McDaniel College mathematics professor Francis "Skip" Fennell will serve on a national commission charged with recommending new and more accountable national standards for teacher preparation. Fennell will join 24 other prominent critics of teacher education to form the Commission on Standards and Performance Reporting. The commission is expected to develop rigorous accreditation standards for educator preparation that will raise the bar for preparation providers. Fennell is one of a few professors on the commission, which is made up of college deans and presidents, school superintendents and national organizations involved with education.
New Day Maryland, a political action committee, organized a cash mob in front of Furnace Hills Coffee Co. on Main Street last weekend to help bring business into the store. It was a trial run for an idea for a statewide initiative to stimulate the economy. The cash mob is an idea derived from flash mobs, an act of a group of people who organize in a public place for an apparently spontaneous act. New Day Maryland has plans on organizing similar cash mobs in every county throughout the state. The cash mob brought 15 customers and $250 to Furnace Hills March 3.
Jiffy Marts in Carroll have partnered with PepsiCo and Waste Management to bring four "Dream Machine" recycling machines to the county. The machines encourage recycling by giving users coupons and points that they can collect on a membership card toward larger prizes from
, an interactive online community dedicated to recycling, resource management and offering rewards for recycling, including deals and discounts for more than 3,000 businesses nationwide. Jiffy Mart had been looking for a cost-effective way to bring recycling to its stores, which had only been operating a cardboard recycling program. PepsiCo has committed to donating $500,000 a year to the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities program, and an additional $250,000 for every 10 million pounds of materials collected through the Dream Machines.
Five individuals were recently awarded the Carroll County Sheriff's Office 2011 personnel awards. Det. Cpl. Juan Carlos Bustos was recognized as the Sheriff's Office Deputy of the Year; Glenn S. Haines was named the Correctional Officer of the Year; Administrative Assistant Roxann Yeager was named Sheriff's Service Civilian Employee of the Year; Administrative Assistant Angela Conley was recognized as the Civilian Employee of the Year for the Detention Center; and Auxiliary Sgt. Wayne Hollenbaugh was the Sheriff's Office's Auxiliary Patrol Officer of the Year.
