Baltimore City Schools open Monday. What's new?

Racquel Bazos, Baltimore Sun on Aug 22, 2026

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BALTIMORE — Baltimore City Public Schools open Monday, welcoming back tens of thousands of students under the leadership of new CEO Jermaine Dawson.

Dawson took the reins from CEO Sonja Brookins Santelises, who ran the district for a decade. Although Santelises presided over years of test score growth, Baltimore continued to trail state test score averages and struggle with chronic absenteeism.

Starting July 1, Dawson began a district-wide listening tour that will run through October. He’s visited about 40 schools so far. By next June, he hopes to have been to every public school in Baltimore, he said Tuesday at the Board of School Commissioners meeting.

At the end of the first week of school, Dawson is scheduled to update the public on what he’s learned so far, according to the district’s website.

“I do not take this job lightly. This is not a job for me — this is a calling to make sure that we impact the lives of young people,” he said Tuesday. “I vow to work tirelessly to ensure that our students are truly career-ready, future-ready and world-ready.”

Heading into the new academic year, here are three things to know about City Schools.

Standardized tests

The district’s opening Monday comes as Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program results show Baltimore continuing to lag behind most of the state.

City Schools’ English Language Arts proficiency rate of 32.9% is the highest score it’s had since 2017, according to Theresa Jones, the district’s chief achievement and accountability officer. In math, 13.3% of Baltimore students were proficient. Meanwhile, more than half of students statewide were proficient in English this year, with 27.1% meeting that standard across all math tests.

That accountability measure is changing, however, as school systems across the state will take the first Maryland System of Testing Academic Readiness standardized tests in third through eighth grades this year. The Maryland State Department of Education says the new tests will be shorter, allow faster reporting of results, and provide more accurate scores.

Dawson said the district needs to “be honest” about not closing the gap with the state and focus on proficiency, not growth.

“Our new north star in Baltimore City [Schools] is to meet and to exceed the state’s target,” Dawson said. “Basically what I’m saying … is we need to get better and we need to get better faster.”

Teacher vacancies

Chief Human Capital Officer Emily Nielson presented tentative data to the school commissioners Tuesday, showing about 100 vacancies anticipated for the first day.

“We’re still seeing a pretty significant fluctuation in vacancies,” Nielson said. “We are working hard to fill those. Principals are still doing interviews … we’re processing folks. So I anticipate that number will go down.”

Final numbers on first day staffing will be published next year, she said.

Over the summer, the district hired 423 teachers, fewer than in previous years, Nielson said. That decrease is in part “testament to our year-over-year improvements in teacher retention over the last several years,” she said. Fewer new school-based positions in the budget meant fewer teachers moving into those other positions, leaving classes unaccounted for too, she said.

Dawson’s goals

Dawson set three focus areas for his inaugural year: reducing chronic absenteeism, making sure ninth graders advance to 10th grade on time, and boosting the district’s four-year graduation rate.

Dawson’s vision for students is to move them toward what he calls the “4-Es”: enrollment in higher education or trade school, enlistment in the armed services, employment or entrepreneurship.

He said the district needs to set its sights beyond simply graduating students. Dawson said he asks himself what students will be doing three months after they turn their tassels.

“If we can’t effectively answer that question, then we have not done enough to make sure that we set our children up for success because graduation is not the end. It’s actually the beginning,” he said.

Dawson plans to visit 10 schools Monday and might bring his sixth grader along to his first stop at the City Schools bus depot, he said.