SAD 29 opens door to SAD 70 talks

By Joseph Cyr
Staff Writer
    HOULTON — Consolidating central offices between Houlton and Hodgdon took one step closer to reality Monday, when the SAD 29 agreed to enter into discussions with SAD 70 for the purpose of allowing SAD 70 into its Regional School Unit (RSU).
    The SAD 29 board, at its Monday night meeting, voted 11-2 in favor of opening talks with SAD 70. Board members Lisa Harvey and Kim Thompson opposed the vote.
    “After the vote in November, our neighbors – MSAD 70 – are now tasked with complying with the [consolidation] law,” Superintendent Stephen Fitzpatrick said. “At MSAD 70’s last meeting, they requested to enter into dialogue with MSAD 29 for consolidation law purposes. This was totally initiated by MSAD 70.”
    Four board members — Sandra Wilkins, Bruce Clark, Frances Grant and Cythia Hillman-Forbush — were chosen to form a committee to meet with SAD 70.
    Mergers, at least in the form of combined central offices and school boards, are the result of the state’s reorganization plan that was passed in June 2007. That plan was created to reduce administrative expenses between smaller school districts by consolidating central offices. It also encourages districts, to engage in academic and administrative planning, strategic planning and curriculum alignment.
    A referendum to overturn that law failed at the polls this past November, meaning any school district that was not part of an RSU would suffer financial penalties.
    SAD 29 is already an RSU, having received permission from the state Department of Education in March 2009 to become its own RSU based on enrollment figures of 1,300 students in the district. The minimum number a group can have to form an RSU is 1,200.
    SAD 70 had previously been in discussion with SAD 25 (Stacyville, Sherman, Mount Chase and Patten) and CSD 9 (Crystal, Dyer Brook, Island Falls, Merrill, Oakfield and Smyrna). Several meetings between those three school systems had been held, but the SAD 70 school board voted 7-2 at its Dec. 14 meeting, to instead explore the possibility of consolidating central offices with SAD 29 by joining their RSU.
    Fitzpatrick stressed that the formation of a committee was merely to open the dialogue between the two districts, in a quest for finding what is in the mutual best interests of both groups.
    “I’m not quite sure how it will work,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s probably the first of its kind in this state where an RSU has already been established and someone is seeking to join them. I would certainly think it will require a referendum vote by MSAD 70. I’m not sure if it would require a referendum vote for MSAD 29.”
Change to harvest vacation
    The school board voted 12-1 (with board member Hillman-Forbush opposed) to approve the school calendar for 2010-11. The calendar features a slight change in the harvest vacation schedule for the 2010-11 school year.
    In the current school calendar, harvest recess featured a one-week “permissive” vacation from Sept. 28-Oct. 2, where high school students could request the time off, provided they had a note from a farmer and their parents stating their intent to work in the harvest. That week was followed by a one-week vacation for the entire district from Oct. 5-12.
    For the 2010-11 school year, those two weeks have been switched, at the request of teachers from Houlton High School, in hopes that it will reduce the amount of time some students are missing from the classroom. Harvest recess will run from Sept. 27-Oct. 1 for the entire district, followed by a “permissive” week for the high school from Oct. 4-8.
    The calendar also features an early release day on Sept. 22, and two teacher workshop days on Sept. 23-24, creating a maximum harvest break of 20 days for high school students to work in the field.
    Fitzpatrick said there were 30-40 students who participated in the “permissive” vacation this past harvest. In years past, harvest break would run for as many as three weeks.
    “What we experienced this year was when early release day came we had some kids check out and we did not see them again until the middle of October,” Principal Marty Bouchard said.
    Bouchard added that some of the “at-risk” students, left even earlier for harvest vacation to work in the field and stayed out much longer than the district’s authorized 21-day break period.
    “From what I heard from the faculty members was that [the lengthy break] severely impacted their ability to continue,” Bouchard said. “We lost at least one student who left for harvest and has yet to come back.”
    Fitzpatrick added this past harvest he had conversations with two families who cited economic hardships and the need for their children to work longer during the break.
    “That was the first time that I have had that happen since I have been here,” Fitzpatrick said. “They both basically told me we could say whatever we wanted to with a policy, but this [working the harvest] needs to happen.”
    In other business, the board heard a 40-minute presentation from Presque Isle CPA Peter Davis on the district’s recent audit. Davis informed the board that there were no “material weaknesses” with SAD 29. His report suggested that an independent review of cash reconciliation should be done at the central office so that two individuals sign off on the financial statements. Fitzpatrick said that system was already in the works.
    The next school board meeting will be Monday, Feb. 1 at 6 p.m. in the Superintendent’s conference room.