BALTIMORE LOOKS TO A PRIVATE CONTRACTOR TO IMPROVE SCHOOLS MAINTENANCE IMPROVES, BUT LEARNING REMAINS A QUESTION.(MAIN)

Byline: YANCEY ROY Staff writer

Everyone agrees the schools are cleaner.

But coming to any other consensus on the most extensive school-privatization experiment in the country is next to impossible.

It's happening in Baltimore, where in 1992 the school district handed Education Alternatives Inc., a Minnesota company, control of eight elementary schools and one middle school for a five-year $26.7 million contract. Privatizing schools is the latest stab at education reform; the experiment in Maryland has attracted many visitors, including a committee from the New York Board of Regents. It also has convinced a majority of the Hartford, Conn., …