Satisfactory

SINGAPORE -- After two months of international debate about crime and effective punishment, American teen-ager Michael Fay was lashed with four strokes of a rattan cane in a prison here yesterday for spraying paint on cars.Although widely expected since the Fays' appeal for clemency was turned down Wednesday, the execution of his sentence provoked outrage from his parents, and the State Department called in the Singaporean ambassador to Washington to express its displeasure."I think it was a mistake," President Clinton told reporters in the Rose Garden, "not only because of the nature of the punishment related to the crime but because of the questions that were raised about whether the young man was in fact guilty and involuntarily confessed."

It's almost cool to be gluten-free. More national brands are offering gluten-free versions of their popular products, cookbooks for celiac disease sufferers are available at your local bookstore and now allergy-friendly bakeries -- such as Sweet Sin Bakery in Waverly -- are available at your doorstep. But it hasn't always been that way. Jules E.D. Shepard of Catonsville was diagnosed with celiac disease in 1999, what she calls "the dark ages of cooking gluten free." At the time of her diagnosis, Shepard was an avid baker, whipping up cupcakes for friends and classmates.

Howard County has the highest overall percentage of students scoring at the satisfactory level on the state's new tests, but it has a long way to go to before all of its schools meet minimum performance standards, according to the latest statewide assessment.One-third of Howard's elementary schools passed some of the 12 categories on the new tests in the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program (MSPAP). The new standards don't formally count until next year."We're doing very well, and we might have the highest percentage in the state, but no one in the state is meeting [the new]

Richard C. Hunter, who tenaciously held on to his job as Baltimore school chief in the face of a steady stream of mayoral fault-finding over the past school year, received a "satisfactory" grade from the city school board last night.Dr. Hunter himself said last January that he deserved an A for his efforts, but the school board, whose members are appointed by the mayor, gave him its lowest "passing" mark, on a scale that ranged from unsatisfactory to excellent.Several board members declared immediately after last night's meeting that the evaluation, based solely on Dr. Hunter's job performance over the 1989-1990 school year, was in no way a signal as to whether they planned to keep him on as superintendent when his three-year contract expires next summer.

The final open casting call for Season One of the Netflix Series "House of Cards" will be held Saturday, Sept. 8, from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Bel Air Reckord Armory at 41 N. Main St. Central Casting says it's looking for union and non-union extras for the original series starring Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright. This will be the final open casting call for Season One of this series which is shooting in Harford County and elsewhere in the Baltimore area. In addition to extras, applicants may also be considered for recurring or featured roles, Central Casting said.

A Baltimore judge summoned attorneys from a large foreclosure law firm Monday to explain whether signatures on key documents were genuine, part of the fallout from revelations last year that foreclosures nationwide were being processed based on deficient — or fraudulent — paperwork. Virginia-based Shapiro & Burson was the third law firm called this year before Baltimore Circuit Judge W. Michel Pierson. He has heard admissions from several attorneys — at Shapiro & Burson and elsewhere — that their signatures on affidavits required to foreclose on homeowners were sometimes made by other people.

Howard County students have again achieved the state's highest systemwide score on the annual Maryland performance exam, becoming the first school system in Maryland to have 60 percent of children receive a satisfactory or higher mark.Results released yesterday showed that 60.1 percent of Howard County students met the goal of the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program, a test given to third-, fifth- and eighth-graders in the spring. That overall score topped the 1997 percentage of 57.9 and the 1996 score of 56.9.

PHILADELPHIA -- Taking shots at the NCAA is normally such a simple task. For decades now, the people in charge of college athletics have been an unrelenting study in both blindness and arrogance, the easiest of targets.Equal justice? Forget it.Obsessed with inconsequential nit-picking? Always.Concern for minorities? Hah.Concern for the athletes? Hah-hah.But that was then, and this is now. And the NCAA Presidents Commission last week did a few things that received scant public notice, but that are really good things.

It's become a cliche whenever a monstrous crime is revealed. Someone will always say: "He's the last person you would think would do something like that."This time, the speaker is attorney Bill Porter and the subject is his client, a 43-year-old Baltimore man who pleaded guilty Monday to repeatedly raping his three daughters during much of their adolescent years, resulting in at least five pregnancies that ended in abortions. His 43-year-old wife also pleaded guilty to rape for her complicity in the abuse.

Maryland students continue to improve their marks on the state's annual tests, but only four of 10 pupils are performing satisfactorily, according to the state Education Department's 1995 report card. Educational, political and business leaders -- including U.S. Education Secretary Richard W. Riley -- gathered yesterday at a news conference to praise the improved test scores as evidence that Maryland school reform is heading in the right direction. But they acknowledged that the state's schools have a long way to go. The Maryland School Performance Assessment Program tests -- given the past five years to all third- , fifth- and eighth-grade pupils -- are intended to assess students' thinking skills.