use the proposal for tactical advantage.
A commitment was made by MCPS, negotiating on behalf of the educational constituency -- and indeed for the County as a whole - in the labor agreements reached with the teachers, the administrators, and the support service employees. The contracts cover not just wages and benefits, but the governance and the shared responsibilities of the educational process. The good faith which is embodied in those agreements is the critical ingredient which made them possible. They represent a commitment from all of us -- and from this County. To fail to honor them, or to attempt to impose one's own agenda on those agreements, is to denigrate both collective bargaining and the participants in the negotiations.
A sense of self is an inextricable element of the faith which our Conference pastors seek to evoke in their parishioners. A sense of self is indeed the necessary beginning of a spiritual awakening. And so must it be with our students.
The student must have that inner light., that belief in his or her capability to learn -- else the most inspired teaching becomes mere words to be endured. A sense of self begins with what the child receives at home - interest in learning to learn or diffidence (or even hostility) to the schooling process -- belief in the child's potential or indifference to education in any form.
Our point is simply that MCPS and the broader community must be as Innovative in constructing the "home front" part of the school budget as in restructuring the classroom.
We ministers learned long ago that faith is kindled or rekindled one person at a time. So must it be with sense of self -- one student at a time -- the moreso for the student who is at risk.
The Black Ministers Conference pledges its full faith and unreserved devotion to this task. We invite and we urge the County Council to join us in that mission. Thank you.