MCPS reports strong transition-day turnout, adopts standard-response protocol and new grading rules for 2025-26

Montgomery County Public Schools opened the 2025-26 year with a set of systemwide operational and instructional changes that district leaders presented to the Board of Education on Sept. 4.

Superintendent Monifa Taylor said transition day—a new practice this year that brings certain grade cohorts to school before others to acclimate to expectations and routines—produced strong turnout and positive feedback. District figures in the presentation showed many elementary, middle and high schools reporting attendance rates above 90 percent for the transition-day activities; the superintendent said principals reported improved confidence and student engagement on subsequent school days.

Safety and emergency response: The district announced adoption of a standard response protocol (SRP) from the I Love U Guys Foundation. Marcus Jones, who leads safety and emergency management, explained that SRP uses five one-word commands—evacuate, shelter, lockdown, hold and secure—to replace more varied local terminology and reduce confusion. Jones said staff, students and families will see new signage and receive guidance; administrators and staff were trained in August and pre-service week materials included guidance for students.

Grading, reporting and instructional supports: The district is implementing changes to final-grade calculation, due-date policy, reassessment opportunities and semester summative assessments. Chief instructional staff said the goal is clarity and consistency across schools to reduce variance in grading practices. Dr. Kesha Logan was credited with assembling a "grading and reporting toolkit" that includes memos, videos and templates for schools and families; the superintendent said the district will share details with local colleges to clarify transcript changes.

Student conduct and equity: The board heard a briefing on updates to the student code of conduct emphasizing prevention and restorative practices. The district said it will prioritize restorative conferences, peer mediation and relationship-centered interventions before excluding students, and that principals received training in June and August on fact-finding and intake procedures.

Personal mobile devices: A new regulation will require elementary and middle school students to keep personal devices powered off and stored for the full school day; high-school students may use devices during lunch and passing times but not during instruction. The district said the change aims to increase engagement and consistent implementation will include scaled responses from teacher redirection to device pouches.

Other operational investments: Central staff described cross-functional teams assigned to clusters (bringing literacy, math, special education and other specialists together to support schools), and noted an expansion in central-office "ambassadors" from 182 to 369 staff deployed to support schools during opening week. Transportation and food services reported that the district ran 1,204 bus routes in the first week and served more than 100,000 breakfasts and 235,000 lunches during the first week; fiscal-year totals presented for 2025 included roughly 18.8 million student meals served.

Board members asked for follow-up data on music and arts budgets, instrument repair capacity, and how the standard-response protocol will be communicated to substitutes, volunteers and contractors. Superintendent Taylor said health and safety is the top priority and that the district would provide follow-up materials to schools and families.

Quotes from the meeting included Marcus Jones saying MCPS "has adopted this standard response protocol from the I Love You Guys Foundation" and Superintendent Taylor stressing that "safety comes first."