February 12, 2006

Newly elected Bolivian Pres Evo Morales has not yet provided many details of his coca policy, except to say that his government will depenalize cocoa cultivation and show zero tolerance to cocaine trafficking; has long opposed American eradication efforts and championed coca leaf; must find ways to reassure foreign governments and investors that Bolivia will control trafficking; United States fears that progress toward eradication in Colombia could be offset by burst of cultivation in Bolivia; photos; map (L)

AT the very least, Michelle Kwan now knows what it is like to be middle-aged and to get off a trans-Atlantic flight and go to work. All around Olympic town these last few days, you could see the disorientation in the lined faces of North American journalists, rushing about in our labored gait. We are a lot older than Kwan, but, at 25, in figure-skating years, she is eligible for senior perks -- like the free pass she received into the Games after withdrawing from the nationals because of a groin injury last month.

Robert M Greenberg oversees diverse team at advertising and communications agency R/GA that aims to use mix of design and marketing to create groundbreaking campaigns; wants to produce advertising that gives consumer more control in order to counter old approaches of traditional marketing that no longer work; believes that consumers will not only shape advertising, but also shape products through interaction with companies; Greenberg is considered visionary in industry that has become more conservative; companies as diverse as Subaru, Target, Verizon, Nokia, IBM and Johnson & Johnson have all used R/GA for promoting their products; profile of Greenberg; history of R/GA; photos (M)

Fewer than half of 215,000 New York City students eligible under No Child Left Behind law are seeking free tutoring; only about 12 percent of eligible students nationwide are receiving help; officials cite multiple reasons for problem, including too little federal money alloted, little advertising to parents and complicated paperwork; no national study exists to show whether students are benefiting academically, and there is no consensus on how progress is to be judged; photo (L)

OUR guide, Daniel Giraldo, is only 12, but he knows the terrain, all the hazards and turns of this steep, four-foot-wide trail. The horse I am riding has done this before and uncannily finds the best passage along rocky corridors where the footing seems uncertain, or the safest path through the narrow but fast-moving waters of the rivers we cross. Until recently, the only people who would have negotiated this path were stoic farmers in rubber boots, bedraggled army patrols or the occasional band of Marxist guerrillas. This is Colombia, after all, a little-understood country whose very name is synonymous with cocaine traffickers and civil conflict.