and an expert on aviation who presently works as senior counsel to FAA administrator Marion Blakey.

Before joining the FAA, Sturgell, who is known widely as Bobby, was a top official at the National Transportation Safety Board. Before working in Washington, he was a flight officer and flight operations supervisor for United Airlines.

Sturgell served in the Navy as an aviator for nine years and was a staff member of the Navy Fighter Weapons School, known as Topgun. He was a Republican candidate for state Senate, running against senate president Mike Miller in 1998.

As deputy administrator, Sturgell will be the No. 2 official in the federal agency that is charged with overseeing both the safety and the efficiency of the nations aviation system.

Just last week, for instance, the FAA issuedare disappointed

You might be, too, if you had a bright new art studio to paint in, a middle-school-sized gymnasium for shooting hoops in and a performing arts studio with a stage.

Thats the early Christmas present the Summit School opened last week, marking the completion of its new 9,000-square-foot student activity center with a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Edgewater campus. Due to be completed before the start of school in August, the building stood empty and nearly finished for four long months as students and teachers bustled about, holding art, music and physical education classes in any space they could find: outside, in a trailer, in other teachers classrooms.

But last week, with temporary occupancy permit in hand, Summit School celebrated this new beginning for itself and the community. The