McDaniel College next month will rename its Academic Hall for the late commercial real estate developer Leroy M. Merritt, a McDaniel alumnus.

Officials at the Westminster college said Tuesday the eight-year-old hall, home of the school’s departments of education, psychology, graduate and professional studies and student academic support services will be called Merritt Hall.

Merritt was a 1952 graduate of the former Western Maryland College, now McDaniel, located in Carroll County.

Merritt grew up in Dundalk and was a graduate of Dundalk High School where he was a football player and boxer. He died of cancer at age 79 in 2010.

His business smarts became legendary in the local commercial real estate community after he founded Merritt Properties in 1967, which went on to become the largest privately held commercial real estate portfolio in the Baltimore metropolitan area. He also founded the chain of Merritt Athletic Clubs.

In 2007, his alma mater named its new Merritt Fitness Center for him. Merritt also pledged $5 million to help fund renovations to student dormitories at McDaniel as well as additional athletic facilities.

The naming ceremony for the Academic Hall is scheduled for May 4 at 11 a.m., during McDaniel’s reunion weekend festivities.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Towson University’s decision to cut its baseball and men’s soccer teams for budgetary and Title IX reasons raised quite a kerfuffle on one local radio show Monday morning.

It wasn’t just the decision by university President Maravene Loeschke that rankled WBAL host Clarence M. Mitchell IV — known as “C4” — and his callers, but also the manner in which it was delivered.

On Friday, baseball and soccer players were called to a meeting on short notice, and Loeschke briefly addressed them while accompanied by several police officers, The Sun reported. Their coaches weren’t present, having separately been given termination papers. One of them, soccer head coach Frank Olszewski, who has been at Towson since 1978, received documents with his name spelled wrong, WBAL reported.

Mitchell and callers — including parents of athletes from the affected teams — also railed against Towson’s administration for its apparent stonewalling of those who questioned the decision.

By adding a men’s tennis team for the next academic year, Towson will compete in six men’s sports, the minimum required to retain NCAA Division I status.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Betamore’s co-founders, Mike Brenner and Greg Cangialosi, in their incubator facility. (File photo)

Betamore — Baltimore’s newest “urban campus for technology and entrepreneurship”— has been bustling with activity since opening in December in Federal Hill.

Dozens of techies, designers and entrepreneurs have signed up as Betamore members, while the center’s business incubation services have attracted more than a dozen startup companies. Last month, Gov. Martin O’Malley chose the facility, at 1111 Light St., as the launch space for the state’s new-and-improved online business licensing system.

Plus, organizers said they are moving ever closer to realizing their ultimate vision for the center. They plan to roll out series of classes this month on topics of interest to members, like the basics of coding or how to find funding for new ventures. By March 1, they hope to average four-to-six classes and workshops a week.

The educational component is what differentiates Betamore from similar co-working spaces throughout the city, said co-founders Mike Brenner and Greg Cangialosi, and it’s what makes the center more than just a business incubator.

In addition to providing desk space for startup entrepreneurs and discounted programs for paying members, Betamore is designed to encourage meaningful interaction and collaboration among members of the community who occasionally choose to stop by.

On Monday night, they will host “The Rise of the Angels (And the Entrepreneurs),” a session on how the process of financing a startup company has changed. The talk will be led by Paul Singh, a partner at 500 Startups, a “super angel” fund based in Mountain View, Calif.

Singh will discuss “the tangible factors and economics of early stage financings around the world,” and share helpful hints and strategies. The event — which targets startup entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and angel investors— is from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. and costs $15 for non-members (Betamore members get in for free).

Some classes, like the one on Monday, will be taught by well-known industry players. But organizers said they also want Baltimore-bred professionals to be the ones at the front of the classroom sharing their expertise with their neighbors.

The following week, though, that teacher might take on the role of student by enrolling in a peer’s class — that’s the vision.

And if Betamore maintains the progress of the past two months, that vision might very well materialize sooner rather than later.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

It’s no secret Maryland public universities are trying to get better at commercializing professors’ and students’ research.

But in 2011, the universities did not get much bang for their buck.

A report by The Chronicle of Higher Education shows the University System of Maryland spent almost $1.07 billion on research in fiscal year 2011. For that investment, the system received just $1.3 million through licensing technology to start-ups.

Compare that to the top-ranking institution — Northwestern University  — which spent $484.1 million but got $191.5 million through commercialization.

According to The Chronicles’ data — compiled through survey responses from 153 universities, plus four more that replied anonymously — the University System of Maryland spent the ninth-most money on research while receiving the 78th-most license income.

The system — which pulls most of its research funding from the flagship University of Maryland, College Park, University of Maryland, Baltimore and University of Maryland, Baltimore County — did manage to receive the 14th-most patents, with 77. The University of California System was first with 343 patents issued.

Overall, universities reported license income of $1.8 billion and research expenditures of $40.9 billion.

(Photo: Colin Gore, grad student in material science and engineering at University of Maryland, College Park working with Eric D. Wachsman, director of the University of Maryland Energy Research Center. Maximilian Franz/The Daily Record)

Powered by Bookmarkify™

You might remember the ads for “Your Baby Can Read.” This wasn’t “your baby” as in your significant other in countless pop songs — “Rock Your Baby,” for example. No, this product was actually referring to your baby in the sense of the Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson song about mamas not letting them grow up to be cowboys.

The makers of Your Baby Can Read said their product would indeed enable you to teach your child to read at as young as 9 months. One infomercial showed a 2-year-old supposedly reading from “Charlotte’s Web.” So for about $200, your child could be the envy of every other parent in the playgroup.

But the Federal Trade Commission said no way, baby.

Responding to a complaint from the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, the FTC accused the Your Baby Can company and the developer of the program, Robert Titzer, with false and deceptive advertising. Your Baby Can has agreed to a settlement with a $185 million judgment, the FTC said.

Most of the judgment is suspended, however, because the company is shutting down, citing “the high cost of fighting complaints alleging that its ads were false,” the Associated Press said.

The FTC said Your Baby Can had no viable studies to back its claims. Susan Linn, director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, told AP: “There is simply no evidence that screen media is beneficial for babies.”

Besides, a 9-month-old who can read would not be nearly as valuable as one who could change his own diaper.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Freeman Hrabowski’s innovative approach to education is what brought him in to The Daily Record for a Newsmakers interview in April.

But the University of Maryland, Baltimore County president grabbed a bit of a bigger spotlight Sunday evening, as he was interviewed by Byron Pitts on “60 Minutes.”

Pitts opened with a question that The Daily Record did not ask, but one that many may wonder: “How does a black man get a name ‘Hrabowski’?”

(Short answer: His grandfather’s grandfather was a Polish slavemaster in rural Alabama.)

The question wasn’t even finished by the time it was met with Hrabowski’s affable, hearty laugh.

Hrabowski and some UMBC students interviewed on the program affirmed his “It’s cool to be smart” mantra, which he also emphasized in The Daily Record’s office. He added, in both interviews, that he gets “goosebumps” from doing math.

But despite the slightly larger audience, Hrabowski’s message about education, and getting students interested in careers in science and math remained the same.

Watch the piece on “60 Minutes” below:

And below you can see Hrabowski’s Newsmakers interview from April:

Powered by Bookmarkify™

The transformation of a former convent in Fells Point has led to two things – a newly renovated Cristo Rey Jesuit High School and an award of excellence for Mullan Contracting Co. for its construction.

Mullan received the award this month from the Baltimore chapter of the Associated Builders and Contractors for work at the school, located at 420 S. Chester St.

Renovations totaled $7.4 million and included the overhaul of the former Holy Rosary convent as well as installation of an elevator system and a three-story breezeway to connect the existing school building to the former convent.

Cristo Rey now has updated classrooms, a computer lab and library for its students, who come from some of the city’s poorest neighborhoods to study under a thorough college prep curriculum. Students also work in part-time jobs in the community, and employers pay the school directly, which funds their tuition as part of the school’s unique model.

The school has an enrollment of 320.

Mullen was founded in 1904 as a general contracting firm that specializes in commercial office, retail, hospitality, healthcare and institutional industries.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

A new library. Suites for college counseling sessions. Updated classrooms. High-tech laboratory space for science studies. These are among the academic pluses awaiting students at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Fells Point as part of a $7.4 million renovation to be unveiled Tuesday night.

The school, a coed college-prep academy for low-income city students sponsored by the Maryland Jesuits, has an enrollment of 320 who pay tuition ranging between $550 and $2,500 based on family income. Cristo Rey has grown since first opening in 2007 with 121 students in 9th grade only, said Mary Beth Lennon, a spokeswoman.

Read the rest of this entry »

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Five billboards created by students at Patapsco High School and Center for the Arts for the “Create, Don’t Hate” project will be on display throughout Baltimore from now through the end of the month.

The project is part of the national Design Ignites Change campaign. Last fall a group of 31 students at Patapsco High worked with members of the Baltimore Chapter of AIGA, an association of graphic designers and artists, to create slogans and logos to encourage citizens to stop crime, prevent violence, care for the community, and develop tolerance.

Here are the five designs and students selected as finalists:

Read the rest of this entry »

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Walden University, a private, for-profit online university that’s part of Baltimore-based Laureate International Universities, has teamed up with the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives to offer discounted tuition to members for graduate and undergraduate programs.

NOBLE, founded in 1976, is an organization that works to eliminate racism in the law enforcement field.  Specifically for NOBLE members, Walden’s School of Public Policy and Administration has added six new certificate programs — five graduate and one undergraduate — in public policy, criminal justice, homeland security and nonprofit management.

NOBLE is holding its 2010 conference in Baltimore –- it began Saturday and goes through today — which Walden is partly sponsoring.  Two program directors in Walden’s School of Public Policy and Administration presented workshops on criminal justice and nonprofit board management.

Powered by Bookmarkify™