EAST MACHIAS — The SAD 77 Board of Directors could have used a little help from their district’s math students Tuesday, as the board tried without success to determine the cost benefits of a superintendent-author-ized student transfer to an out-of-district school, as compared to a board-approved transfer.

According to East Machias board representative Margaret Cole, each out-of-district transfer authorized by SAD 77 Superintendent Ellery Bouchard would result in a loss of about $3,000 state subsidy funds to SAD 77 for that student.

The district also would lose that student from its register, reducing the total number of students in the district and resulting in higher per-pupil costs.

The higher the district’s cost to educate each student, the lower the amount of subsidy received by the district from the state.

The loss would be reduced to about $1,000 per student, explained Cole, if the board handled the transfers instead of the superintendent. Although SAD 77 would pay the gaining district about $4,000 in tuition for each student, it would receive about $3,000 in state subsidy for each student.

But according to Michael Hinerman of Machiasport, “There’s a basic flaw in Peggy’s (Cole’s) formula.” Hinerman is a Washington Academy trustee whose wife, Mary Hinerman, is on the SAD 77 Board of Directors,

Hinerman said the board needs to study the question from a different perspective, beginning with a given amount of money existing in a theoretical account.

If the account opened with $10,000, and the superintendent authorized an out-of-district transfer, SAD 77 would neither pay tuition to the receiving district, nor receive subsidy from the state for that student.

The account would therefore remain unchanged at $10,000.

But, if the board handles the transfer, SAD 77 would eventually receive a subsidy payment from the state of $3,000, raising the account’s balance to $13,000. SAD 77 would then have to write a $4,000 check for tuition to the district accepting that student.

The check would reduce the $13,000 after-subsidy account balance to $9,000, resulting in a $1,000 loss to SAD 77 for each student authorized by the board for transfer to a different district.

“That’s the bottom line,” noted Hinerman. Either way — whether the superintendent or the board makes the transfer — SAD loses the $3,000 per pupil subsidy payment from the state.

The issue of superintendent versus board transfers has been a thorny one for the board of directors since September. Tuesday’s discussion only added to the confusion.

Several members took issue with the position of Cole and others by maintaining that tuition and subsidy were two separate items.

As Elm Street School Principal John Gardner explained that the subsidy follows the student. “when a kid appears on my register, I get the subsidy,” he said.

Irvine H. Millgate, a board member from Cutler, opened the meeting by asking the board to consider adopting a policy giving students the right to attend any school the student chooses.

Hinerman claimed that the policy would violate the district’s contract with Washington Academy. Transfer provisions are contained in both the old and new contract with the school.

Millgate was asked by WA Headmaster Roger LaChance how the proposed policy would change the existing contract with his school.

“We’d have to make the decision (to change the policy), come back and adjust the contract,” Millgate replied, adding, “I don’t have the answers.”

The board killed the request, but recommended that Millgate’s proposal be studied in more detail by the district’s policy committee.

The board considered a request to allow Bouchard to sign a superintendent transfer with the receiving superintendent for transfers approved by the board on March 20. The question died without a motion or vote.

A third transfer-related item passed, however, authorizing Bouchard to accept transfers into SAD 77 of students whose parents teach in the district, but live outside the district.

The right of the student to attend school in the district in which his parent teaches is a condition of employment contained in some teachers’ contracts in both SAD 77 and School Union 102.