Boards Of Education

Increasingly, Maryland schoolchildren are having to wait until after school to get cookies, soda and potato chips. According to a report presented this week to the state Board of Education, 17 of Maryland's 24 school districts have extended their ban on junk food sales to the entire school day. The schools are responding to the board's nutrition policy, which was adopted in February. Schools are not permitted to sell foods of "minimal nutritional value" until the end of the last lunch period.

Valerie Lewis went to the Anne Arundel County school board with a desperate plea. Her son, Curtis Lewis, an eighth-grader, has attended eight schools since 2000. To participate in special education programs in Anne Arundel he had to be labeled "emotionally disturbed," a designation that doesn't fit him, his mother says, because he mostly has behavioral problems. This year, he was found not to fit the designation and was placed in regular classes in Arundel Middle School. After a week, he was suspended, she said.

As part of the effort to replace outgoing superintendent Eric J. Smith, the Anne Arundel County school board will hear a presentation Tuesday on finding a new superintendent. The board has had two executive sessions - meetings not open to the public - in recent weeks to discuss their options and consider whom they will appoint in the interim to take over for Smith, who abruptly announced two weeks ago that he would step down Nov. 23, seven months before the end of his four-year contract.

With little time to spare, Anne Arundel County school officials and leaders of two proposed charter schools have nearly finished agreements that would allow them to open this fall. School board members will consider the 34-page document at its meeting tonight. "The way it stands right now, it looks like we could work with that contract," said Vural "Al" Aksakalli, project manager of the proposed Chesapeake Science Point Public Charter School, which hopes to offer math, science and technology education in Glen Burnie to middle and high school students.

In a room packed with friends and family, Thomas G. Hiltz and Cynthia L. Foley were sworn in yesterday during a brief ceremony that marked the beginning of their four-year terms on the Carroll County school board. Hiltz, 45, of Woodbine, was re-elected last month to a second term on the five-member panel. Foley, 48, of Westminster, will be the board's newest member when it meets tomorrow. As Circuit Court Clerk Larry Shipley read the oath of office, Hiltz and Foley repeated in unison a pledge to uphold the U.S. Constitution and Maryland's laws.

The Baltimore County Board of Education will meet at 7 p.m. on Tuesday to conduct a work session. Topics of discussion will include the roles and responsibilities of local and state education boards and the structure of the Baltimore County public school system. State schools Superintendent Dr. Nancy S. Grasmick is among those scheduled to participate in the session, to be held in Room 114 of the ESS Building on the Greenwood campus at 6901 Charles St. in Towson. The meeting is open to the public.

The appointment of four new members to the Baltimore County Board of Education has added momentum to a push to build a high school to ease crowding in the Perry Hall and Towson areas, board members and community activists say. Community groups, armed with a study showing a need for a new school but unable to persuade officials to move forward, have found hope with appointments made this month. Three of the four new members on the 12-member board - Luis E. Borunda, Frances A.S. Harris and Rodger C. Janssen - say they would like to move quickly on the issue.

Patrick Hess, an Aberdeen businessman, and Lee Merrell, an Army environmental engineer based at Aberdeen Proving Ground, have been appointed to the Harford County Board of Education by Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., the governor's office announced yesterday. The governor's office also announced yesterday the appointment of Stewart C. Wilson, 47, to the Cecil County Board of Education. Hess, 48, of Fallston replaces Karen L. Wolf, who resigned from the board in January. He is president and chief executive of Operations Management Inc. and WDPB Inc. in Aberdeen, which operate nine Denny's restaurant franchises in Harford and five other Maryland counties.

The Howard County Board of Education unanimously reversed the demotions of two top administrators accused of grade tampering, announcing yesterday that one reassignment had no factual basis and the other was arbitrary and illogical. In separate legal opinions written Friday, the board cleared former Assistant Superintendent Roger L. Plunkett of charges he abused his power by performing academic favors for the children of Deputy Superintendent Kimberly Statham, who was also found innocent of any intended misuse of her office.

The small wooden building that once housed Queenstown Elementary School contains a paradox. Built in the era of racial segregation, it was a place where black children received a second-rate education. Its teachers were paid less than white teachers, and its pupils learned from worn books discarded by white children. But former pupils have surprisingly fond memories of the northern Anne Arundel County school, which they say was a place of warmth and caring - and a focal point for the black community.