The Maryland School Report Card grades schools on a scale of 0 to 100 points, based on a variety of factors that vary by level. For example, all schools are graded on school quality and student success measures, while only high schools are graded on readiness for postsecondary success and graduation rates.

To earn five stars, a school must score 75% or more of the possible points. Below that, schools reaching 60% receive four stars, 45% three stars and 30% two stars. Schools scoring below 30% receive one star.

Each school’s results was published Tuesday on the Maryland Report Card website.

Year-over-year changes in star ratings were driven primarily by a reduction in two-star schools and an increase in four-star schools, said Geoff Sanderson, chief of accountability at the Maryland State Department of Education, during a presentation to reporters last week.

More than four-fifths of Maryland schools had a star rating of three or higher, with 43% earning four or five stars, according to a Tuesday news release from the department. Both figures represent slight increases from 2023-24, when 41% of schools earned four or five stars and 83% earned three or more.

No school increased by two stars, but 193 schools gained one star, Sanderson said. That includes 26 in Baltimore County, 25 in Baltimore City, 18 in Anne Arundel County, 10 in Howard County, seven in Carroll County and five in Harford County. Prince George’s County Public Schools had the most one-star gains with 34 schools.

Worcester County had the highest percentage of five-star schools at 18.2%, or two of the district’s 11 schools, according to a Sun data analysis. Baltimore County Public Schools had the greatest number of five-star schools at 23.

A total of 123 schools dropped by one star, including 17 in Baltimore City, 12 in Anne Arundel County, nine in Baltimore County, nine in Howard County, five in Harford County and one in Carroll County. Only one school statewide — in Baltimore City — fell by two stars. The most downgraded schools were in Prince George’s County, where 20 dropped by one star, according to the data.

Three-quarters of Maryland schools had no change in rating from the previous year.

Baltimore City schools experienced the three largest gains and the three largest losses in points. Creative City Public Charter School gained 15 points and George Washington Elementary gained 13 points, taking both schools from two to three stars. The Mount Washington School gained 14 points, raising it from three to four stars.

Meanwhile, Charles Carroll Barrister Elementary lost 25 points, dropping from three stars to one, while Edgewood Elementary lost 20 points and Moravia Park Elementary lost 17, with both dropping from three to two stars.

Chronic absenteeism

Following data from the 2022-2023 school year, which showed that 30% of Maryland students were chronically absent, the state education department set a goal to reduce that number by half over a three-year period. Data from 2024-2025 show statewide absenteeism was 25%, continuing a trend of incremental decreases.

The department measures chronic absenteeism as the percentage of students at each school who are absent for at least 10% of the school days and are enrolled in that school for at least 10 days.

When considering all schools in a district and treating distinct grade spans within the same building as separate schools, Worcester County had the lowest median percentage of chronically absent students, at 15.1%. In contrast, Baltimore City had the highest, at 44.2%.

Future accountability

State Superintendent of Schools Carey Wright launched an accountability task force in 2024 to reexamine the Report Card. At the time, The Baltimore Sun reported that she was skeptical of the Report Card system, as it graded many schools as excellent while statewide student proficiency in reading and math were relatively low.

Joshua Michael, president of the Maryland State Board of Education, noted during Tuesday’s board meeting that some schools have increased their rating by seven to 10 points without changing their star category.

“The biggest problem right now is … schools are not being rewarded for growth enough in our report cards,” Michael said, speaking later to reporters. “Quite frankly, our report card right now is too much a proximity of poverty in our schools.”

Building on the task force’s recommendations presented to the state board in December 2024, the Maryland Accountability Advisory Committee will propose next steps for the board to consider by the end of the year, according to the MSDE news release.

Wright highlighted during Tuesday’s board meeting that three-fourths of schools saw no change in their star ratings this year.

“What we’re hearing from schools is that some of them are just feeling stuck,” she said. “So that’s really what the Maryland Accountability Advisory Committee is looking at, is … what do we need to be changing in order so the schools don’t just get stuck, if there’s a better way to differentiate as the law requires.”

Have a news tip? Contact Racquel Bazos at rbazos@baltsun.com, 443-813-0770 or on X as @rzbworks. Contact Brooke Conrad at bconrad@baltsun.com or 443-682-2356.

Around the Baltimore region, Anne Arundel County outpaced the state for share of schools with at least three stars, individual Baltimore City schools posted the region’s largest shifts in raw scores, Baltimore County had the region’s highest percentage of schools earning five stars, Carroll County saw seven schools gain a star and one school lose a star, Harford County had all but five schools retain or improve upon last year’s ratings, and Howard County saw a decline in five-star schools. The Eastern Shore, meanwhile, is home to the best and second-worst performing district, according to the data.

View districts’ and schools’ data in the graphics below including percentage of points earned and star ratings, statewide chronic absenteeism data and a breakdown of the components that determine schools’ ratings.

According to data analyzed by The Baltimore Sun, from 2023 to 2024, reported crime for the main campuses of larger institutions increased 14%. Since 2019, the state’s colleges and universities have reported a 55% increase in all crimes.

Thefts of vehicles, including non-automobiles such as electric scooters, rose 42% year over year, and aggravated assaults jumped 8%. Each is up considerably compared with before the pandemic.

The federal Clery Act requires that colleges and universities participating in federal financial aid programs report crime statistics that involve events on campuses or near them. This includes crimes like assaults and thefts, but also requires reporting of hate crimes, hazing, domestic violence, weapons charges and illegal drug use.

While the percent increases are steep, total crime reports across the 21 schools analyzed total fewer than 800. Increased crime on campus contrasts with national trends that show an overall decline in crime, including in Maryland. Baltimore, for example, continues to see steep drops in both violent and property crimes.

The University of Maryland, College Park and the Johns Hopkins University had the highest number of crimes reported in 2024, at 329 and 88, respectively.

More than a third of the total crimes reported on all Maryland campuses in 2024 were UMCP vehicle thefts. The Sun’s analysis examined data for four-year public or private nonprofit institutions with at least 1,000 students, excluding the distance learning-focused University of Maryland Global Campus.

Violent crime

Violent crime, excluding sexual offenses, rose 22% over 2019 levels, but 6% over 2023. Johns Hopkins University led the pack of 21 schools with 37 instances of violent crime — 17 of which were aggravated assaults — on or near its Homewood campus.

“Johns Hopkins University is deeply committed to campus safety and actively working to reduce crime. While most aggravated assaults occurred on public property adjacent to campus — not on campus itself — these incidents directly affect our community,” a Johns Hopkins spokesperson told The Sun on Friday.

Thirteen of the 17 aggravated assaults were on public or non-campus property close to Homewood; four were on-campus.

The school is responding by “enhancing security measures,” including adding regular JHPD patrols, putting more closed-circuit cameras online and “strengthening our coordination with the Baltimore City Police Department and other law enforcement,” the spokesperson said.

Aggravated assault reports on Maryland campuses were 88% greater in 2024 than in 2019.

Johns Hopkins Police Department personnel, who began rolling out marked cars and uniformed officers to Hopkins’ campuses in September 2024, are intended to “replace the use of off-duty Baltimore police officers on our campuses and help to reduce the strain on the city’s resources while also advancing and modeling equitable and reform-oriented public safety strategies,” the school’s crime report says.

The school still deploys unarmed Hopkins public safety and behavioral health personnel in situations that don’t require a police response, it says.

Some faculty, students and advocacy organizations have opposed Johns Hopkins’ police department for years.

“Hopkins has armed their own police force without even a single public hearing in the City Council,” a spokesperson for The Baltimore Abolition Movement wrote Wednesday. “They avoid public forums because they know that the residents of Baltimore oppose their invasive force and want fewer cops in our neighborhoods.”

Property crime

Institutions reported 335% more motor vehicle thefts in 2024 than there were in 2019.

At the University of Maryland, College Park, almost 90% of all crimes reported in 2024 were motor vehicle thefts. The category included vehicles like golf carts and e-bikes in its motor vehicle theft statistics.

The 287 thefts consisted of 261 e-scooters, eight golf carts, six electric bikes, one motor scooter and one e-skateboard, as well as seven sedans, two trucks and one SUV, according to the university’s crime report.

Since e-scooters came to the area just before 2020, they have made up a large proportion of the university’s vehicle theft for several years, according to Lt. Rosanne Hoaas of the University of Maryland Police Department.

“It is a very popular mode of transportation, and it’s not just our campus, but across college campuses,” Hoaas said.

“Sometimes these e-scooters aren’t secured. They’re just left there. And sometimes someone takes them for a joyride somewhere else, or they take them altogether,” the lieutenant said. But sometimes even secured e-scooters aren’t locked effectively, allowing for theft. New students have a session with campus police that covers best practices in securing bikes and scooters.

Beginning in August, the campus effectively banned student residents from bringing their personal e-scooters to school, citing limited charging infrastructure and fire hazards. Hoaas said she couldn’t predict how that policy change would affect theft rates in the next year’s crime data.

By contrast, UMCP burglaries have fallen by half their 2019 level. Hoaas cited education and outreach, such as reminding students to lock their doors, secure their belongings and report suspicious activity, for the success.

Sexual crime

Reports of sexual crimes like rape and fondling were down across the state’s schools, reduced by 18% over last year and 9% over 2019. Many large institutions reported relatively low numbers of such offenses.

College Park had over 40,000 students enrolled in fall 2023; UMBC enrolled more than 14,000 at that time, according to the latest numbers from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System.

In 2024, they reduced their year-over-year reports of sex crimes by 52% and 41%: 19 in College Park and 13 at UMBC. At Towson, a school with 19,527 students enrolled in fall 2023, there were 11 sexual assaults reported in 2024.

“We know that sexual assaults are underreported,” Hoaas said. “It’s not just a UMD thing. That’s across the country.”

If students don’t want to report an incident to police, other offices on campus can assist students reporting sexual assaults and act as a liaison with police, she said. All UMCP incoming freshmen and transfer students are required to take a course on sexual assault prevention, per the school’s website.

UMBC spokesperson Cherie Parker said Friday that the university provides “multiple confidential and non-confidential reporting options, ongoing prevention and awareness programming, and ensures supportive measures are available to all parties.”

“In reviewing the reporting statistics year over year, the baseline level of reported incidents remains relatively stable, showing no significant long-term change. The reporting for 2023 was an exception, which accounts for the difference you are seeing,” Parker said.

A representative for Towson University said the relatively low numbers are due to the success of its education on sexual assault.

“Crime rates are down, but reporting levels have maintained — an indicator that the vast programming and education at TU is effective. With robust education, programming and a suite of support services, TU prioritizes the health and well-being of our campus community,” said Sean Welsh, a Towson University spokesperson.

“TU has put into place systems, tools and resources that help to eradicate the stigmas of reporting. That is combined with a staff of caring professionals who work hard to educate the university community about sexual violence and violence prevention.”

Mount St. Mary’s University and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County have both been sued by former students over sexual assault claims. The federal Justice Department found “profound systemwide problems in [UMBC’s] response to allegations of sex discrimination that persisted for years,” in its investigation of sexual misconduct and discrimination claims made by student athletes.

“I just want to stress that how one feels is going to vary from person to person,” Hoaas said when asked about whether students feel UMCP is safe.

“We are a safe campus, with theft being our most reported crime. With that being said, we have a population of about 50,000 people plus visitors, plus we have over a hundred countries represented, so how one feels is going to depend.”

Baltimore Sun intern Mennatalla Ibrahim contributed to this article. Have a news tip? Contact Racquel Bazos at rbazos@baltsun.com, 443-813-0770 or on X as @rzbworks.

Hundreds of thousands of Maryland jobs depend on the federal government.

About 269,000 Maryland residents work for the federal government, while about 161,000 federal jobs are physically located in the state, according to the Comptroller of Maryland. Another 225,000 jobs in Maryland are supported by federal contracts, according to an estimate from the Maryland Department of Labor based on 2023 data.

An extended shutdown could cost the state millions in revenue.

Citing a Congressional Budget Office analysis of the previous shutdown, which ended in January 2019 after 34 days, the Comptroller of Maryland extrapolated from national figures and adjusted for inflation to estimate that the state could lose $700,000 a day during the current shutdown.

The most recent previous shutdown was also the longest, lasting almost five weeks.

This is the fourth shutdown during a Donald Trump presidency. The previous one was the longest under any president, stretching from Dec. 22, 2018 to Jan. 25, 2019. (Trump was also president during the shortest, a five-and-a-half-hour lapse in February 2018.) The only other shutdowns lasting more than five days were under the Democratic administrations of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

Maryland has contingency plans for the states’ hundreds of hundreds of thousands SNAP and WIC participants.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, or WIC, are among social services that could be disrupted by an extended shutdown. Based on previous shutdowns, SNAP benefits during the first month of the shutdown are not expected to be impacted, but WIC benefits could run out sooner.

According to U.S. Department of Agriculture data from May, almost 668,000 Marylanders are SNAP participants and more than 123,000 participate in WIC. Gov. Wes Moore’s administration has said it will work to see that SNAP, WIC and other major federal programs like Medicaid, Head Start, and veterans’ services continue, but indicated that an extended shutdown, or a lack of commitment from the federal government to reimburse the state, could test that.

Have a news tip? Contact Steve Earley at steve.earley@baltsun.com.

“This is a true low-budget movie that is based on all the locations we could get for free,” lead actor, co-writer and Baltimore native Michael Strassner told The Baltimore Sun earlier this month.

Directed by Jay Duplass and with a 98% rating on film website Rotten Tomatoes, the independent romantic comedy follows would-be improv comedian Cliff and dentist Didi over one day of Christmas Eve hijinks. Several key scenes take place alongside famous Baltimore spots, like the iconic holiday lights sequence along Hampden’s Miracle of 34th Street display or eye-catching B-roll of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, filmed about two months before the structure collapsed in March 2024.

The film also resonated with Libby Francis Baxter, vice president of the Hampden Village Merchants Association, a group that supports small businesses around the neighborhood. She’s working on a holiday walking tour of all the “Baltimorons” locations filmed in Hampden, noting that the tour will be accessible online through QR codes on signage. The tentative kickoff date is Nov. 29, when the association starts its holiday activity rollout.

Hampden is heavily featured in the movie, with characters walking past mainstays like Rocket To Venus, Dylan’s Oyster Cellar and The Avenue’s strip of businesses.

“I was really thrilled,” Baxter said after seeing the film. “This is one of the rare instances where we have Baltimore being represented in a very light and happy way.”

Baxter has conducted walking tours for the films of Baltimore’s John Waters and hopes this one will also speak to Hampden residents.

“I look at [“The Baltimorons”] and especially in Hampden, in the holidays, it’s a really authentic experience,” she said. “And I think that this kind of realness is very unique to Baltimore in general.”

With a plethora of iconic neighborhoods and landmarks on display, here are almost all of the locations featured in “The Baltimorons.”

Have a news tip? Contact Caleb Townsend at ctownsend@baltsun.com. Contact Steve Earley at searley@baltsun.com and 443-478-6310.

While rainfall in the state was about normal during spring and early summer, there’s been a lack of precipitation since, leading to abnormally dry conditions in much of the state and drought in parts of Maryland’s five westernmost counties.

For foliage, this can mean leaves display more muted colors and drop sooner. In Western Maryland, foresters have already observed red maples and sugar maples turning early and showing more browns and yellows than oranges and reds, according to Melissa Nash, a forester with the Maryland Forest Service in Garrett County. Leaves began changing in Western Maryland the last week of summer, with fall officially beginning on Monday.

Predicting when fall color will peak is inexact, given the number of variables at play, and heavy wind or rain can abruptly cut the season short.

Heading into the foliage season, DNR forecasted peaks from the weekend of Oct. 11 for Maryland’s mountains through the weekend of Nov. 8 for Southern Maryland and Eastern Shore. The state’s population center in the Baltimore and Washington, D.C., region can expect peak color the weekend of Nov. 1.

Leaves that haven’t started to turn yet could benefit from new rainfall, which is a possibility in the forecast this week, and end up hanging on a bit longer and displaying slightly bolder colors. “There’s a lot that can change as we go through the season,” said Nash, who pointed out that the fall pigments that we see are always there, but they’re just masked by the green from chlorophyll during the trees’ growing season.

Timing and color can also vary depending on species. Maple leaves, for example, tend to turn earlier and can show red, while hickory leaves tend to turn later and show yellow. Ideal conditions for foliage, which treated Maryland to a spectacular season in 2022, are a little bit of moisture, warm but not hot days, and cool nights.

While the Maryland Office of Tourism does not directly track foliage-related visits, a spokesperson said in an email message that, anecdotally, trips along scenic byways surge in the fall. The state seeks to lure leaf peepers via multiple channels, including email, social media, radio and targeted web ads on travel platforms. In Maryland’s westernmost jurisdiction, Garrett County, where the leaves change first, there’s a driving tour and an Oct. 8-12 festival that revolves around foliage.

Have a news tip? Contact Steve Earley at searley@baltsun.com and 443-478-6310.

Coronavirus pandemic

Activation of the National Guard was among major actions that former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan took on March 12, 2020, as the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 rapidly spread. The Guard’s response to the public health threat would last years and involve thousands of soldiers. Its presence in Baltimore stretched from the early days of the pandemic into 2022 and included assisting returning cruise ship passengers, distributing food, setting up the Baltimore Convention Center field hospital, managing the flow of people at the M&T Bank Stadium mass vaccination site and performing nonmedical tasks at overburdened hospitals.

Freddie Gray uprising

More than 3,000 Maryland National Guard members were in Baltimore for a week in response to the April 27, 2015, unrest that followed the funeral for Freddie Gray. Hogan activated the Guard shortly after 7 p.m. that evening, following fires, looting and injuries to police officers. The Republican governor said he was ready to call in troops hours earlier but chose to wait for a request from then-Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake. The Democrat mayor went on to say that she had sought to balance the need to control the situation against the risk of escalating it. In the end, there were few conflicts between troops and the public. Guards members provided security and supported police, including during curfew enforcement, before the announcement of (ultimately unsuccessful) prosecutions of the officers accused in Gray’s death shifted the mood of the city.

1968 riots

Rioting following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. — in Baltimore, six people ended up being killed, 700 injured, 1,000 businesses ransacked or burned and 5,800 people arrested — drew several thousand Maryland National Guard members to the city for just over a week in April 1968. Most of that time, they were under federal rather than state control, as, at the request of Gov. Spiro T. Agnew, they were joined by federal troops, which President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered to Baltimore under the Insurrection Act (Although Johnson had state consent, two sections of the act don’t require it). During their deployment, guard members confronted curfew violators while armed with bayonets and protected firefighters at hundreds of fires. They fired tear gas and, four times, bullets but in after-action reviews were praised for their restraint.

Multiple extreme weather events

The National Guard has come to Baltimore and other parts of Maryland in response to numerous severe weather events over the years such as Winter Storm Jonas in January 2016 and the Blizzard of 1996. Statewide, some 700 guard members responded to the 2016 snowfall and 500 to the 1996 storm, performing missions like clearing major roads, escorting public safety personnel and transportation patients to hospitals.

Have a news tip? Contact Steve Earley at steve.earley@baltsun.com. 

The city has seen a 22.7% reduction in homicides and a 19.6% reduction in non-fatal shootings between the first halves of 2025 and 2024. There have been 68 homicides through June, which a news release from the mayor’s office said was the fewest in over 50 years.

“Our continued progress is the direct result of the comprehensive, evidence-based public safety strategy that we have implemented in partnership with residents,” Scott said in the release.

The mayor thanked the Baltimore Police Department, the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement and prosecutorial offices at the local, state and federal level.

Other categories of crime, such as car theft, robberies and arsons, are also down over the past six months, the release says.

“But our work is far from over. 68 lives lost to violence is 68 too many. While we acknowledge the historic lows we are experiencing, we must simultaneously acknowledge that there is much more work to do and our success makes me commit even further to doing it.”

A Baltimore Sun analysis showed that the drop in homicides was not across the board for all police districts, with some staying flat and one showing a more than 20% increase.

Three of the nine police districts did not show a decrease. Southwest had 11 homicides compared with nine through the first half of last year. Both Central (six homicides) and Southeast (10 homicides) districts had the same number as this point last year.

“The State of Maryland is incredibly proud of the work that has been done in partnership with local, state, and federal officials to take an all-of-the-above approach to public safety that is showing results across the state,” Gov. Wes Moore said in a statement.

“This year’s mid-year report highlights meaningful progress in reducing crime, hiring more officers, advancing Consent Decree compliance and addressing quality-of-life concerns,” said Baltimore Police Commissioner Richard Worley in a release from the police department.

He noted that “recent high-profile incidents” show the department still has work to do in building community trust. While Worley did not reference any specific incidents, Baltimore Police were involved in the deaths of three people in June: Bilal Abdullah, an arabber who was fatally shot during an armed confrontation with police in Upton; Pytorcarcha Brooks, a 70-year-old woman who allegedly lunged at officers during a mental health call; and a third man, who appeared to be suffering a mental health crisis and whose name has not yet been released by the Office of the Attorney General’s Independent Investigations Division.

Worley said in the release that the department will “continue to strengthen community policing efforts, build trust and stay focused on reducing gun violence and crime in our neighborhoods.”

“Baltimore is a safer city today, and I’m proud of the dedication shown by our officers, community members and all of our partners in working together towards that goal.”

Have a news tip? Contact Racquel Bazos at rbazos@baltsun.com, 443-813-0770 or on X as @rzbworks.

The county’s 2025 Redistricting Commission has until June 13 to recommend lines for nine council districts that voters will elect members to next year. At public hearings on the commission’s two draft plans, many residents on the west side of the county favored a third option created by a former county budget chief and some east side residents shared concerns about splitting communities. The expansion will be the council’s first in seven decades, a span in which the county’s population grew more than 70% to over 854,000 residents and became considerably more diverse, from around 4% nonwhite to 48% nonwhite.

Map: Baltimore County councilmanic redistricting draft plan iteration 1

Tip: Click the magnifying glass icon at the bottom of the map, type an address in the search box and press enter to center a map on a location.

The commission’s first draft includes two majority Black districts:

• The hook-shaped District 2 tracks Baltimore City’s western border before jutting west to Milford Mill then northwest to parts of Randallstown south of Liberty Road and out to Liberty Reservoir and the Carroll County line.
• The more compact District 3 is centered around Owings Mills, also including parts of Randallstown and Reisterstown.

And one additional majority nonwhite district:

• District 1 cups the county’s southwestern corner, running south then southeast from Woodlawn to Catonsville, Arbutus and Lansdowne.

Map: Baltimore County councilmanic redistricting draft plan iteration 2

Tip: Click the magnifying glass icon at the bottom of the map, type an address in the search box and press enter to center a map on a location.

The commission’s second draft includes two majority Black districts:

• The T-shaped District 2 in southwestern Baltimore County includes a few communities inside the Beltway in the Lochearn area at the top of the T before jutting west to the Patapsco River, which forms the county’s western border, capturing Milford Mill and parts of Randallstown. The bottom of the T from north to south includes parts of Woodlawn and Catonsville outside the Beltway.
• To the north of District 2, District 3 straddles I-795 between the Beltway and Reisterstown then also runs all the way west to the Patapsco and Liberty Reservoir. It is dominated by Owings Mlls.

And two additional majority nonwhite districts:

• The L-shaped District 1 follows the border with Baltimore City from the Gwynn Oak area to the Lansdowne area, hopping the Beltway around Route 40 to include parts of Catonsville and all of Arbutus.
• Resembling a bird in flight, District 7 runs from the Rosedale area east to eastern stretches of Middle River along the bird’s body and flanks northwest to Nottingham and southeast to Essex along the bird’s wings.

Map: Current councilmanic boundaries

Currently represented by six white men and one Black man, the existing council districts include one majority Black district (District 4, on the county’s west side) and two others that are also majority nonwhite (District 1, in the county’s southwestern corner; and District 2, framing Baltimore City’s northwest border then extending northwest into Worthington Valley).

Tip: Click the magnifying glass icon at the bottom of the map, type an address in the search box and press enter to center a map on a location.

Map: Most common race or ethnicity by census block group

The more populated a block group is, the darker it’s shaded on the map.

Like Baltimore County’s redistricting commission, the map below uses data from the 2020 census. However, unlike the commission’s data, the map’s data has not been adjusted to count incarcerated people in their home jurisdictions, an adjustment that state law requires for political boundary drawing and that increases Baltimore County’s population by 0.25%.

Have a news tip? Contact Steve Earley at searley@baltsun.com and 443-478-6310.