Homewood House ushers in holidays with open house

Homewood House Museum, one of the country's finest Federal period houses, will come alive with holiday spirit during a Candlelight Tour from 5 to 7 p.m. today, Dec. 9.

The house will be decorated for the holidays by the Homeland Garden Club; David Hildebrand will perform period music for the harpsichord, baroque guitar and English flute; and visiting professor W. Barksdale Maynard will sign copies of his book Architecture in the United States: 1800-1850. Holiday refreshments will be served in the wine cellar.

This is a good chance to see the 200th anniversary exhibition, Building Homewood: Vision for a Villa, which closes Dec. 29. Admission is free to members and Johns Hopkins affiliates; $6 for adults; $5 for seniors. For more information, call 410-516-5589.

English as a Second Language courses are introduced

Courses in English as a Second Language for professionals and graduate students are now being offered by Advanced Academic Programs in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences. Designed for adults with an intermediate knowledge of English who need to increase their effectiveness at work or school or in social settings, the courses are designed to enhance presentation skills and improve fluency and writing skills.

The three offerings, which will be given from January to May on the Homewood and Montgomery County campuses, are Strengthening Oral Fluency in English, Enhancing Oral Fluency for the TSE, and Oral Communication and Written Expression for Academic and Professional Purposes. Classes will meet on Tuesday/Thursday evenings and on Saturday mornings.

For more information, go to http://www.jhu.edu/advanced.

Annual Gathering of the Greens to be held on Friday

In a holiday tradition, the plaza in front of Levering will be piled high with evergreen branches from Homewood trees on Friday, Dec. 13, for the annual Gathering of the Greens. Faculty, staff and students are invited to arrive at 10 a.m. to help themselves to the greenery--and cider and doughnuts, too.

Staples and Teach Baltimore to address summer learning loss

Recognizing the impact of summer enrichment on academic achievement, Staples Foundation for Learning and Teach Baltimore at Johns Hopkins are joining forces to ensure that young people don't take a vacation from learning during the long summer months.

Over the next year, the foundation will invest $11,550 to provide high-quality summer learning experiences to more than 300 kindergarten through second-grade students from eight Baltimore City schools. Funding will support curricula, supplies, field trips and stipends for the college students who will serve as instructors in the Teach Baltimore Summer Academy program.

Research shows that the traditional vacation has a particularly harmful impact on the reading achievement of low-income students, whose test scores decline significantly during the summer months. Studies also show that summer learning losses of low-income children accumulate and that their achievement scores fall further behind those of their more-advantaged peers as they progress through school.

With the help of this grant, students will participate in reading and writing activities, math games, science experiments, arts and crafts, foreign language, music and drama. They also will take field trips to museums and participate in cultural events offered throughout Baltimore.

Tajikistan President Emomali Rakhmonov to speak at SAIS

Emomali Rakhmonov, president of Tajikistan, will speak at the School of Advanced International Studies at 4 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 9. Rakhmonov, elected president in 1994, will speak about "Post-Sept. 11 Prospects for Tajikistan" at this W.P. Carey Forum of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute at SAIS.

The event will be held in the first-floor auditorium of the Rome Building. Non-SAIS affilitates who would like to attend should contact the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute at 202-663-7721 or caci2@mail.jhuwash.jhu.edu.

APL forms strategic partnership with software institute

APL has forged a strategic partnership with the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, combining the lab's systems engineering experience with SEI's advanced software expertise.

The collaboration positions APL and SEI to offer better systems and services to the military and other government agencies facing the critical challenges of national security. The key goal is to improve the quality, utility and interoperability of complex, software-intensive systems.

Next week's 'Gazette' will be the last before holidays

The Dec. 16 Gazette will be the last published before the holidays; its calendar will include events scheduled from Dec. 16 through Jan. 6, 2003, when the first issue of the new year will be published.

Submissions for the Dec. 16 calendar should be e-mailed to gazette@jhu.edu or faxed to 410-516-5251 by noon on Monday, Dec. 9. Submissions for Jan. 6 should be sent by noon on Monday, Dec. 30.