Hampstead Hill

In the wake of community complaints, city school officials plan to revise dismissal policies at Hampstead Hill Middle School as suggested by Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke.The school system today was expected to ask the state's Mass Transit Administration to provide five additional buses each day to ferry students away from the school, according to Willie J. Foster, director of middle schools.Currently, there are only two MTA buses assigned to the school, despite the fact that 65 percent to 70 percent of the school's more than 1,200 students live outside the immediate neighborhood.

Spaceships soar and abstract flowers bloom at Canton Gallery this week, as art students from nearby Hampstead Hill Elementary School make their professional debut."

All sixth-grade boys at Hampstead Hill Middle School -- more than 100 of them -- were suspended yesterday after a disruption that followed a fight between two of them.But the mass suspension ordered by an assistant principal was criticized last night by Dr. Walter G. Amprey, the Baltimore city school superintendent, who urged that all students return to school today.Dr. Amprey said the fight involved two sixth-grade boys, one of whom apparently had a knife but did not use it.The fight was broken up by the school staff, but the majority of the boys in the sixth grade were disruptive when they returned to classrooms, and that prompted the suspensions.

Baltimore city school Superintendent Walter G. Amprey took office pledging to move forward on reforms aimed at giving principals greater authority over the way their schools are run -- and making them more accountable for results.Now Amprey has faced an early test of that doctrine in the case of Hampstead Hill Middle School Principal Margaret Wicks, whose staff apparently lost control of the situation last Thursday when a fight between two boys set off a mini-riot that disrupted classes for several hours at the East Baltimore school.

About 400 residents of the Patterson Park area met with police and city officials at St. Elizabeth's Roman Catholic Church to seek solutions to end the on-going violence and unruly conduct they say is caused by some students at Hampstead Hill Middle School.During the two-hour meeting last night at the church at Lakewood Avenue and Baltimore Street, residents showed strong emotions and deep frustration."Enough is enough," said Loretta Willits, 60.Willits said it's time that parents of troublemakers at the school be held accountable for their children's actions.

He was introduced simply as Pedro Lugo. At Hampstead Hill Middle School, everyone knows who Pedro Lugo is.Last May, three youngsters took Mr. Lugo's baseball bat from him as he walked across Patterson Park. They beat him with it and split his skull.One of those three was from Hampstead Hill Middle School. Witnesses said a crowd of other students watched. Expedito "Pedro" Lugo nearly died.Yesterday, a friend wheeled Mr. Lugo onto the scarred wooden stage at Hampstead Hill and the auditorium filled with applause from students.

Despite its promotion by The Sun last week, the recent PBS television program about the War of 1812 once again ignored the Battle of North Point, which was fought in 1814 around the area of what is now Dundalk-Edgemere. This seemed like a deliberate oversight, given the fact that the battle was covered in the show's companion book, "The War of 1812: A Guide to Battlefields and Historic Sites. " Granted, Fort McHenry is the star attraction of the 1812 war because it inspired Francis Scott Key to write the words of our national anthem.

Baltimore school board members are having second thoughts about their decision earlier this month to allow an educational television program that includes commercials to be aired in city schools.After hearing from two parent groups that criticized the decision last night, board members conceded that they didn't know as much about Whittle Educational Network's Channel One program as they'd thought.One board member, Linda C. Janey, was surprised to learn that schools would not get to keep the video equipment provided free as part of Channel One. Another, Stelios Spiliadis, was dismayed to hear that parents had not been consulted -- at least, the Baltimore City Council of PTAs had not been consulted.

Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke has outlined a number of changes at Hampstead Hill Middle School, after neighbors complained about incidents involving rowdy students.But some of those changes were already in the works before the beating of a man last week by three youths, according to a school department spokesman. One of the three youths charged is a student at Hampstead Hill.Changes include the reassignment of Principal Preston Roney after this school year and the possibility of redistricting the school as part of an citywide redistricting program, said to Douglas J. Neilson.

Work didn't stop last week at Hampstead Hill Academy, although teachers and pupils were away for the winter break. Late one morning, two workers were perched on a scaffold, sealing the Southeast Baltimore school's new windows with caulk. They were not school system employees, but workers from a glass company hired by local developer Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse Inc., which has been making improvements at several city schools near its major building projects. Hampstead Hill, one of five schools in which Struever Bros.