The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future education reform plan sets a goal to increase the number of apprenticeships for high school juniors and seniors to 60,000 in seven years, and to ensure at least 45% of high school students complete a high-school level apprenticeship program by the 2030-31 school year. Getty Images.
As Maryland continues to implement a decade-long education reform plan, the focus of multiple state boards and commissions has shifted to a key initiative: ensuring that all students are college and career ready.

A new study commissioned by the Maryland Tech Council estimates that Quantum Loophole’s planned data center campus would annually generate almost $41 million in county tax revenue and employ 1,700 in its data center facilities. The study, done by Sage Policy Group for the council, analyzes the campus’ economic and fiscal impacts on Frederick County and Maryland during its estimated 15-year construction phase and after completion, which is tentatively slated for 2038.

As of three weeks ago, Sigal Ariely’s plans for late October were set: She’d fly from her hometown of Ashkelon, Israel, to Baltimore to help the Jewish service organization she works for celebrate a major milestone. The Baltimore-Ashkelon Partnership — a program that fosters personal, cultural and educational ties between Central Maryland’s Jewish community and the residents of Ashkelon, a city of about 170,000 in Israel — turns 20 this month.

Ken Ulman’s rise to lead the state Democratic Party will face opposition from one of the major Democratic candidates for U.S. Senate. Rep. David Trone, who is seeking to succeed retiring Sen. Ben Cardin (D), said Wednesday he will oppose Ulman’s nomination for the position, citing Ulman’s “cozy relationships with real estate developers and special interests.”]

Sykesville’s Main Street water and sewer improvement project, which has been plagued by numerous delays, is getting another extension. The latest is for 40 days to complete construction inspection services. The Board of Carroll County Commissioners unanimously approved the extension to Whitman, Requardt & Associates, LLP of Baltimore, at a cost of $28,470, on Oct. 26.

Baltimore agencies have been put on notice: They could soon face a lawsuit over the Brooklyn Homes mass shooting from July. The families of the two young people killed at the gathering, along with two gunshot survivors, intend to make claims of negligence and intentional wrongdoing, according to notices of claim filed on Thursday by attorneys.

Mark Twain is said to have described the obelisk honoring George Washington in the nation’s capital as a “memorial chimney.” Some leading Parisian critics judged the Eiffel Tower as “useless and monstrous” in 1887. We’re going to guess that quite a few Baltimoreans were less than enchanted when the Bromo Seltzer Tower became the city’s tallest building in 1911 — especially when a 51-foot illuminated bottle of the headache and indigestion remedy was added to the top a quarter-century later.

The city of Frederick is getting ready to further develop Westside Regional Park, and the money behind the planning is coming from a familiar angel: the Ausherman Family Foundation. The Board of Aldermen voted unanimously last week to allow the foundation to develop the park plan. While they are at it, the city should give thanks to the foundation for all of the money, time and effort it has provided to improve the Frederick community since it was founded in 2001 by Marvin E. Ausherman, a home builder and developer.

The Federal Aviation Administration is working to implement changes to flight patterns to ease residential noise pollution from airplane traffic at BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport. The DC Metroplex BWI Community Roundtable, which acts as a liaison between the FAA, the state Department of Transportation and communities surrounding the airport, helped draft the changes along with the Maryland Aviation Administration, airport contractors, industry professionals from Southwest Airlines and FAA representatives.

Health officials held a 125th anniversary celebration Monday for the Maryland Public Health Laboratory, the oldest continuously functioning unit of the state health department, recognizing the long history of disease surveillance and environmental testing that helped inform public health policy. “For decades, the men and women who dedicated their careers to the Maryland Public Health Laboratories have made it their mission to protect Marylanders from disease, research new and emerging health threats, and preserve our lands and waterways from environmental dangers,” Health Secretary Dr. Laura Herrera Scott said at the facility located in Baltimore.