Thousands of Prince George's County students head back to class

BOWIE, Md. - Thousands of students in Prince George's County are headed back to class on Tuesday.

Prince George's County students head back just a day after the public schools in D.C. began their new year, one of the largest school systems in the area, Prince George's County Public Schools, sent its nearly 129,000 students back to class Tuesday morning.

Chief Executive Officer Kevin Maxwell says a lot of preparation has gone into this school year, teacher hiring is nearly complete as of Monday. Maxwell explains that they are also still fielding a couple of controversies as well, one of them, a scandal from earlier this year involving Deonte Carraway, an elementary school volunteer charged with child sex abuse and producing child pornography.

Maxwell said that there are new policies that were passed by the board over the summer, there are new administrative procedures that have been finished and they've been posted on their website.

Another big issue for lot of families in Prince George's County is the head start program. Just last week we learned that the federal government was pulling its $6.5 million grant to run that program. Although, Dr. Maxwell well says the money is still flowing into the program right now and the county has 30 days to decide how they are going to respond.

Maxwell says it will start on time on Monday, August 29th and he expects the program will run uninterrupted throughout the school year.