6-6-03

Washington Post

Perverts beware, teens teaching FBI online cool

By Phuong Ly
The Washington Post
Published June 6, 2003

As undercover assignments go, posing as a teenage girl online to catch pedophiles has its share of challenges for the typical FBI agent.

Should he ever capitalize words in instant messages?

Is it OK to say you buy your clothes at 5-7-9?

And singer Justin Timberlake--is he still hot or is he so two years ago?

For those investigative details, the FBI calls on Karen, Mary and Kristin, who are 8th graders and best friends in Howard County, Md. Their last names were withheld to protect them from harassment on the Internet and elsewhere.

During the past year, the three have been teaching agents across the country how to communicate just like teenage girls, complete with written quizzes on celebrity gossip and clothing trends as well as assigned reading in Teen People and YM magazines. The first time the girls gave a quiz, all the agents failed.

"They, like, don't know anything," said Mary, 14, giggling.

"They're like, do you like Michael Jackson?" said Karen, 14, rolling her eyes.

Learning a thing or two

Probably the youngest instructors ever in an FBI classroom, the girls have become an invaluable help to Operation Innocent Images, an initiative that tries to stop people from peddling child pornography or sexually exploiting children, FBI officials said.

On Tuesday, at their middle-school graduation ceremony, each girl received a silver-framed letter of commendation signed by FBI Director Robert Mueller. In the letter, he thanked them for developing the lessons that have helped catch pedophiles.

Operation Innocent Images was launched in 1995 by the FBI field office in Baltimore, and agents investigated 113 suspects in the first year. Over the years, Internet pedophiles have become savvier and more suspicious about whether they are chatting with a law-enforcement agent or a real teenager. Many of the suspects question the chatters on trends and pop culture, trying to catch the FBI agents off guard.

Karen, Mary and Kristin--honor roll students, PacSun shoppers and aficionados of pink toenail polish--have kept the FBI a step ahead, said Gary Bald, agent in charge of the Baltimore office.

Dad recruits girls

The girls were recruited after one of their fathers, an agent involved in the pedophile investigations, watched her instant messaging a friend and couldn't understand what she was typing. He realized that FBI training wasn't enough.

"We can teach agents how to be careful and make sure they're following the law and how to arrest people," Bald said. "But how to convince people they're a 13-year-old is something we need help on."

Agents estimate that at any given time, 20,000 pedophiles are online worldwide, trolling chat rooms after school hours for vulnerable teens. The program has led to the convictions of about 2,200 people across the country for swapping child pornography or arranging to meet minors for sex.

Around the FBI offices, Karen, Mary and Kristin have become like the agents' adopted daughters, getting hugs and high-fives from their students. But naturally, the adults often think they know best.

One agent kept insisting he was right when he answered on a quiz that Timberlake was more popular than Destiny's Child. Another was miffed when the girls told the class that Led Zeppelin was just not cool. Some kept wondering why "l2m" in instant messaging couldn't be "love to meet," instead of "listen to music."

And the younger female FBI agents assumed that teenage girls would think actor George Clooney is cute.

"We're like, no," said Mary, making a face.

"He's like 50!" Karen exclaimed.

Lessons for all involved

The girls say they are interested in continuing in law enforcement. Karen wants to be a forensic investigator. Mary thinks being a lawyer would be fun, "to put the bad guys in jail." And Kristin, 13, the quiet one, says she'll write about their exploits.

Most of their classmates did not know about their FBI work until Tuesday, when Bald commended them on their achievements. Thanks to the girls, he said, the FBI has gathered such valuable information as: never begin a chat with "hello"; never use proper grammar in instant messages; and "pos" stands for "parent over shoulder."

After the ceremony, several parents talked excitedly about finally finding out what "pos" meant.

Karen shot Mary a worried look: "Our classmates are going to kill us."



June 12, 2003

Baltimore Sun

New guiding principals lift middle school spirits

Attitudes change, scores rise with focus on literacy

By Liz Bowie and Tanika White
Sun Staff

Sixth-grader Sierrea Pope hurried down the hallway yesterday after her West Baltimore Middle School Principal Everett X. Garnett, waving a neatly folded note.

"Mr. Garnett! Mr. Garnett! I wrote you a letter!" she said, nearly tripping over herself to give him her request for a day-long respite from the school's mandatory uniform policy -- a small gesture that illustrated many things about the school and its leader.

Several years ago, West Baltimore's kids weren't writing their principal and sixth-graders at nearby Calverton Middle school didn't have boxes of new books waiting to be unloaded into a renovated library.

These middle schools, two of the lowest-performing in the city three years ago, are making progress with talented principals, a new focus on literacy and lots of training for their young teachers.

Scores from the most recent national standardized test, released this week, showed both schools improving -- in both math and reading at every grade level. Citywide, middle schools in general showed similar progress.

"When you walk in, the culture in the building is different. You don't see a lot of children in the hallways. You see teachers really engaged and teaching. You see increasing numbers of parents," said Chief Academic Officer Cassandra Jones, describing the changes in the middle schools. "Students are turned on and excited about their learning."

Three years ago, Calverton's test scores were in the single digits: the median percentile sixth-grade reading score was 6 and the math score was 8. Now, sixth-graders are scoring in the 24th percentile in reading and the 19th percentile in math.

And in West Baltimore's eighth grade, a particularly bright spot for the school, scores jumped 10 percentile points in both subjects in one year.

If a student ranks in the 50th percentile, he or she has scored better than 49 percent of all pupils who took the test. As a result, 50 is considered the national median.

The scores at those two middle schools still are low -- more than half of Calverton's students will have to go to summer school because they are in danger of failing -- but the progress made so far gives educators a glimmer of hope that these schools can be turned around.

Sierrea's letter to Garnett was organized in the much-practiced "writing to persuade" method tested on state exams, evidence that West Baltimore Middle students know and use what they've been taught.

And Sierrea's enthusiasm shows that Garnett is a principal who is approachable as well as respected, and that his informal practice of communicating with students through the written word was being embraced.

Calverton eighth-grader, Ja'Leesa Ramsey proudly wore her bright yellow 340 Club T-shirt, which represented the organization students belong to when they have passed all the state functional tests now required to get to high school.

"I like it here because of the teachers," she said. "They make sure we are always on top of our work. They instilled in me that I could be anything I want to be."

Ja'Leesa will be going to Western High School next year, one of the most selective in the city. Half of the Calverton eighth graders who are passing are going to citywide high schools, which have entrance requirements.

"It seems that Mr. Garnett has been able to get more of a grip on the discipline," said Earl Payne, a parent volunteer whose daughter also will be attending a top high school, Baltimore City College, next year. "Because if you don't have discipline, it's impossible to teach."

West Baltimore seventh-grader Michael Stanley used to throw chairs when he was angry, he said. No more, under Garnett's leadership.

"Now I know how to just walk away and count," Michael, 14, said.

The day Karl Perry arrived to take over at Calverton -- a tough west-side middle school with more than 1,000 students -- he knew he was in for a challenge.

"The kids were actually in charge of the school," Perry said. Children roamed the halls, teachers were often absent and there was a high teacher turnover rate.

Like Garnett at West Baltimore, Perry's first job as principal was to get the school under control, by instilling strict rules and enforcing the school system's zero tolerance policy.

Roxanne Thorn, eighth-grade assistant principal at West Baltimore, said Garnett's insistence on structure and staff development turned teachers' attitudes around.

"This is not a place anymore where people are going to enjoy working, if they don't buy into the hard work we do here," Thorn said.

Even the janitors and cafeteria workers at West Baltimore, with close to 1,300 students, had to be sold on Garnett's tough new stance.

"The atmosphere is completely different," said custodian Marvin Powell. "We don't have the tension we used to. We don't have the fear of the kids we used to have. I don't leave here with my heart pounding the way I used to. Now, I come in early and stay late."

The system handed out new textbooks, urged schools to spend more time teaching reading and writing, and started using a program called Achievement First. Administered by the nonprofit Fund for Educational Excellence, that program supports principals and teachers with training and mentoring, among other things. It is also heavy on reading and writing.

Adding academic coaches to the schools, Jones said, also helped teachers learn new techniques they could use right away in their classrooms to improve instruction.

Another factor may have helped raise scores, Perry said. Today's middle-schoolers were elementary pupils when the reform of the Baltimore schools began in 1997. As a result, this year's sixth-graders seem to be doing better than their counterparts a few years ago, he said.

Today, Calverton's attendance is up from 70 percent to 81 percent. Teachers are absent less and staff turnover is down. Only five or six of Perry's staff of 65 will be leaving after the school year ends.

Both principals agree that the key to success is believing that children can achieve, no matter where they come from or what obstacles their schools faced in the past.

"Life is so stressful for some kids," Perry said, "I want to make this a safe haven."

"It makes no difference to me where kids come from," Garnett said. "They come here to learn."


June 15, 2003

Associated Press

Maine school gives students own laptops


FREEPORT, Maine (AP) -- The end of the school year is near and children are playing baseball outside. But the students in Shawn Favreau's classroom are focused on their laptop computers.

For their final social studies project, they're using the computers to create multimedia presentations on ancient Greece. Some of the Freeport Middle School students find it hard to imagine going back to using just pencils and paper.

"We still do the same things. We just do it differently. The teachers are winging it. They're looking for ways to make it more interesting," said student Kaitlyn Beaule. "I think it's a lot more fun."

Getting high marks

Maine's first-in-the-nation laptop program, which covers all 241 public middle schools, has received high marks as the first full year ends this month.

The program began last fall with 17,000 seventh-graders and 3,000 teachers using the laptops. Next fall, it will be expanded to eighth-graders for a total of about 33,000 laptops in use.

In Favreau's class, the students use the computers for research, reports and e-mail. Gone are the days of turning in handwritten reports; assignments are more likely to call for students to make movies or Power Point presentations.

Next door, in Alex Briasco-Brin's math class, students used laptops for a project building model rockets. A teacher in Pembroke used the laptops to communicate in real-time with a deep-sea submersible off the coast of Africa.

One of the first things Favreau learned last fall was to sit in the back of the class instead of in front. That allows him to keep an eye on the screens to make sure kids aren't surfing or playing games.

On a recent day, his 16 students were grouped in twos as they worked on their presentations on Greece. Three were without computers: Two computers were broken and shipped off to Apple for repairs, and a third student lost his computer privileges after gaining access to the administrative password.

Playing games

There have been other cases where school officials had to crack down. Soon after the program started, Freeport Middle School technology coordinator John Lunt sent an important message when he caught a student playing a computer game in class. He used his link to the student's laptop to shut down the game and trash it as the student wondered what was happening.

The laptops aren't used all the time. On a command of "lids down," the students close the computers and pick up textbooks or listen to lectures.

Freeport Middle School Principal Chris Toy said this is the first truly successful innovation he has seen in 23 years as an educator. He said using computers comes naturally to most students.

"Kids are digital natives, having grown up with computers," Toy said. "They're not afraid of it."

A midterm report showed students were more engaged and that absenteeism dropped with the introduction of laptops. Teachers, some of whom were leery of giving computers to students, have largely picked up on students' excitement about the program.

Commitment appears solid

In one sign of high hopes for the program, state lawmakers facing a projected $1.2 billion budget shortfall at the start of the legislative session made no attempt to dismantle it.

But legislators will have to provide more money in the next session if there's to be a seamless transition when the current crop of middle school students enter high school, officials say.

Gov. John Baldacci said he's determined to see through the project that was the brainchild of his predecessor.

The state does not yet have the money, but Baldacci said he'll "turn over every stone" to find a way to expand the program. A four-year contract with Apple for the first phase in middle schools cost the state $37.2 million.

Already, some school districts are looking at private funding for pilot programs in high schools.

"I'm optimistic. You can't hold this back. Parents have told me, 'You better not touch that laptop fund,"' he said. "It's almost like the students and families are going to be demanding that it be continued and expanded."


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