School Attendance

A bill that would require students to attend public school in Maryland until age 17, beginning in 2010, won preliminary approval in the state Senate yesterday, though the proposal's fate remains uncertain. The Senate, which is expected to take a final vote next week, amended the bill to ensure that it would not take effect unless the governor provides added funding to pay for it. The House of Delegates has not taken action on a similar measure. The Maryland State Board of Education opposed the bill.

Clutching a portfolio and a messenger bag with a city schools logo, Monique Robbins knew her unannounced visit to the homes of chronically absent students in West Baltimore on a recent misty evening might seem ominous. So when she was met with narrowed eyes and a defensive stance, she was ready. "I'm just a volunteer and a member from the community, here to let you know that whatever you need help with to get your child to school this year, we have resources," Robbins said, almost in one breath, to the first parent to open the door a sliver.

The Anne Arundel school board will hold the following hearings on proposals to redraw school attendance areas in four sections of the county.All hearings will begin at 6: 30 p.m. They are:For the Chesapeake and Northeast feeder systems, the hearing will be Feb. 24 at Northeast High School. The school board is considering removing from George Fox Middle School the students who live in the Riviera Beach Elementary attendance area and part of the Sunset Elementary area. Instead, those 270 children would attend Chesapeake Bay Middle School, but would return to Northeast High for grades nine through 12.Also, the board wants to clarify the boundary for a small area of Sunset Elementary, where six children wrongly have been attending Sunset and going on to Chesapeake Bay Middle.

County school officials are planning to shift attendance boundaries for some Pasadena elementary schools to alleviate crowding at George Fox Middle School.The school board agreed last week to consider four proposals to send some students now destined for George Fox to Chesapeake Middle School instead, then return them to Northeast High School.George Fox is in the Northeast High School feeder system, and Chesapeake Middle is in the Chesapeake High School system. The change would not take place until the school year that starts in September 1997.

IT WAS JUST before 9 last Wednesday morning when the duck appeared in the outer offices of Douglass High School."Quack, quack to you," quoth the duck just before all 5 foot 6 inches of it strode through a pair of swinging doors and then out another door that led to the hallway. Within seconds the duck was at the front door, greeting the steady parade of Douglass students as they hurried in for classes."Welcome! Hurry up! Put some pep in your step!" the duck chided. "This means getting to school every day on time."

An expected influx of high school students during the next few years in Carroll County public schools has prompted school officials to consider shrinking the attendance area of North Carroll High School and contemplate scrapping plans to reduce capacity at the mammoth Westminster High School. Enrollment projections released this month show that county schools are expected to gain nearly 800 high-schoolers in the next four years while elementary and middle school populations level off or decline slightly.

The Schaefer administration announced plans yesterday for massive changes in the state's welfare programs -- including a proposal to cut benefits to families who don't take their children to the doctor and to school.At a hastily called news conference, Human Resources Secretary Carolyn W. Colvin outlined the administration's intention to impose tough new rules in the main welfare program for families, cut thousands of disabled adults from a second program and eliminate a third program altogether.

Four boys killed in a recent house fire will be memorialized by young friends, their teachers and community members with a playground to be built at Norwood Elementary School in Dundalk, where two of the children were pupils.Administrators and teachers at Norwood hope to raise about $45,000 to pay for the plastic and metal play set and erect it before the end of December, Principal Harry Walker said yesterday.The play area will be dedicated in memory of James McCready, 10; Brandon McCready, 6; Raymond Jamison, 12; and Jacob Jamison, 10 -- stepbrothers who were killed Sept.

A report last week that Montgomery County officials now favor raising from 16 to 18 the minimum legal age at which students can drop out of school signals a growing awareness that Maryland's future depends on a well-educated work force capable of competing in a global economy. Along with Baltimore City and Prince George's County, Montgomery County's support means there will now be a substantial bloc of lawmakers in the General Assembly ready to back toughening the requirements for school attendance to ensure that Maryland doesn't fall behind.