Transfer Students

Twenty years after opening its first large residence for students, the Maryland Institute College of Art plans to build a $16.5 million addition that will increase the number of undergraduates living on campus and help revitalize Baltimore's North Avenue corridor and northern Bolton Hill. College officials intend to break ground this fall on Commons II, a five-story building with 62 apartments that can accommodate about 240 students. When it opens in the fall of 2013, MICA will have on-campus housing for more than 1,000 students, up from practically none in 1991 and enough for more than half of its undergraduates.

Coppin State University should enroll higher-caliber freshmen, focus more on transfer and returning students, and reorganize its academics and administration, a committee plans to report Wednesday to the University System of Maryland Board of Regents. The recommendations, from a panel convened in December to study Coppin State, are meant to turn around the stressed institution, one of Maryland's four historically black colleges and universities. The school has one of the lowest six-year graduation rates for first-time, full-time students in the country at 15 percent as of fiscal year 2012 and is underenrolled by more than 2,000 students, the committee said.

Facing a critical teacher shortage, Maryland educators spent three years hammering out a program to help future elementary teachers transfer smoothly from two-year to four-year colleges and move to school classrooms. But now, as the first students to earn the associate of arts degree in teaching for elementary education get ready to move on, they are finding added requirements still stand between them and enrollment in the education programs of some four-year schools. Administrators at Howard Community College in particular are concerned that four-year colleges - including more affordable state schools - plan to admit transfer students to their schools and then delay their entry into education programs for a semester or more by requiring additional classes.

Coming to the United States as a 15-year-old, Cuban-born refugee, it truly was a dream to think that I could go to college and become president of a great Maryland university. But with the support of many people along the way, and the belief instilled by my parents that education was the key to success, it is a dream come true. That's why I support Question 4 - the Maryland Dream Act - which allows the children of undocumented workers to get in-state tuition at Maryland public universities.

It's the first day of school at the Baltimore International College, and chef instructor Kurt Reuschling is urging the students to breathe through their mouths as tears roll down their faces. The incoming freshmen - decked out in crisp white uniforms and armed with shiny kitchen knives - are cutting onions. The culinary training at the school draws chefs-to-be from various backgrounds and experience. While some have restaurant experience, others are transfer students or have military backgrounds.

Dominique Yarbor has the right to attend a better school, according to federal law, but the yellow bus never came to carry her there. So the fifth-grader is walking again to the neighborhood school that the state considers to be failing. "I called the school's transportation unit and I got the runaround," said Towanda Yarbor, who had hoped to send her daughter to Hampstead Hill Elementary in East Baltimore. "They said they were scheduled to pick her up but they didn't have enough buses."

Clemens Crossing parents didn't just ask the school board not to move their children from Clarksville to Wilde Lake Middle School. They brought a carefully researched alternative proposal to Thursday's public hearing on redistricting.Other speakers at the school board hearing sought additional portable classrooms for Guilford Elementary School; "reunion" of children from Sebring. Woodleigh and Hawthorn subdivisions with Clemens Crossing; no transfer to Pointer's Run for Clemens Crossing Elementary School students; and redistricting of Dunloggln Middle School students to fill Harpers Choice Middle.

Harford Community College and the University of Maryland University College are to sign an agreement Wednesday allowing HCC students with associate degrees the option of transferring to various UMUC degree programs. Under the alliance, transfer students could enroll in UMUC programs that include accounting, business administration, computer science, computer and information science, computer studies, environmental management, human resource management, information systems management, legal studies, management studies, psychology and secondary teacher education.

The St. Frances  baseball team has been accepted into the Maryland State Private School Tournament and will play its first game against Bishop Walsh on Tuesday, May 15. St. Frances coach Brian Boles applied to play in the tournament after he learned April 27 that his team would have to forfeit all its games because of incomplete paperwork on two transfer students. The Panthers were among the leaders in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association B Conference before the penalty, which turned their 8-4 record into 0-12 and eliminated them from MIAA postseason play.

In Baltimore CitySchool officials urge new, transfer students in city to register nowCity education officials are urging parents and guardians of new enrollees and transfer students to register now for public schools, which open Aug. 30.New enrollees need two items to prove residency, such as rent receipts; a Social Security card; and a copy of their birth certificate. New enrollees younger than age 18 must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian.International students enrolling for the first time should report to the Office of Planning and Placement, 200 E. North Ave. Information: 410-396-8600.

Twenty years after opening its first large residence for students, the Maryland Institute College of Art plans to build a $16.5 million addition that will increase the number of undergraduates living on campus and help revitalize Baltimore's North Avenue corridor and northern Bolton Hill. College officials intend to break ground this fall on Commons II, a five-story building with 62 apartments that can accommodate about 240 students. When it opens in the fall of 2013, MICA will have on-campus housing for more than 1,000 students, up from practically none in 1991 and enough for more than half of its undergraduates.

UPDATED (10:55 p.m.) -- St. Frances won the semifinal game, 4-0, and will advance to play The Heights in the championship game on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. at a site to be determined.   On April 27, members of the St. Frances baseball team were near tears. Today, the Panthers are in the Maryland State Private School semifinals and putting a positive ending on a season that could have been a disaster. Until that Friday in April, St. Frances had been among the leaders in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association B Conference.

The St. Frances  baseball team has been accepted into the Maryland State Private School Tournament and will play its first game against Bishop Walsh on Tuesday, May 15. St. Frances coach Brian Boles applied to play in the tournament after he learned April 27 that his team would have to forfeit all its games because of incomplete paperwork on two transfer students. The Panthers were among the leaders in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association B Conference before the penalty, which turned their 8-4 record into 0-12 and eliminated them from MIAA postseason play.

The St. Frances baseball team, which had been among the leaders in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association B Conference, has been forced to forfeit all of its games because of incomplete paperwork on two transfer students. “It's an unfortunate situation,” said Rick Diggs, executive director of the MIAA. “It was absolutely not intentional. It's just that over the past two years our paperwork involving transfers has become more complicated.” Diggs said the paperwork errors were discovered by the league office during routine cross-checks of team rosters that are done for the entire league, and the decision to impose forfeits was made Thursday.

Some Baltimore County students are losing the option to transfer out of failing neighborhood schools - the result of the system's decision to stop giving its middle schools federal money aimed at concentrations of low-income students. By choosing to spend all its federal Title I funds in the county's elementary schools starting next month, the school system will no longer be obligated under the federal No Child Left Behind law to provide transfers to students in its six failing middle schools.

Baltimore schools chief Andres Alonso is making it harder for the city's elite magnet high schools to remove students who are struggling academically. Alonso says that the schools are already getting the city's brightest students and that they have an obligation to work with them. Historically, he said, a significant number of students who began as freshmen at Polytechnic Institute, City College and Western High were not still enrolled four years later at graduation. "That's unacceptable," Alonso said in an interview.

In Baltimore CityFugitive task force arrests Lochearn man in June fatal stabbingA man charged in a warrant with first-degree murder in a stabbing in June in Northwest Baltimore was arrested yesterday at his Baltimore County home, police said.Daryl Dennis, 40, of the 3400 block of Redman Road in Lochearn was arrested about 7: 30 a.m. by members of the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force, said Detective Donald Steinhice. Dennis is being held without bail at the Central Booking and Intake Center.

The Baltimore Ravens and their hordes of purple-painted fans have departed from Western Maryland College for the year, making way for the school's next group of residents: students. About 1,545 full-time undergraduate students are expected to report to class Monday at the private liberal arts college in Westminster. The school's 367 freshmen arrived yesterday and will attend their first class - their freshman seminar - today. The 27 seminars, with topics ranging from "The Principals of Biology" to "Educational and Life Experiences of [a]

Baltimore : Northeast Poured chemicals close Mervo A Northeast Baltimore high school was evacuated and closed yesterday afternoon after someone poured a chemical substance in three spots in hallways, according to a spokesman for the city Fire Department. No injuries were reported. The spokesman, Kevin Cartwright, said the first call came in about 11:45 a.m. for an "unusual odor" at Mergenthaler Vocational-Technical High School in the 3500 block of Hillen Road. Cartwright said firefighters found about 20 ounces of liquid poured in three hallways.

It's the first day of school at the Baltimore International College, and chef instructor Kurt Reuschling is urging the students to breathe through their mouths as tears roll down their faces. The incoming freshmen - decked out in crisp white uniforms and armed with shiny kitchen knives - are cutting onions. The culinary training at the school draws chefs-to-be from various backgrounds and experience. While some have restaurant experience, others are transfer students or have military backgrounds.