School board concludes 100year celebration with reception
Charles County Public Schools’ Board of Education capped off a sixmonth celebration of its history with a reception at the Sasscer Administration Building Tuesday night following the regular board meeting.
The reception was attended by past and current school system officials and administrators.
School board chairwoman Virginia McGraw said the celebration was intended to mark the 100th anniversary of the school system’s administration officially being a board of education, an occasion marked in the school system’s minutes on Oct. 17, 1916.
School board member Barbara Palko said there were a number of interesting facts highlighted in the minutes that show how much life has changed over the past century.
According to the minutes, in 1922, the school board planned the construction of a new, eightroom school, and budgeted $6,943.87 for its construction, Palko said.
“Compare that to our newest high school, St. Charles, which has 72 teaching stations, four floors and cost $73 million to build, including the James E. Richmond Science Center,” Palko said.
The number of teachers has grown, too.
“In 1920, the Board of Education minutes stated there were 104 teachers in the county;
we now have 2,079 teachers,” Palko said.
To recognize the occasion, the school board has sponsored a series of lectures on the history of education, segregation and disaster management in Charles County Public Schools.
“I learned quite a bit about our school system as well,” McGraw said.
Del. Edith Patterson (D-Charles), a former school board member, presented a citation from the Maryland General Assembly to McGraw and Superintendent Kimberly Hill marking the occasion.
School board member Mark Crawford said the school system has created a time capsule, containing minutes from 1916 to 2016, student-made notecards, an invitation, commemorative coins and a teacher salary scale to be sealed in the time capsule, which will be kept at Sasscer.
“We hope that it will not be opened for another 100 years, but that will be left to future boards of education,” Crawford said.