"I don't need no caning," said Tyrone.
Tyrone is a young man of indeterminate age. He says he's 13. His teacher says he's 15. He looks 16, but at that legal age for rTC dropping out of school, he probably wouldn't be in this high-ceilinged double classroom on the fourth floor of Sojourner-Douglass College in East Baltimore. He'd be on the street.
With 21 other young men and a couple of young ladies, Tyrone is enrolled in the Tri-School Alternative Project, an effort by three city public middle schools -- Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Dunbar and Lombard -- to remove their worst behavior cases from home schools and subject them to a month of training and counseling about civilized behavior, combined with a dose of rudimentary academics.
Tyrone, for example, had no idea what "caning" meant when he was asked Friday. The phrase "corporal punishment" is far beyond him. So are "cruel and unusual punishment," the U.S. Constitution, the General Assembly, how bills become law -- all related to East Baltimore Del. Clarence Davis' proposed legislation allowing the state to apply a rattan cane to the behinds of teen-agers caught vandalizing or stealing property.
But when the concept of "caning" was explained to Tyrone, he decided he needed none of it.
Perhaps not. Tyrone was not asked whether he had engaged recently in vandalism or stolen a car. But he had made life miserable for a middle-school teacher (probably more than one), who from time to time no doubt fiercely wished to apply strap or cane to Tyrone's bottom. The decline of discipline, not the decline of test scores, is the major problem in urban and suburban public schools.
But Tyrone won't be caned in the Tri-School Alternative Project, nor will he be physically punished. Rather, the program subjects the students to strict discipline, aided immensely by the stern Maj. Robert Clay, a retired corrections officer who helped establish the state's correctional boot camp at Jessup. Three other adults, two men and a woman, presided last week in the sunlit room donated by Sojourner-Douglass.
Tyrone and the others began the day by reciting the project creed: "Whatever it takes, I'll do to be a winner. I'll sacrifice all to change my losing ways. Whatever it takes, I'll do to see my dreams come true. I'm willing to do. I am ready to do whatever it takes."
Then the students were divided into three groups. One group performed simple mathematics problems, then assembled jigsaw pieces of the 50 states. A second group role-played, simulating a mathematics class, one student playing the teacher. Major Clay led the students through examples of good classroom behavior -- and of the bad behavior in which they all specialize.
The third group played chess. Instructed in the rudiments of the game by Ryan Drake, one of the instructors, the students had learned most of the movements of the chess pieces by this, the third of their four weeks in the alternative school. William Taylor, another of the instructors, said chess teaches "socialization skills." Students learn that when they lose, they don't assault their opponents. And they learn how to concentrate on an intellectual game.
Throughout the day, which included counseling sessions, other games and instruction in the other "R's" -- reading and writing -- students had to be quieted constantly, occasionally pulled apart, sometimes simply waited on patiently while a tantrum passed like a summer storm.
"These are students who have been passed through school without learning to control their emotions," said Mr. Taylor, who grew up in the projects across Caroline Street. "They need to learn something of self-discipline, to show respect for authority. They need to learn how to get along with each other and with those in authority. If they don't, we tell them again and again, from here they go to one of two places: jail or the cemetery."
People have been talking about such alternative schools for 30 years, but only now have several been established in Baltimore and Baltimore County. "We're just in our second group and still working the kinks out," said Mr. Taylor. "A few of them are repeaters from the first group; some are no longer in school. For a few, we seem to have gotten through."
Without caning.
*
What sport can earn you admission to the University of Virginia, even though much of your success is owed to a horse?
It's indoor polo, a sport in which Garrison Forest School in Owings Mills has won the national girls' high school title four years in a row.
Polo is like hockey on horses, with no zones or goalies, explained Cindy Halle, coach of the Garrison Forest team. The teams, each with three mounted competitors, play four 7 1/2 -minute "chukkers" without stopping, even after goals. Teams typically ride the host school's horses, alternating mounts so as not to be accused of home-horse advantage.
Ms. Halle said the game is "catching on nationally," with about 25 college "club" teams. But there are so few high school teams -- none other in the Baltimore area -- that Garrison Forest plays against the likes of Cornell and the University of Virginia, which she said offers an admissions slot to a talented poloist.
"It's a very athletic sport -- and very addictive," said Ms. Halle, "because it requires interaction with your horse and your teammates at the same time." On March 9, Garrison will compete with coeducational high schools and men's college teams at the National Interscholastic Polo Tournament in Charlottesville, Va.