Petition To Alleviate Perry Hall Middle Overcrowding Goes Online

PERRY HALL, MD — A petition to build a new Nottingham Middle School is gaining traction. A Change.org petition that started this week had more than 100 signatures within a day.

Joe Norman started the petition to alleviate overcrowding in northeastern Baltimore County.

Perry Hall Middle School, which has the capacity to hold 1,643 students, had an enrollment of 1,888, according to the school system. It has 10 relocatable classrooms.

Norman, a Perry Hall parent, posted the petition online after the Baltimore County Board of Education voted to postpone handling the overcrowding situation at Perry Hall Middle School in hopes that the state would come through with school construction funding.

This session, the Maryland General Assembly failed to pass the Build to Learn Act, which would have made additional funding available for school systems around the state.

At Perry Hall Middle School, community members have proposed alternatives such as sending kids to the under-capacity Pine Grove Middle School, according to WBAL. However, part of the reason the school board did not want to alter the attendance numbers in Perry Hall was to be able to justify the need for state dollars.

Baltimore County school board member Julie Henn and Perry Hall councilman David Marks will hold a meeting to discuss the middle school situation on Tuesday, July 2.

"School Board Member Julie Henn and Councilman David Marks are leading an effort to put pressure on the General Assembly to pass the bill and make funds available in 2020," Norman wrote, adding: "but this will not happen without the support of our community."

See the petition for the new Nottingham Middle School on Change.org.

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