New Cards

In the new report cards for some Carroll first- and second-graders, the card is only part of the report.More important, say teachers and parents who have developed the new report card, is a 30-minute parent-teacher conference in November.The conference will replace what otherwise would have been the first report card. Teachers say when first report cards normally come out in October, they're just getting to know the students.At the conference, parents will receive a checklist from the teacher that indicates the child's progress, strengths and weaknesses.

How old is the report card used in Carroll elementary schools?Older than some teachers.So old that Dorothy "Dottie" Mangle, director of elementary education, isn't even sure how old."This report card is the only [one] I remember," she said. "I've been in the school system 25 years."But that card is changing, as educators and parents prepare a new kind of card in time for the school board to vote Wednesday night.The board will vote on a version to be used as a one-year pilot program in grades one and two at four schools: Carrolltowne, Eldersburg, Manchester and Mechanicsville elementaries.

Even Bill Haelig is boggled.For the past 11 years, Haelig has compiled a checklist of Cal Ripken collectibles -- everything from cards to watches and magazine covers. But the plethora of insert sets and commemorative cards featuring Ripken that have been issued in 1995 and 1996 has him shaking his head."My problem is just keeping up with all the new issues," he says.He says the sheer number of new cards, as well as the number that are listed by Beckett for $100 or more, has changed his collecting habits.

It's back, a year early, bigger and smaller than before.Sports Collectors Digest has added 68 pages to its "1996 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards," but lighter paper makes its 1,214 pages less hefty than the 1995 edition.The catalog is usually published every two years, but Krause Publications says it brought out its fifth edition a year early to reflect current market trends and to add more than 200 previously unlisted sets. The newly listed sets include regional issues.Phone cards are listed for the first time.

BEING UP FRONT with the public doesn't mean you have to expose your vital, personal statistics to everyone. That should be clear to the Howard County government and county taxpayers.There is no reason that a county employee must disclose his date of birth, height, weight and Social Security number on a photo ID card for all to see. The inclusion of all that data on ID cards county employees were made to wear was an insensitive overreaction by officials to security concerns following the Oklahoma City bombing.

There's a merry little world of flying rabbits, dancing chicks and galloping turtles sequestered in the back room of a Charles Village rowhouse.There, post card publisher Sandy Waters hand colors a pastel kingdom where every day is a holiday occasion.This table-top entrepreneur will never challenge Hallmark or American Greeting or Ambassador, but her work is sought by serious collectors, especially those who delight in beautiful cards printed some 90 years ago.Her story begins with a flying rabbit on a post card sent to Brussels on April 12, 1903.

NEW YORK -- Warning: Keep an eagle eye on your mail.Thieves are targeting postal deliveries in the hope of snaring Social Security and welfare checks, as well as phone and credit cards.They are also looking for bank statements or other financial information, such as Social Security numbers, that could help them loot a bank account.Consider the antics of Phillip Kousnetsov and Yuri Kosnogov. As the pair walked out of an East Side Manhattan apartment building last July, federal postal inspectors followed them to their car. Once inside, the authorities nabbed them.

Q: I owe about $5,000 on four credit cards that charge interest rates of 16.5 percent to 18 percent. I've been trying to pay them off, but most months, I just pay the minimum amount, but always on time.I recently read your column about low-rate credit cards and figured that if I could get an 8 percent or 9 percent card I could save almost $500 a year in interest charges.My question is: What do I do about the $5,000 I still owe? Is there any way to transfer my balance to the new card at the lower interest rate?

CHICAGO -- Never before has a set of trading cards had so many people with such extraordinarily high foreheads.And, outside of ads for the optical department at Sears, rarely has there been such an extensive display of thick-framed eyeglasses.It is sometimes lamented that trading cards lost their innocence when children began looking at them as investments, as economic instruments. But it is difficult to look at, say, the brand-new R. H. Coase trading card and see it from anything but an economic perspective.

There was no World Series in 1994. But there were World Series baseballs -- and they have become popular collectibles.According to Scott Smith, director of marketing services for Rawlings, which manufactures the balls for Major League Baseball, the balls sold as souvenirs are identical to the ones put in play.Smith says these are sold to authorized Rawlings sporting goods dealers, who sometimes resell them to hobby dealers or sell them by mail order.He would not disclose production figures but says, "It is not a numbered collectible or a limited edition.