Come July 1, we’ll say goodbye to county superintendent Jerry Weast, a MCPS icon during his 12 year term. Despite Weast’s successes, including his work to close the achievement gap, problems still pervade county schools.

Incoming superintendent Joshua Starr will inherit a shaky attendance policy, over-acceleration in math and an uneven punishment for drug and alcohol use. This change in leadership is an opportunity to rework some of these problems.

Currently, students who skip class face no consequences other than zeros on missed work, a policy teachers don’t universally enforce. Starr should revisit the attendance policy because the existing procedure doesn’t deter many students from skipping class. Starr should consider leaving attendance policies to each school administration so schools can more effectively address specific issues based on the school’s unique academic environment.

At Whitman, reinstating the Loss of Credit policy could solve frequent absences. The LC policy was initially eliminated because some felt it discriminated against minority students who did not understand the appeal process. However, losing credit in a class still resonates strongly with most students. Consequences such as detention can’t replace the threat of losing credit for a class, especially in Whitman’s competitive academic atmosphere. On a county-wide scale, Starr should consider leaving attendance policies to individual schools because schools that place less pressure on students to succeed academically may not be best fitted with the LC policy and can choose their own policy.

Starr should also decrease the number of students over-accelerated in math, a practice that increased under Weast’s leadership. Too often, schools push students forward who aren’t ready to move to the next level. Starr should strive to ensure schools place students in the correct level class and help them stay on the right track. However, changes must be made to the current evaluation system in order to ensure proper placement, as standardized tests are usually too broad to effectively identify strengths and weaknesses and teacher evaluations can be overly subjective. At each school, math teachers teaching at the math level above students’ current level could design a test to determine future placement. This creates an objective evaluation and avoids over-standardization, as tests would be made by individual teachers.

Starr should also allow schools to create their own policy for punishing students for usage of alcohol and drugs on school grounds. As superintendent, Starr should not accept school alcohol and drug use policies that punish some students more than others. At Whitman, several students were punished by zero tolerance this year, and those involved in extracurriculars were hurt by the policy more than other students. A new, more flexible plan should balance effective consequences with enough lenience to allow students to move past their mistakes. Starr should work actively with schools to ensure that violators of drug and alcohol use policies can return to school life as swiftly as possible.

Starr has announced to the county that he doesn’t intend to make drastic changes to Weast’s policies, a statement the Board of Education supports. There is room, however, to adjust a few county policies, like attendance, over-acceleration and drug and alcohol use.