Daily Press from Newport News, Virginia • Page 1

Sinking 3 a nerve Will changing your diet you fight pain? One physician thinks so. HealthyLife, El. Eastern State inquiry over Federal civil-rights investigators have given Eastern State Hospital a clean bill of health after complaints of patient neglect and low staffing triggered an investigation seven years ago. Local, 1 iSStOWednesday Yes, UCobudh Huskies' coach is elated but not surprised that his team won NCAA title. Festive Easter breads are symbolic of the new life spring brings.

Fl. Ik Sports CI. OA LI III I Lr-ILJ-I Freeman Final Edition Fabio, duck! Steelworkers make another Report card gives mixed grades to area schools Hampton, NN cited for violence; York, Surry are tops in graduates By Sandra Tan Daily Press counteroffer A S. a ix Latest proposal seeks holidays, smaller raises a counteroffer to the union late Tuesday night but details were unavailable at presstime. The current contract for the yard's 9,200 hourly workers expires Sunday.

The offer the CONTRACT COUNTDOWN CoMfwroownpi By Dennis O'Brien Daily Press The Virginia Department of Education released a new school report card today that for the first time offers parents and community members specific data for every public school in the state The report card for the 1997-98 school year includes information related to individual school Standards of Learning test performance, enrollment and dropout rates, college preparatory classes, gradua tion rates, teacher training and school violence figures. The state is currently in the process of printing and shipping 1.3 million copies of the state report card, NEWPORT NEWS The Steelworkers have made another contract counteroffer to Newport News Shipbuilding that seeks hourly raises of $1.95, $1 and $1 over three years and restoration of vacation and holidays cut in the union's 1995 agreement with the yard. The latest proposal, made Monday, is a comedown from the United Steelworkers of America Local 8888's previous offer, made March 12, that proposed raises of $3, $1 and $2. And it's far less than the the union initially asked for. "We've bent over backward so much our head's almost touching the ground," Local President Arnold Outlaw said.

"There's not much further we can go." The yard was expected to make yard tendered Friday calls for a 47-month contract with an immediate raise of 4 percent a 3 percent raise in the next year and a 4 percent raise in December 2001. For someone making $13.50 per hour, the average wage at Newport News Shipbuilding, that translates into raises of 54 cents, 42 cents and 58 cents and would bring the average wage to $15.04 by the end of the contract The union's proposal, in contrast would raise the average wage to $17.45 per hour adding about $75.6 million to the yard's annual payroll The yard's plan would increase wage costs about $29.5 million a year. v. Local 6888 also is asking the Please see YardAS i i Inside Hampton NN officials say better reporting and better investigation of school offenses boosted violence numbers. A8.

Hampton High School had the highest dropout rate in the state last school year, report shows. A9. which will eventually be mailed to every public school parent said Cam Harris, assistant superintendent for assessment and reporting. Meanwhile, the state has released the information to the media. "It assembles a lot of critical information into one document for parental use," said Kirk Schroder, president of the state Board of Education.

"In the past, parents would -I Adrin SniderDaily Press A bloody-faced Fabio, accompanied by women dressed as Apollo's "vestal virgins," tops the last rise on the new Apollo's Chariot roller coaster on Tuesday at Busch Gardens near Williamsburg. The model was hit in the face by a bird during his ride. Bird flies in face of Apollo's debut Busch Gardens: Model's iipry was minor have to go great lengths to find information of interest" Standards of Learning test data take up most of the report card. The report lists the percentage of students at each school who passed the state's standardized tests in history, math, science and English last spring. That information was first released and reported in early January Among the new information about area schools included in the state report card: Hampton and Newport News reported the highest incidents of school violence and alcohol and drug possession.

All area schools reported that more than 95 percent of their teachers are teaching classes that match their specialty High schools in Hampton and Newport News recorded the highest dropout rates, while high schools in Surry and York counties had the highest percentage of students graduating with either a standard or advanced diploma. Harris said parents should receive a copy of the state report card by mid- to late April. It will consist of a single sheet of paper loaded with information about the school their child attends. Parents with Internet access can get Please see ReportA8 Kemwih D. lyomDaily Press Newport News Shipbuilding security's Special Team has begun training for a possible strike at the yard.

For details, see highlight on A6. By Mike Holtzclaw Daily Press Milosevic: Troops to remain until NATO ends airstrikes Fabio is shown with a bloody face after the ride. Many of the women with him were spattered with blood during the two-minute ride. ap See the video For videos of Apollo's Chariot and Fabio's short, strange trip on it, visit dailyprest.com By John Donnelly Knight Rudder Newspapers -r it I Inside Relief agencies begin rushing tents, blankets, food and medicine to ethnic Albanian refugees. A5.

JAMES CITY The promotion was billed as a showdown between "the modern-day Adonis" and the "ancient Sun God," and the stars of the show were supposed to be an international supermodel and a spectacular new roller coaster. In the end, it was an unidentified bird that stole the show. Fabio came to Busch Gardens on Tuesday to help introduce the theme park's new roller coaster, Apollo's Chariot But his joy ride was interrupted in a bizarre incident marked by the imagery of Hitchcock and the timing of the Keystone Kops when a bird smashed into his nose and left Fabio's Kosovo as a "modern-day Great Terror" a comparison to Josef Stalin's purges from 1936 to 1938 that killed about a million people in Russia. Lett finalist for Fla. job WASHINGTON On the seventh day of NATO air-strikes against Yugoslavia, a bid for peace failed as Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic said Tuesday that the allied bombing must stop before he would withdraw troops from the killing fields of Kosovo.

Tens of thousands of ethnic Albanians, meanwhile, continued moving en masse to the southern borders of Kosovo, some of them on Serbian buses ordered by the Milosevic regime And NATO spokesman Jamie Shea described the situation inside Newport News schools Superintendent Wayne Lett is one of four contenders to be superintendent of a school system in Naples, Fla. 1 saw this as a new opportunity for me should something happen," Lett inch-long nick on the bridge of his nose; Williamsburg Community Hospital communications manager Kelley Please see Fabio AS famous face splattered with blood. In a medical sense, it was little more than a tweak on the beak. Park officials described the wound as an The only way to stop the flow of refugees, Shea said, was to stop the Serbs in Kosovo. Prospects for that dimmed Tuesday The United States said Milosevic's position was "woefully Please see Kosovo AS LETT said Tuesday.

1 think that if I'm a finalist, 1 speaks wen for things that are happening in Newport See story, Bl. E4 Local Bl Advice Line mi Find us online at dailypress.com rttpWajrTJftas-roiTi GOOD TURN. I DtiiiJhTM 6 1999 DsRy Pratt Inc. 103rd Vn No. 90 Beverly Winiams 93.52 See B74 Answer Desk E3 Lottery B2 Astrology ES Nation A3 Business B7 Obituaries B6 Classified Dl Sports CI Comics 4 Stocks BIO Editorials AlO Survival Guide B2 Healthy Life El Taste Fl Jim Spencer Bl TV E6 spotlights good Abo at tmnijjiir Hmptonroads AOL Kfvwdi Hifflrton RohH Isle of Wight: 357-6594 Gloucester County: 757-928-1111 24 hours a day! Increasing clouds.

High 78, low 38. Details, B12. deeds. Life. 6 '5073V.