Pilot Program

Thirty kindergarten students at Crofton Woods Elementary School could learn to read, write and speak French before they learn the same English skills under a pilot program that would begin in September.But some of their parents have questioned starting the program when the school system can't afford computers and other supplies. "Why are we considering implementing a program that will benefit so few students when money is so tight?" asked Richard S. Zipper, a Crofton parent who has gathered 125 signatures protesting the program.

Maryland corrections officials are taking advantage of new technology designed to block the use of contraband cellphones by inmates - a problem at the heart of recent indictments at the Baltimore City Detention Center. In a program being used at another prison facility in Baltimore, phones smuggled inside have been severed from the network and rendered inoperable, officials said. The new system, which the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services hopes to expand, could supplement efforts to find the phones using metal detectors or trained dogs to sniff them out. The department says it is catching more illicit phones than ever - more than 1,300 were found in the last fiscal year - but the federal indictments show the limits of those efforts.

The Clinton administration approved yesterday a pilot program in which some Maryland welfare recipients will be denied benefits unless they agree to look for work.The program, passed by the legislature earlier this year, is scheduled to start in Anne Arundel County, Prince George's County and Baltimore in April.The administration also approved Maryland's plan to require teen-age mothers to live at home and to stop paying additional cash benefits for children conceived while their parents are on welfare.

The Maryland Department of Human Resources will step up efforts to find people who sell their food stamps for cash or otherwise defraud the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, under a pilot program with the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday. The agencies will sign enhanced data sharing agreements to monitor the more than 754,000 Marylanders who receive food stamps and the nearly 3,800 retailers that accept the benefits. Virginia will also participate in the initiative, which will gradually expand to other states over time.

The residents of 323 Bel Air households will be getting the county'sattention when they start putting blue bags filled with glass, plastic, cans, newspapers and yard waste at their curbs later this month.Bel Air administrators have selected the homes in the Major's Choice, Howard Park, Bradford Village and Homestead neighborhoods for a pilot program to see how the town's proposed recycling program will work.Because the Bel Air program is nearly identical to the one the county plans to introduce to about 52,000 households next year, the outcome of the town's four-month test could set the standard for Harford.

WASHINGTON -- Stepping up its assault on illegal immigration, the Clinton administration announced yesterday a nationwide expansion of a pilot program in California that requires participating employers to verify the legal status of job seekers.Specifically, the Immigration and Naturalization Service reached agreement with the nation's four largest meat-packing companies, representing 80 percent of the industry's 70,000 employees, to use a computerized data system at 41 plants in 12 Western and Midwestern states to determine if job applicants are legal workers.

Travelers who voluntarily undergo a background check and pay an annual fee will be allowed to move through airport security checkpoints much faster under a new government program starting next year. Kip Hawley, head of the U.S. Transportation Security Administration, announced recently that he expects the program to be fully operational in June. The TSA will oversee the program and check participants against terrorist and criminal databases, but private companies hired by individual airports will recruit the travelers, gather their personal information, and verify identities at security checkpoints.

Look out, spiral notebooks, your days at Oldfields School are numbered.The old, reliable friend of students everywhere is being replaced at the Glencoe girls' school by laptop computers that flip open almost as easily -- but which students also can use to produce science projects, hand in homework and communicate with their parents.These days, black laptop bags are nearly as common as backpacks and lacrosse sticks at Oldfields, a boarding and day school and one of 10 private schools in the country participating in a pilot technology project co-sponsored by Microsoft and Toshiba.

A pilot program in more than 30 Baltimore County elementary schools has greatly increased the number of poor and minority children in gifted-and-talented programs, according to a report presented last night to the county school board. The program looks beyond test scores to identify children as gifted, sending resource teachers to schools to evaluate pupils. It has been launched in 38 Title 1 schools, which receive extra federal money because they serve large numbers of poor children. The report looks at 31 schools.

Two organizations that help disabled people with financial assistance and job training are teaming up at Carroll County's new nonprofit center in Westminster. In a new partnership, Wellness Employee Service Transfer Inc. (WEST) and Catastrophic Health Planners Inc. recently secured a $51,000 grant from the state's human services agency to help disabled people, those who have experienced catastrophic events and those who suffered life-threatening illnesses enter the work force. "We have had grants before, but this brings in another piece in helping those that can work get to work," said Esther Davis, who founded WEST in 1999 and still operates a satellite office in Towson.

Law enforcement officials are watching a test program in Anne Arundel County that entices people with open criminal warrants to turn themselves in — so they can get their state tax refunds. Thus far, the results of dangling a refund as bait have stunned the sheriff who pitched the one-year pilot project. "If I had gotten 10, that would be good, too. But 134? That's huge," said Sheriff Ron Bateman. "It's baseball season, and this is a grand slam. " Under the measure adopted last year, and which went into practical effect with the current tax season, the comptroller's office blocks Maryland tax refunds of residents of Anne Arundel County, and others, who have unserved warrants in Anne Arundel.

Maryland has received a $375,000 federal grant to help launch a program to curb domestic violence, state officials announced Wednesday. The state is one of six that received grant money, which it will use on  a program to help health care providers play a larger role in helping those who may have been victims of domestic violence. Under the program to launch later this month, health care providers will have access to training to help identify and assist domestic violence victims.

When you enter Julie Chang's world languages class at Waverly Elementary School in Ellicott City, you leave English at the door. Then, if you know the answer to a question and are told to " qing ju shou ," you raise your hand. If you're told, " bu shou hua ," then you must keep quiet. And if someone asks about the weather and it's sunny outside, you say, " yin tian . " Chang teaches Chinese, one of two languages offered in the Howard County school system's world languages pilot, which is in its second year at Laurel Woods and Waverly elementary schools.

When Richard Young gets done with a day of crabbing, he often calls the co-owner of his seafood business on his cellphone to let her know he's headed back in. Starting next week, though, the 56-year-old waterman from Dundalk is going to be checking in by phone with the Department of Natural Resources every morning as he leaves the dock in the wee hours and then again when he's caught his last crab. And by the time he gets back to land, he'll have texted in the details of his catch - while still keeping one eye on the water, of course, as he steers his workboat, the Island Girl.

Anne Arundel County Sheriff Ronald S. Bateman says he has a plan for an innovative crime tool that plays on criminals' greed by making them turn themselves in before they can collect tax refunds. At Bateman's urging, the General Assembly signed off on a bill —awaiting Gov. Martin O'Malley's signature — that will allow the state to withhold refunds for people with outstanding arrest warrants in the county. Bateman says he hasn't seen such a program anywhere else. "I came up with the idea because I know greed is a close first or second to the root of all crimes," Bateman said.

A bill to withhold the tax refund from anyone wanted on an open criminal warrant in Anne Arundel County will return to the General Assembly for a second attempt at passage. The measure would create a one-year local trial, but proponents say it has the potential to lead to a statewide program. It would force people with unserved warrants in the county to choose between turning themselves in or forgoing tax refund dollars. The county sheriff hopes people will be hungry for the money.

Taneytown is looking to build a national reputation as the place women go to start a business.Officials there plan to begin a pilot program designed to attract women entrepreneurs and offer them four essential services: advice, training, loan assistance and office help.It is not all altruistic."Women-owned businesses are the most successful in the nation," City Manager Charles P. Boyles II told a breakfast crowd of more than 70 local business leaders Friday."The statistics are enough to open your eyes.

Against the backdrop of an elegant 19th-century mansion, state and Carroll County education officials announced this week plans to pilot a mentoring program aimed at encouraging new teachers to stick with the profession. Concerned about startling statistics on retention - one state school official said nearly two-thirds of new teachers leave the classroom by the end of their third year - officials are focusing on mentoring as a way to help teachers through their first two years. "We're giving them a window of what some of the opportunities are and the support systems" that are available to beginning teachers, said state schools Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick.

The City Council's finance committee chairman threatened Thursday to impose a moratorium on tax breaks for developers until City Hall implements more transparency in the process and funds more projects outside of downtown. Carl Stokes, who chairs the Taxation, Finance and Economic Development Committee, said he wants to see City Hall implement nearly a dozen recommendations from a task force composed of some of Baltimore's best-known business and political leaders before he would allow any more PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes)

Casa de Maryland launched a program Tuesday to offer small loans to legal permanent residents who would like to apply for U.S. citizenship, the nonprofit said. The pilot program will loan 125 individuals each $680, the fee charged for naturalization, the immigrant advocacy group said in a statement. Borrowers will be required to repay the loan over a six-month period at an interest rate of 8.5 percent to 9 percent, according to the statement. Applicants will pay a $25 application fee that will be returned upon full repayment of the loan, Casa said.