Around Maryland

Jessica Melton’s decision to assume the top slot at Suburban Hospital in April wasn’t just a professional one. It was a chance to come home. The D.C.-area native had set out to become an epidemiologist — that is, until she learned more about health care administration. After years at Duke University Hospital, followed by Sentara Norfolk General Hospital in Norfolk, Virginia, she found herself back in Bethesda, as “a personal decision to be able to come back to this community.”

After years of discussion the Anne Arundel County Board of Education said Wednesday evening that it would implement a plan to change school start times next fall, allowing high school students to start classes after 8:30 a.m., an hour later. Board President Melissa Ellis said the board had initially set January as its goal to make the change. Moving high school start times later is the healthy choice for students, backed up by decades of research, she said.

Sheila Jones deemed her first U.S. Powerboat and U.S. Sailboat shows as general manager a success. While she said they do not have the total attendance figures yet, she said it appeared there was an increase in attendance at both shows and the Powerboat Show may have exceeded 2019′s attendance, which was their best year ever.

The owner of dozens of zebras living on a farm in Maryland has been charged with several counts of animal cruelty after three escaped nearly two months ago and one was caught in a snare trap and died, having “completely decomposed” by the time investigators found it. Meanwhile, one of the zebras on the farm was found dead Tuesday, officials with the Prince George’s County’s Department of Environment said Wednesday. The dead zebra was seen by a news crew on a helicopter, and they reported it.

If all goes according to plan and federal health authorities authorize the use of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for children under 12 by early next month, officials in Montgomery County, Maryland, say they will be able to hit the ground running with administering thousands of shots the first week. Montgomery County, which already has one of the highest vaccination rates in the region — and in the U.S. — plans to ask for 20,000 pediatric doses of the vaccine per week, which is the maximum amount the state is allowing jurisdictions to request, according to Earl Stoddard, the county’s chief assistant administrative officer, during an online news briefing Wednesday.

Governor Larry Hogan on Wednesday announced over $25 million in grants to four colleges in Maryland for new construction. Over 70 percent of that funding went to Howard Community College in Columbia. The community college will receive an $18,458,000 grant to replace its existing athletic and fitness center with two new buildings that will house its athletic department and mathematics department.