Prize

They were dancin' ghouls and prop-pushin' fools. Now they'll be partying, and cleaning up, through the weekend. Members and friends of Bill McIntyre's Shooting Stars returned to the clubhouse on 3rd Street near Mifflin yesterday to keep the celebration going after they copped top prize in the Fancy Brigade Division at Wednesday's Mummers Parade. "The last guy left at 8 a.m. He just came back in looking a little green around the gills," said Captain Mickey Adams yesterday afternoon.

One of the traditions at the Pennsylvania State Farm Show in Harrisburg is the sheep-to-shawl contest, in which an adult sheep is sheared and then a team of five people card, spin and weave the sheep's wool into a shawl. The teams have only 2 1/2 hours and are scored on how neatly the sheep is sheared, how quickly and how well the shawl is completed - and on how much fun the group seems to have doing it. Each year since 1980, when the contest began, the winning shawls have been auctioned off, and the first-prize shawl usually fetches a record price.

On the boardwalk, where those games of skill - or is it chance? - hold forth an irresistible lure, it's hard to tell which sets the hook, the game or the prize. The game might appear deceptively simple, if not downright silly. And the prize, anywhere else, might seem hopelessly tacky. But on the boardwalk, all is different. Where else can you put to the test your ability to take up a mallet and bop a rubber frog into a floating, rotating lily pad? (Where else would you even try?

The 98th annual Philadelphia Amateur Golf Championship, including 36 holes each on four days, began yesterday with David Brookreson and Mike Gregor of Huntingdon Valley and Jim Kania of Overbrook tying for the medal prize at par 140. The field of 250 contended for 31 places in the match-play draw, which will begin this morning at the Aronimink Golf Club. Aronimink and Merion's West Course were used yesterday. Chris Lange of Overbrook, who qualified automatically as defending champion, shot two 74s. Brookreson, the 1991 champion, followed a par 73 at Merion with a 3-under- par 67 at Aronimink.

Leslie Smith, a Furman College senior from the Tavistock Country Club, won the medal prize with an 80 in yesterday's qualifying round for the 94th annual Philadelphia Championship of the Women's Golf Association of Philadelphia, at the Huntingdon Valley Country Club. Smith - who came out of a trap on the 18th hole and scored 4 from four feet for her lone birdie - and 14 others with scores through 86 qualified for the match-play rounds, which will take place today through Friday.

Barbara Papso of Philadelphia Cricket Club and Cara Swinden of Whitemarsh Valley Country Club scored a 2-over-par 38-37-75 for the medal prize in the qualifying round for the Jane McCullough Hamilton 50th Invitational Golf Tournament yesterday at Huntingdon Valley Country Club. In the better-ball competition, Papso-Swinden made back-to-back birdies on six and seven and also birdied 17. Last year, Swinden won the medal prize in partnership with Laura Martin of Philadelphia Country Club.

Looks likes the nominees of this year's 73d Academy Awards presentation will be competing for more than just Oscar. In an effort to avoid a repeat of last year's prolonged 4-hour-and-9- minute presentation, Gil Cates, producer of the last 10 Academy Awards shows, announced that he has issued a 45-second time limit on all acceptance speeches. To provide added incentive, the winner who delivers the shortest speech of the evening will be awarded a prize: a brand-new, high-definition television set, valued at more than $2000.

NEW YORK - Brad Richards impatiently waited for this day, the day he could finally pick a new team from a whole slew of suitors. After a day of being wooed by teams around the NHL, Richards chose the one that was the front-runner all along - the New York Rangers. Richards, considered the biggest prize in this year's underwhelming free-agent market, struck it rich Saturday when he agreed to a nine-year, $60 million deal. "The phone will probably get thrown in a lake later today and we'll get on with just relaxing," Richards said.

Students in fifth through 12th grades can win savings bonds up to $5,000 with essays about a person who has made a mark on society this year. Students can enter by writing essays of 250 words or less about a person whose achievements - positive or negative - have left an impact on society from Jan. 1 through Nov. 1, 2001. The Biography of the Year National Scholarship Challenge is sponsored by the A&E Network. The grand prize is a $5,000 savings bond, a $500 cash award for the classroom, and an A&E home-video library for the school.

The Kennedy Center Friedheim Composition Awards ceremony took place on a bright afternoon in the District of Columbia. Unlike the weather Sunday, the decision of the jury to award first place to two composers, Ralph Shapey and William Kraft, was not so clear and brilliant. Naming dual first-prize winners is not, in itself, to be criticized. In some circumstances it could, indeed, demonstrate a brave generosity, but neither Shapey's Concerto for Cello, Piano and Strings nor Kraft's Veils and Variations for Horn and Orchestra made a penetrating impression on this listener or, judging by the lukewarm applause, on the audience.

WITH THE obvious exception of college football and its computerized BCS shenanigans, sports championships are determined solely by merit. There are established formulas to crown the winners of the World Series, Super Bowl, NBA Finals, Stanley Cup playoffs and Final Four. A favorite might be upset somewhere along the way, but a really good team can't duck a particularly difficult opponent simply because its decision-makers don't like the way the respective rosters match up. Professional boxing, of course, is a different animal.

TRADITIONALLY, they call the last pick in the NFL draft, Mr. Irrelevant. If a certain young woman is to be believed, this year's final selection might become known as "Mr. Lucky. " A flirty — some might say flighty — frizzy-haired woman who claims to be from New York has posted a video on the Internet promising that the last player selected in this year's draft will get "a night, alone with me. " "My name is Brianne, I live in New York City," the woman says. "And I'm super-excited for the NFL draft, but I'm really not interested in who is going No. 1 or No. 2 or No. 3 or No. 4, anyone really in the first round for that matter.

Montgomery Media presents the 17th annual Baby & Toddler Expo at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Performances on both days include the Petting Zoo Puppet Show with puppeteer Abby London and magician Sam Singer. On Saturday, singer and caricaturist David C. Perry will perform his Drawings, Songs, & Silliness concert. There will also be a diaper derby and inflatable play park for kids. On Friday from noon to 2 p.m., games and prizes will be provided by mascot Buzzbee and the B101 B-crew.

I keep a picture of Tamika McNeill at my desk. It keeps me focused. Tamika was 12 when classmates from Cleveland Elementary School in North Philadelphia grabbed her, forced their hands inside her shirt, and tried to fondle her breasts. They threatened to attack her if she told the truth. School officials didn't report the incident for months. Tamika thought about killing herself. I remember sitting in her living room, listening to Tamika struggle to articulate the terrible things that had been done to her, things that no child should have to endure, especially at school.

Now that hands have been shaken, hugs shared, congratulations extended, and champagne imbibed, Philadelphians not in the newspaper business may want to take a moment to ask what it means to them that The Inquirer has won journalism's top award — the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. It is a tribute to any city to have an award-winner, but virtually every town with a Pulitzer recipient also has a problem that the newspaper or online publication revealed. In the case of The Inquirer's 19th Pulitzer, a team of reporters, editors, photographers, and videographers pointed out the prevalence of violence in Philadelphia's schools.

The Inquirer's investigation of the climate of pervasive violence in Philadelphia's public schools on Monday won the Pulitzer Prize for public service, the profession's most prestigious honor. The award is the 19th Pulitzer Prize for the 183-year-old newspaper and its first since 1997. The seven-part series, "Assault on Learning," revealed that violence in city schools was widespread and underreported, with 30,000 serious incidents over the last five school years. Those findings were later corroborated by a Philadelphia School District panel on safety, spurred an overhaul of incident reporting in the district, and prompted hiring of a state-funded safe-schools advocate.

Before principal Christine Borelli-Connor arrived at James H. Webster Elementary School in Philadelphia's Kensington section in 2006, expectations for its students were not high. Borelli-Connor, 35, said that few of the school's fifth graders were being admitted to the city's magnet middle schools and that scores on standardized tests were low. The outlook for the school's 940 students has changed significantly since then. "We received, this week alone, 37 acceptance letters from magnet schools," she said.

YANGON, Myanmar - She struggled for a free Myanmar for a quarter-century, much of it spent locked away under house arrest. Now, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate whose nonviolent campaign for democracy at home transformed her into a global icon is on the verge of ascending to public office for the first time. Aung San Suu Kyi, 66, was elected to parliament Sunday in a historic victory buffeted by the jubilant cheers of supporters who hope her triumph will mark a major turning point in a nation still emerging from a ruthless era of military rule.

The Philadelphia Inquirer won a prestigious award today from Investigative Reporters & Editors Inc. for its investigation of violence in Philadelphia schools, "Assault on Learning. " In making the award, the judges praised the series as "local reporting at its highest level. " The Inquirer's work won the print/online large division in the contest which awarded honors in 15 categories. The seven-part series was reported by John Sullivan, Susan Snyder, Kristen Graham, Dylan Purcell and Jeff Gammage.