University Officials

The University of Maryland Medical Center lost track of almost 8,000 doses of the prescription painkiller OxyContin and now must pay the government $250,000 in fines for its poor record-keeping, federal prosecutors announced yesterday. The civil settlement also calls for the university hospital to reform its methods to prevent, detect and report prescription drug losses at its downtown Baltimore campus or face an additional $250,000 in penalties. "When a licensee fails to follow [the]

Towson University announced yesterday that it will offer automatic admission and at least a $4,000 scholarship to all Baltimore public school students who graduate in the top 10 percent of their class. University officials say they want to increase the number of Baltimore students who attend Towson. Only 25 in this year's freshmen class were graduates of city public schools, according to university officials. "We're trying to be good neighbors, and we hope that it will improve our diversity on campus," said Louise Shulack, Towson's director of admissions.

The University of Baltimore will not merge with another institution, but the school will consider admitting underclassmen and forming partnerships with other state schools to boost enrollment, officials said yesterday. UB was targeted in a recent university system cost-cutting report, which said that the 5,000-student school could make better use of its facilities. About 60 percent of the students take night courses, according to UB officials, meaning that many facilities are underused during the day. No merger planned Some regents have said they are willing to discuss merging the university with another institution, but Chancellor William E. Kirwan said yesterday that idea "has been taken off the table."

The University of Maryland, College Park will not adopt rules to punish unruly fans but will instead encourage better behavior through initiatives such as T-shirt trade-ins and contests that reward non-profane signs, school officials said yesterday. But if students continue to chant profanities or act inappropriately at athletic events -- as they did during a nationally televised basketball game last winter -- the university will impose new disciplinary measures, officials said. "Students have the chance to police themselves," said Michael Lipitz, associate athletic director.

Coppin State University will conduct a study to look for ways to reduce poverty, improve safety and attract private developers to the Rosemont and Coppin Heights neighborhoods that surround the West Baltimore school. "You see blight, you see deterioration, you see rats," Coppin President Stanley F. Battle said yesterday. "What we want is houses that are nice, and we want people to live here." The nearly $210,000 study is funded by the state, the city, the university and private groups.

Demolition is set to begin today on a 1915 Mount Vernon building that neighbors and preservationists struggled to save, University of Baltimore officials said yesterday. The decision to tear down the building this morning is a crucial step as the president of the commuter campus, Robert L. Bogomolny, forges ahead with plans to build a strikingly modern $14 million student center on the site. The state property at Mount Royal and Maryland avenues is expected to be cleared within two weeks, university officials said.

Perched before 230 high school students he hopes will attend his university this fall, Johns Hopkins President William R. Brody began a presentation Thursday by telling them one of his students had been brutally killed. It seemed an odd way to start, some of the prospective students and their parents would later say. But they listened as Brody described how a burglar entered a fraternity house through an open door, came upon Christopher Elser and attacked him. The April 17 stabbing of the junior from South Carolina - the first homicide in Charles Village since November 2000 - serves as a stark reminder to prospective students and their parents that if they choose to attend Johns Hopkins, they are opting to go to school in one of the most violent cities in America.

In rallies on opposite sides of Mount Royal Avenue yesterday, University of Baltimore students formed a conga line on a campus plaza to support plans for a student center, while preservationists and community activists gathered to defend a vacant 1915 building due to be demolished for a starkly modern structure. Third-year law student Peter M. Dolkart said it was high time for a student union at the commuter campus with about 5,000 students. "We're the only campus in the state system without a center.

A 20-year-old Johns Hopkins University student stabbed by an intruder at his fraternity's Charles Village apartment house after a party died yesterday evening, authorities said. Christopher Elser, a junior from Camden, S.C., had been on life support at Maryland Shock Trauma Center. His parents and other family members had come to Baltimore to be at his side, officials said. University officials, informed of his death, quickly announced plans for a campus memorial service. They said classes at the Homewood campus will be canceled between 10 a.m. and noon tomorrow for the service, which will start shortly after 10 a.m. and likely be held outdoors at a site to be determined.

Towson University police were investigating two suspicious letters sent to university staff containing a white granular substance, apparently intended to look like anthrax. Preliminary field testing showed no evidence of a hazardous material, and police believe the letters are a hoax, Susanna Craine, a Towson spokeswoman, said yesterday. Still, university officials sent alerts via email and the university Web site asking students and staff to call police to report any other suspicious letters and packages.