Dormitory

COLLEGE PARK -- A fire Tuesday night forced the evacuation of a University of Maryland dormitory just as students were in the middle of studying for final exams, but no one was injured. The fire started about 6:20 p.m. in a heating and air conditioning unit at La Plata Hall, campus police said. Six dormitory rooms suffered water damage but were deemed habitable when the building reopened at 11:20 p.m. The fire's cause is under investigation, but foul play has been ruled out, police said.

William Arthur "Bill" Seal III, a retired McDonogh School dean, faculty member, coach and dormitory parent, died of an apparent heart attack Monday at Carroll Hospital Center. The Reisterstown resident was 65. In nearly four decades at McDonogh, Mr. Seal taught lower school science and upper school psychology and history, guided the senior class, and coached soccer, lacrosse and wrestling. He was inducted into the McDonogh Athletic Hall of Fame in 1999 and received the Alumni Association's Distinguished Service Award in 2007.

A small fire on the first floor of a Johns Hopkins University dormitory in North Baltimore filled the six-story building with smoke and forced the evacuation of students, office workers and shoppers at several street-level stores.No injuries were reported.Inspector Michael Maybin, a Fire Department spokesman, said sprinklers extinguished the fire, which began about 2 p.m. in an electrical panel in the Homewood Apartments in the 3000 block of N. Charles St. Officials said the panel was being repaired by Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. workers.

A George Washington University student has died after falling from a dormitory window. University president Steven Knapp announced the student's death during commencement on Sunday, and graduates observed a moment of silence. Taylor Hubbard of Lexington Park, Md., fell out of a window at Guthridge Hall around 4 a.m. Saturday. Officials say the 20-year-old sophomore was taken to George Washington University Hospital. There's no word on why Hubbard was at the dorm or what caused him to fall.

Correctional officers at the Maryland Penitentiary found a cheap, .25-caliber handgun hidden in a metal column yesterday morning during their continuing search of the prison's C-dormitory following last week's inmate uprising."

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling Monday on Prince George's County's "mini-dormitory law" should not affect two Baltimore County ordinances that indirectly deal with off-campus student housing, said the sponsor of the measures.Councilman Douglas B. Riley, R-4th, said that the Baltimore County laws don't regulate based on who lives in the house, but on how the house is used.One of Mr. Riley's measures tries to control the noise often associated with off-campus college student housing; the other regulates the rooming houses that many students prefer to the more expensive and restrictive campus dormitories.

Dormitory charges at the nine residential schools in the University System of Maryland are set to increase from 2.5 to 5.9 percent next school year, according to figures approved by a committee of the Board of Regents yesterday.Meeting at Towson University, the regents' finance committee also increased meal plan costs up to 5.4 percent above this year's price.These jumps come on top of tuition increases of up to 4 percent that were approved by the Regents in August. Smaller mandatory fees paid by students to support nonacademic buildings, services and sports are also set to rise, by as much as 16.5 percent.

Inside the high-rise dormitory where Adam Spillman once lived, red-eyed University of Maryland students sit together in silence.Just two days ago, they were awakened by the flashing lights of emergency vehicles as rescue workers tried to revive their fellow student, who died after falling eight stories from his dormitory window.Though police will not issue a cause-of-death statement until the state medical examiner has completed an autopsy, campus public information director Roselyn Hiebert said a note found in Spillman's room indicated a probable suicide.

Gilliam Hall, a contemporary new dormitory on the Colonial campus of St. John's College, will be formally dedicated Thursday - but it is already receiving glowing reviews from undergraduates who have lived there since the fall semester started. "It's amazing how much this seems like a house," said Chris Utter, a 20-year-old junior from Cleveland Heights, Ohio, as he strolled through the first-floor kitchen and dining area, which includes a chalkboard filled with ancient Greek words. Perhaps best of all, Utter's small single room and others like it overlook College Creek, where rowers from the Annapolis liberal arts college and the neighboring Naval Academy pass by in the fall mornings and afternoons.

A 19-year-old woman allegedly raped by former Calvert Hall star Gary Neal and a La Salle University basketball teammate told police she was so drunk she was throwing up into a sink when Neal forced himself on her, according to a police investigation report. In the report, the woman says Neal was the first to rape her in a dormitory at the Philadelphia school at about 1 a.m on June 24. She told investigators Michael Cleaves joined in, saying at one point: "I want to get some of that." Neal, a 6-foot-4 guard who grew up in Aberdeen, was the Explorers' leading scorer last season as a sophomore.

An Islamic school wants to build a small dormitory in Woodlawn. But in an area with the highest concentration of homes for foster children and disabled and troubled youths in Maryland, a boarding school for 20 teenage boys sounds too much like a group home to some community leaders. "We don't know where these kids are coming from," said Van Ross, president of the Woodlawn Community Education and Development Association. "We don't know if they are troubled young people or what. How would you like a dormitory or a group home next to your house?"

Arguing that a retreat center proposed by Loyola College would have little effect on its rural northern Baltimore County neighbors, lawyers for the college asked the Court of Special Appeals yesterday to uphold county approval of the project. "Because this use has such a light impact, it ought to be approved," James A. Dunbar, one of Loyola College's lawyers, argued yesterday before a panel of three appellate judges in Annapolis. But some Parkton-area residents remain opposed to the college's plans to build a lodge and two dormitories on a 10-acre portion of a 53-acre property in Parkton.

Within a couple of years, homeless teenagers could be living in a new dormitory-style center that would give them stability. Or they could be among at-risk students in an inner-city boarding school that would provide shelter as well as an education. Advocacy groups say new ways must be found to help a nearly invisible group of teenagers who try to keep their homelessness a secret from authorities. Yet those programs would help a tiny percentage of the hundreds of homeless teenagers, who live unsupervised by adults.

Towson University officials said yesterday that the school will not house students as part of a development planned for downtown Towson, pleasing residents who don't want a dormitory in the heart of the county seat. Alan Leberknight, interim vice president and chief financial officer of Towson University, said the decision to reject a bid by Heritage Properties and the Cordish Co. to build a 600-bed dormitory in Towson was based on how much debt the public university system would have had to carry and not on the community's opposition.

Gilliam Hall, a contemporary new dormitory on the Colonial campus of St. John's College, will be formally dedicated Thursday - but it is already receiving glowing reviews from undergraduates who have lived there since the fall semester started. "It's amazing how much this seems like a house," said Chris Utter, a 20-year-old junior from Cleveland Heights, Ohio, as he strolled through the first-floor kitchen and dining area, which includes a chalkboard filled with ancient Greek words. Perhaps best of all, Utter's small single room and others like it overlook College Creek, where rowers from the Annapolis liberal arts college and the neighboring Naval Academy pass by in the fall mornings and afternoons.

Gilliam Hall, a contemporary new dormitory on the Colonial campus of St. John's College, will be formally dedicated Thursday -- but it is already receiving glowing reviews from undergraduates who have lived there since the fall semester started. "It's amazing how much this seems like a house," said Chris Utter, a 20-year-old junior from Cleveland Heights, Ohio, as he walked through the first-floor kitchen and dining area, which includes a chalkboard filled with ancient Greek words. Perhaps best of all, Utter's small single room and others like it overlook College Creek, where rowers from the Annapolis liberal arts college and the neighboring Naval Academy pass by in the fall mornings and afternoons.

Towson University officials said yesterday that the school will not house students as part of a development planned for downtown Towson, pleasing residents who don't want a dormitory in the heart of the county seat. Alan Leberknight, interim vice president and chief financial officer of Towson University, said the decision to reject a bid by Heritage Properties and the Cordish Co. to build a 600-bed dormitory in Towson was based on how much debt the public university system would have had to carry and not on the community's opposition.

Dormitory construction set at St. John's College Construction of a dormitory, the first building to be built since 1958 on the campus of St. John's College in Annapolis, is scheduled to begin this month. The dormitory should be ready for occupancy in the fall of 2004. The St. John's campus was built for a student population of 350, and enrollment now tops 450. Currently, the college accommodates 315 students on campus by using some large dorm rooms for triples, and turning some common rooms into rooms for students.

A 19-year-old woman allegedly raped by former Calvert Hall star Gary Neal and a La Salle University basketball teammate told police she was so drunk she was throwing up into a sink when Neal forced himself on her, according to a police investigation report. In the report, the woman says Neal was the first to rape her in a dormitory at the Philadelphia school at about 1 a.m on June 24. She told investigators Michael Cleaves joined in, saying at one point: "I want to get some of that." Neal, a 6-foot-4 guard who grew up in Aberdeen, was the Explorers' leading scorer last season as a sophomore.

The Johns Hopkins University is close to buying the Stafford Apartments in Mount Vernon, a school official says, and by autumn the elegant 11-story building should be converted from low-income housing to student dorms. The change has been in the works since 2002, when Maryland's congressional leaders helped void a federal provision restricting the tower -- overlooking one of Baltimore's most picturesque squares -- to poor residents. But Hopkins had not said publicly it would buy the building from Denver-based AIMCO Inc. Nor did it specify when the 96 units would be ready for students, mostly from Hopkins-affiliated Peabody Institute a block away.