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IT’S TIME TO GO “BACK TO THE FUTURE” AGAIN FOR THE MDI REGION’S EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
Just as in the movie Back to the Future, come with me and climb into that DeLorean and accelerate to just above the speed of 88 mph and take yourself back in time for an informative visit to Mount Desert Island starting in the early 1950’s. What do you see and hear about people’s experiences back then and the nature of our schools?
Teacher salaries in Bar Harbor are averaging $4,800 per year
At the local Red and White Grocery Store in Bar Harbor, a standing rib roast is selling for 56 cents a pound, three dozen Florida oranges are going for $1 and you can buy a brand-new Ford Galaxie sedan at Morang Robinson Automotive on Main Street for $1195
There are three high schools operating on MDI serving the 655 high school age children of the region: Mount Desert High School located in Northeast Harbor has 196 students with 29 attending from the nearby off-island town of Trenton, Bar Harbor High School enrolls 274 students, all from Bar Harbor, Pemetic High School is educating 185 students from Southwest Harbor and 78 from the neighboring town of Tremont
While in Bar Harbor you go into the stately old and historic Jesup Memorial Library and read closely a tattered report done by the University of Maine at Orono that has recommended forming a consolidated high school on the Island for many justifiable reasons to include:
A more consistent curriculum
More levels of instruction for children with differing learning styles, abilities and aspirations
Formation of an educational 9-12 structure with less duplication of effort
Reduction in the competition for hiring teachers between the area towns
The establishment of greater efficiencies and more cost-effective measures resulting from having to operate only one secondary educational facility
As you walk the streets of each of the four towns you are told that they have been having ongoing discussions about forming a Regional High School for some time now. Their major goal has been focused on improving the overall educational opportunities for their children
You stop by the Tremont Town Office and hear from town officials that in 1957, the State of Maine Legislature passed the Sinclair Act encouraging and offering incentives to all of the towns in Maine to consolidate education on a regional K-12 basis including offering a 20% financial incentive ($240,000 in the case of MDI) for the construction of a new regional high school. According to the terms of the Sinclair Act, the four towns that would make up this new high school would fund it through their residential property taxes based on the 100% valuation determination of individual homes in each town and also pool all of their existing and future school building construction debt into the assessments to each member town
You are there in Southwest Harbor one late election night to witness firsthand the vote results whereby the Sinclair Act is rejected on MDI because the individual towns want to maintain their local control of the education system (what a novel idea!) and the Town of Mount Desert does not want to fund a new high school due to its high overall property valuation and relatively low student enrollment. In addition, the towns do not want to share collectively in paying off each other’s school construction debt as required by the provisions of the Sinclair Act
You spend some of your moments reliving parts of the year 1959, where by virtue of continued local support on MDI for educational equity, the Maine Legislature passes a Private and Special Act. This Act allows for the creation of a local regional high school funded by all of the 4 towns with a funding formula that is based on 67% valuation and 33% enrollment. It is therefore one which asks for equitable financial contributions to 9-12 education by all taxpayers and treats property owners of similar financial means in a fair and equitable manner for their individual contributions to secondary education regardless of whether they have children in school or not.
You are at the Asticou Inn in Northeast Harbor one early fall night and watch with amazement, dismay and severe disappointment as the new high school plan is defeated at the ballot box for the third time by the voters of Southwest Harbor who do not want to lose their local-control of Pemetic High School and are also reticent to transport their high school kids all the way, a total distance of eight miles, to the proposed new site for the regional high school on the Eagle Lake Road on the way to Bar Harbor
Then finally, you are staying the night at the Claremont Hotel on the shore of Southwest Harbor looking towards the entrance of Somes Sound one beautiful early summer night and witness the positive outcome of the much-anticipated adoption of the Private and Special Act which finally paves the way for the creation of MDI Regional High School. You watch with pride, anticipation and a renewed sense of hope as the votes come in and are counted and certified in all four towns indicating support for the new high school by margins of 5:1 in Bar Harbor, 2:1 in Mount Desert, 3:1 in Tremont and with Southwest Harbor coming on board in the end by a slim margin of 36 votes for a final island-wide margin of victory of 2.5:1
Following this successful vote, you climb back into your shiny Delorean and are whisked forward back to the year 2025. As you are hurdled forward through time and emerge back into the present day you are returned to the realities and the issues that are now facing us on our beloved Mount Desert Island and notice that it is, as Yogi Berra stated so accurately “déjà vu all over again.” Once more we are facing the proposition of the further consolidation of the educational system for our young people but this time the proposal is for expanding it to the vision of including all of the children of the region in Pre-K to 12th grade in one coordinated and equitable school system. Driving this effort are continued declining enrollments, ever increasing costs and a frustration with the cumbersome and duplicative management and oversight system that is in place for the ten different schools that make up what is now AOS 91.
This time around, the guiding principles are centered around very similar points that ring true with those that propelled the formation of MDI High School so many years ago:
To provide equitable access to the best educational programs and opportunities to all of the PreK-12 students
To utilize our collective resources in a fair manner
To create one budget that is shared equitably and taxed similarly for the purposes of the education
To more efficiently design and deliver special education programming
To better utilize our existing school spaces
To provide for an efficient governing and administrative oversight
I have been an educator proudly serving in various roles in both Maine and Massachusetts for over fifty years but my forever home and my heart have always been and will always be embedded in and engaged with the special soul of this unique and wonderful community we all simply call “the Island.” I had the honor and privilege of a lifetime for over twenty years to have worked as an administrator on this Island, first as Mount Desert Island High School’s Assistant Principal/Athletic Director, then as High School Principal and finally for eight years as the school district’s Superintendent of Schools. Along with all of you, I truly love “our kids” and am thrilled to watch them proudly grow to become fine young women and men who carry this special place we all call home with them in their everyday lives with the inherent instilled values that drive their positive decision making and their overall contributions to our society no matter where they may go in life.
I am convinced that if we had been charged originally hundreds of years ago with the awesome responsibility of designing from scratch the best educational system possible for our Island communities that we would have chosen one far different from that of our existing structure and that what we would have built would more closely resemble what is being proposed to you for your careful consideration at this time and that is ultimately seeking your support at the ballot box in the coming months.
The most important thing that I have learned over the years during my long career is that a great education is the ultimate equalizer in life and that “kids truly only get one shot at it." Just as the creation of MDI High School did for our high school age students many years ago, in my opinion so shall the creation of this new MDI Regional School System do for all of our K-12 students. I feel strongly that the time has come to take and move this well thought out school restructuring plan from a dream to a true reality to benefit all of our kids. Investing wisely in our young people is the most important obligation we have and the ultimate responsibility that each of us has in order to leave a positive mark on the future.
— Rob Liebow
Rob Liebow is a former long-time resident of Somesville and school administrator on MDI and now lives on Cranberry Island in the summers. He is presently the Superintendent of Schools in Nahant, MA. but he still captains the Mailboat Sea Queen and the Tour Boat Sea Princess out of Northeast Harbor as he has done for 52 years during the tourist season.
Thanks, Rob... what a great re-cap. I am excited to support the new approach, the product of many months work by a group of our thoughtful and experienced MDI neighbors.
As a graduate of MDIHS shortly after its founding I wholeheartedly agree with Mr. Liebow’s historical assessment.
And would add a couple of more fundamental benefits of consolidation, I have gained and retained life long friends from MDI and surrounding area and a greater understanding and appreciation of our communities within.
The Twenty-first century beckons us to move forward.