Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Schools to use grant to plan for next crisis

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2003 20:56:49 -0500

Schools to use grant to plan for next crisis

by Sean R. Sedam
Staff Writer
Nov. 12, 2003

County public schools will use a $626,000 federal grant to produce brochures and
a series of videotapes for students and parents; conduct emergency readiness
training for school staff; and improve emergency communication between schools
and county agencies, county and school officials said last week.

The Emergency Response and Crisis Management grant from the Department of
Education will go toward buying Palm Pilots and Nextel cell phones with
walkie-talkie features for high school security teams.  The technology will
allow schools to store student rosters and schedules and easily identify staff
and students with special needs during a crisis situation.
It also will help the school system coordinate security, safety and traffic flow
in an emergency, school officials said. Schools saw that need on Sept. 11, 2001,
when many parents came to schools at the same time to pick up their children,
creating a chaotic situation.

"Our communications didn't work so well," recalled school board President
Patricia B. O'Neill (Dist. 3) of Bethesda.
The grant also will be used to enhance mental health support programs and train
staff and students in first aid and CPR through partnerships with the county's
Department of Health and Human Services and the American Red Cross. It will pay
for additional security for portable classrooms.

Events such as the 2001 terrorist attacks, last year's sniper shootings and the
1999 Columbine High School shootings in Littleton, Colo., changed the climate of
school security, O'Neill said.

"The fact is the world has changed and schools have got to be coordinated with
county governments," she said.

Curbing bus pollution

The Maryland Department of the Environment will pay $600,000 for Montgomery,
Prince George's and Anne Arundel counties and Baltimore city to install
pollution control devices on their school buses and pay for cleaner-burning
fuel, a spokesman said Monday.

Work could begin as soon as spring to retrofit school buses with diesel
oxidation catalysts, said Richard McIntire, an MDE spokesman. That could cut
particulate emissions by 20 percent and hydrocarbon emissions by 50 percent, he
said.
The state money also could be used to reimburse counties for the added cost of
using low-sulfur diesel fuel in school buses.
There are more than 1,800 county-owned school buses in Montgomery and more than
1,500 county-owned school buses in Prince George's, McIntire said.

Money for the initiatives comes from a $2.5 million settlement between the
federal Environmental Protection Agency and Virginia Electric and Power Co. The
company is paying for pollution reduction programs in Maryland, Virginia, New
Jersey, New York and Connecticut.

Maryland's portion of the settlement could go toward retrofitting 400 to 600
buses, McIntire said.
MDE will decide how to apportion the money after the four jurisdictions submit
their plans for it later this month, he said.

Credit union branch opens

The Montgomery County Teachers Federal Credit Union has opened its sixth
in-school branch, at Thomas S. Wootton High School in Rockville.

Fifteen Wootton High students from Lloyd Ryan's entrepreneurship class will
serve as tellers as part of the school's national Academy of Finance program,
which provides students with hands-on experience in financial services.
Wootton students and teachers are able to become members of MCTFCU and access
their accounts at the school and on the Internet.

MCTFCU already operates branches at Montgomery Blair, Gaithersburg, Albert
Einstein, and Watkins Mill high schools and Glenhaven Elementary School.

Public hearings
The school board will hold public hearings on the six-year, $956.2 million
school construction recommendations at 7 tonight and Thursday at the Carver
Educational Services Center at 850 Hungerford Drive in Rockville. Speakers must
register; call 301-279-3617. A school board vote is set for Nov. 20; the board's
budget request then is forwarded to the County Council.
The recommendations are available online at www.mcps.k12.md.us/
departments/planning.

http://www.gazette.net/200346/montgomerycty/education/186924-1.html

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