Montgomery Community Media

Montgomery County Public Schools published a letter that Superintendent Jack Smith emailed to the Damascus high school community on Sunday. The letter is about how MCPS is cooperating with law enforcement’s investigation into alleged rapes and violent assaults at Damascus, and they’ve also hired an external firm to internally investigate the school and football team […]

MCPS Office of School Support and Improvement (OSSI) plans to host a series of community meetings at nine different MCPS high schools in the county to learn about the MCPS Equity Accountability Model. Members of the community are invited to attend and participate in a community conversation about how to improve existing strategies that are […]

The recent Damascus High School assaults trained attention on the juvenile court. The boys charged in the case were first charged as adults, facing adult penalties, until their lawyers successfully petitioned to move their cases to the juvenile system. We talked with the Department of Juvenile Services to learn how the system for adjudicating youths […]

Maniya Jules, an assistant principal at Damascus High School, has been put on “extended personal leave” effective April 1, according to a letter emailed home from Principal Casey Crouse. “We are in the process of identifying a qualified professional to act in her role while she is on leave. I will send a follow-up communication […]

A judge ruled Thursday that the fourth defendant in an alleged sexual assault that occurred in Damascus High School will have his case moved to juvenile court. The public generally gets little information from the juvenile court system. On Tuesday, Circuit Court Judge Steven G. Salant heard arguments on where the boy should be tried. […]

A third boy charged in the locker room rapes in Damascus High School will have his case moved to juvenile court, State’s Attorney John McCarthy said at a news conference Thursday. Maryland law requires some youths to be charged as adults depending on the nature of the crime. In this case, four boys were charged […]

A Montgomery County judge Tuesday signed an order sending one of the four defendants in the Damascus High School rape case back to juvenile court, his lawyer said. The other three defendants have hearings later this month and in March to decide whether their cases should be sent to juvenile court, according to online court […]

DARNESTOWN, MD; February 2, 2019 STOP!  A whisper, lowly delivered, was aimed at a green ball arching across a curvaceous gymnasium floor as it headed towards the pallina.  Simultaneously, cheers could be heard from the adjacent court. A hitting shot dislodged a cluster of green and red balls confronting the pallina. Subsequently, there is a […]

The alleged sexual assault at Damascus High School shook parents, teachers, administrators and students themselves. We asked Jennifer Alvaro to join us in the Montgomery Community Media podcast booth to talk about the issues surrounding the incident. We believed some of the things Alvaro said deserved a response from Montgomery County Public Schools. In an […]

1. Elrich Becomes County Executive Voters roared in 2016, passing term limits on County Council members and the county executive. In 2018, the voters continued to roar. First, in the Democratic primary, voters winnowed a list of 38 candidates down to four in the council’s at-large race. Next, voters chose Marc Elrich as their party’s choice […]