PRESQUE ISLE – A well-known and highly respected county educational leader has taken over the reigns as director of admissions at Northern Maine Community College. Eugene McCluskey of Presque Isle, former director of the Presque Isle Regional Career and Technology Center, has been tapped by the college to lead enrollment management efforts for the campus community.
“I’m pleased to have Gene McCluskey return to the NM family,” said Dr. William Egeler, NMCC dean of students. “Gene’s knowledge and experience at both the high school and collegiate levels will prove invaluable to our student applicants. Those interested in applying for admission to the college will find his easy-going personality and breadth of experience reassuring and comforting throughout the entire admissions process.”
As director of the PIRCTC from 2001 to 2005, McCluskey was responsible for overseeing all operations at the center. His targeted recruitment efforts resulted in an increase in enrollment in the technical and occupational programs. In addition, McCluskey developed and implemented the early childcare education program at the SAD 1 facility and expanded the agriculture science program to include an apple cider processing lab at the school farm. Since 2005, he has served as orchard manager for the facility he helped to create.
Prior to his role as director of PIRCTC, McCluskey served for eight years as the tech prep coordinator for the Northern and Eastern Maine Tech Prep Consortium based at NMCC. In that administrative role, he was responsible for providing services to the faculty, staff and administration of 30 high schools, seven technology centers, two technical colleges and four campuses of the University of Maine System.
In his tenure with the tech prep consortium, McCluskey coordinated the development of articulation models that enabled and encouraged high school students to go on to college.
Those models were later recognized and cited for replication at both the state and national level. More than 100 articulation agreements were developed between secondary schools in northern Maine and NMCC. Additional agreements were established to enhance opportunities for NMCC students to transfer to four-year institutions.
Before his work with the tech prep initiative, he spent 25 years as a classroom technology teacher in the Presque Isle and Biddeford school systems.
“Gene has the education and professional work experience needed to provide the direction and support needed to lead our admissions effort,” said NMCC President Timothy Crowley. “He also has a passion for community college education and NMCC that will serve prospective students and the college very well. We are excited about welcoming Gene back to NMCC.”
For McCluskey, returning to NMCC and helping prospective students realize their educational goals is a role he feels comfortable in filling.
“Over the past years I have developed a very good rapport with area school guidance personnel, statewide technology directors and Northern Maine Community College staff, faculty and administrators. Throughout my time as tech prep coordinator and technology school director, one of my most important and rewarding goals was to encourage students to attend college,” said McCluskey. “I am very excited about this opportunity to utilize my varied experience, my unique skill sets, my organizational talents and my energy to enhance the admissions program at NMCC. Clearly NMCC is a fantastic college with a highly qualified staff and vast curricula.”
McCluskey is a graduate of Presque Isle High School and a 1967 alumnus of Northern Maine Vocational Technical Institute – a forerunner of NMCC. He also earned a bachelor of science degree from the University of Southern Maine in 1980.
Eugene McCluskey
