School Officials

A Baltimore high school student was listed in stable condition Monday afternoon after he was stabbed in his upper body during an in-school confrontation with another student, school officials said. The Heritage High School student was treated by a school nurse and taken to Johns Hopkins Hospital after the incident about 10:45 a.m., city school officials said in a statement released five hours after the stabbing. School officials did not release the grade levels of the students involved.

Baltimore schools opened the year with 87 teacher vacancies, a trend that is not uncommon in the region but comes during a critical year for the system as it embarks on a new student curriculum and teacher evaluation system. City officials said they are tapping substitutes and other school staff, such as department heads or instructional support teachers, to lead classroom instruction. Electives in student schedules are also being shifted. In rare cases, they said, classes are being combined.

Baltimore County schools dealt with reported threats on three separate campuses Thursday morning, as officials worked to quash rumors and assure parents their children are safe. The schools were not placed on lock down and all the rumors proved to be unfounded, officials said. "It appears at this point that a flurry of rumors is circulating on social media," said Charles Herndon, county schools spokesman. "People are understandably on edge because of recent events and these threats are really playing on people's nerves.

Regarding your story on questionable credit card expenses by Baltimore City school administrators, the various explanations offered by school officials are unconvincing despite their incredible rhetoric ("City school officials play loose with credit," Aug. 26). A prime example is the description of a $13,000 catering bill for a central office meeting as "fellowshipping around food that has existed in city schools for decades. " First, saying something has been done for decades doesn't mean it is right.

While visiting classes on the first day of school, new Howard County Superintendent Renee Foose had a pedometer strapped to her waist as part of a systemwide program for employees that emphasizes health. By midmorning, she had already logged tens of thousand of steps, canvassing hallways, classrooms, weight rooms, media centers and cafeterias of the system she took over in July. "This is like a kid waking up on Christmas morning. That's exciting," said Foose, who joined other local, state and elected officials in ushering in the first day of the academic calendar year for many jurisdictions.

Perry Hall High School is more than 20 miles from Catonsville High, where Principal Deborah Bittner announced Monday, Aug. 27, on the school intercom, "There's been a tragic situation ... " "It's made us think and rethink how we would handle something like this," Bittner said an interview, reflecting on the shooting at Perry Hall High that morning. There, a male student was flown to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center after being shot by a fellow student with a shotgun during the first lunch period of the school year, according to county police.

Maryland School Assessment test results have been revised for some Anne Arundel County students, causing the county's overall scores to fall slightly from what was reported earlier. Revisions were made to include results from a modified version of the test (known as MOD-MSA) that school officials said was taken by special-education students unable to take the regular MSA. Anne Arundel officials said that 1.6 percent of students were administered the MOD-MSA but the MOD-MSA scores were not factored in when results were reported in July.

The headmaster of the Calvert School in North Baltimore will depart at the end of the coming academic year for a new position at a school in Houston, school officials announced Wednesday. Andrew Martire has been headmaster of the Calvert School, located in the Tuscany-Canterbury neighborhood of Baltimore, since 2004. He has accepted the job of Head of School at the Kinkaid School in Houston starting next year. Both schools are private coeducational schools for students in kindergarten through eighth grade.

Baltimore city school officials rolled out last week, the system's annual school readiness plan that includes a vast reduction in the number of bell schedules to alleviate pressure on its transportation system, as well as a sharp uptick in 'managing' school leaders. The update--the PowerPoint can be found here --also included 14 facility renovation projects all due to be completed by Monday when schools open to students; and a new, multilingual communications campaign that will distribute the system's literature in English and Spanish.

The family of a 6-year-old special-needs student who died after he jumped from a moving school bus has filed an $80 million lawsuit alleging negligence on the part of the Baltimore school system and the contractor hired to transport him. The boy's mother, Lisa Avery, filed the lawsuit this month, accusing the school system and the bus personnel of M.R. Hopkins Transportation Services Inc. of failing to ensure the safety of her emotionally disturbed...