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The Gazette GERMANTOWN | POOLESVILLE | BOYDS
DAILY UPDATES ONLINE www.gazette.net
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
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County charter school’s funding prompts concern Montessori school needs to raise about $150,000 this year n
BY
LINDSAY A. POWERS STAFF WRITER
PHOTOS BY DAN GROSS/THE GAZETTE
Maryland amusement ride inspector Chad Georg (right) walks through the funhouse with ride supervisor Stephen Bergeron at the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair on Thursday.
BEFORE THE THRILLS,
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Safetyfirst
Ride inspector says mechanical failures are rare
KATE S. ALEXANDER
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STAFF WRITER
efore thousands of fairgoers hop on the Ferris wheel or enter the funhouse at the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair, inspectors spend days combing over every midway ride to ensure each is in safe working order. Maryland’s Department of Labor Licensing and Regulation conducts about 6,000 ride inspections each year to ensure the safety of Marylanders who use amusement rides, said Rob Gavel, supervisor of the department’s Amusement Ride Safety Unit. State inspectors arrived at the Montgomery County Agricultural Fairgrounds on Aug. 5, when most rides were still in transport trailers.
“When they are like that, you get to see the rides ... parts of the rides you don’t get to see once they are fully assembled,” Gavel said. Gavel spoke Thursday as his team was finishing inspections in advance of Friday’s opening. Inspectors checked for proper assembly, that the foundation of each ride was secure, that the nuts and bolts holding rides together were properly torqued, that all pins were in place and that safety devices worked. Each ride also was turned on and run to ensure proper speeds and that fences were in the correct place, he said. “We have to see it run before we put a certificate on it,” Gavel said. Gavel said no major issues or concerns were found among the approxi-
As Community Montessori Charter School heads into its second school year, some county and school system officials are concerned about fundraising efforts to complement Montgomery County Public School funds in the school’s budget. As of July 26, Crossway Community — the nonprofit that operates the county’s only charter school — was continuing to raise the roughly $150,000 needed to
complement about $66,000 the school system contributed to the 2012-2013 school year budget, according to Kathleen Guinan, the nonprofit’s CEO. The nonprofit has no deadline to come up with the funds, said Larry Bowers, the school system’s chief operating officer. The organization will need to raise a similar amount of money for the 2013-2014 school year budget, Bowers said. Guinan said at a July 22 meeting with the County Council’s Education Committee that the school has the support of “highly reliable sources” in the county to help
See CHARTER, Page A-9
Online and in class Montgomery College introduces first ‘massive open online course’ n
BY
LINDSAY A. POWERS STAFF WRITER
ONLINE: www.gazette.net/mocofair
Montgomery College is offering a new English prep class with no price tag, no class-size limit and only one prerequisite: an Internet connection. Joining in a growing group of colleges offering such a course, and setting out as the first community college in Maryland to produce its own, Montgomery College has added its first massive open online course (MOOC) — an English prep class that is, as the name would suggest, pretty big and completely open. “It’s free and available to anyone in the world who has Internet access,” said Emily Rosado, an associate professor at the college who
Maryland amusement ride inspector Chad Georg checks over the funhouse at the Montgomery County Agricultural Fair on Thursday. n Visit our website for more stories and photo galleries
See SAFETY, Page A-9
will lead the online course involving video lectures, assigned readings and discussion boards. “MOOCs are kind of all the rage right now,” she said. Rosado said she has experience teaching several English classes, including freshmen English, introduction to literature and introduction to journalism — but this class represents a large jump for her in terms of class size. “It’s a little scary,” she said. As of Monday, about 215 students were enrolled, including people living in England, New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates. The college also plans to reach out to high school students in Montgomery County Public Schools, Rosado said. While she said it is exciting to have international students, Rosado said the
See CLASS, Page A-9
Humane Society lends a paw to Arkansas pups n
Rescued dogs looking for new homes in D.C. area BY
ELIZABETH WAIBEL STAFF WRITER
An uber-fluffy brown and gray puppy no bigger than a loaf of bread snuggled sleepily into Ashley Mauceri’s arms. She carried the pup from a large kennel trailer to volunteers from the Humane Society of Calvert County, who hope to find the dog a new home.
NEWS
THE FUTURE MEETS THE FAIR Students using technology to document Montgomery County Agricultural Fair.
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The puppy was one of 95 animals seized from an apparent hoarding case in Arkansas in July. Mauceri, manager of cruelty response for The Humane Society of the United States, helped Arkansas State Police remove the dogs from a trailer and the surrounding yard where they lived, often without veterinary care. “The majority of them lived outside, without shelter,” Mauceri said. Now, 48 of the dogs are in the Washington area, where pet adoption agencies will try to find new homes for them. They stopped at the Humane Society’s office in
Gaithersburg on Aug. 7 so the agencies could pick them up and take them to temporary homes in shelters or foster care. Some puppies snuggled deep into the arms of the people carrying them, looking weary from the long ride from Arkansas to Gaithersburg. Others wagged their tails and tilted their noses upward to bestow doggie kisses on their new friends. Humane Society employees and reporters snapped photos of the pups as they made their way to cars for the next leg of
See PUPS, Page A-9
SPORTS
A WHOLE NEW REALITY Coaches say there has been an increase in high school athletes transferring to new schools.
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TOM FEDOR/THE GAZETTE
Amy Surette (left) of Mount Airy and Ashley Mauceri of Frederick — members of The Humane Society of the United States’ rescue and response team — take the first of nearly 50 dogs off a trailer Aug. 7 as the HSUS transfers dogs and puppies to area pet adoption agencies in Gaithersburg.
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