Parents, teachers, alumni fight to save Prince George's Camp Schmidt

Oxon Hill Elementary School fifth-grade teacher Jamea Hunter, 26, said the overnight trip she took in 1996 as a fifth-grader to the William S. Schmidt Outdoor Education Center inspired her career choice.

Watching her students roam the center's grounds Feb. 16, Hunter said she is "enraged" about a proposal to close Schmidt — a Brandywine facility owned and operated by the Prince George's County public schools system — as part of countywide school budget cuts.

"When the children come to school, they're being constantly pressured with standardized testing," she said. "Schmidt is that time to step out of the classroom and make sense of the world around them."

The fiscal 2012 budget proposed by Superintendant William R. Hite Jr. includes cuts totaling $155 million. Closing the 450-acre Schmidt center, which employs eight full-time employees, would save an estimated $687,000 annually, according to Hite's proposal.