While budget deliberations at the University of Maine and at the local level of education have dominated the news in this difficult economic year, Maine Maritime Academy has steamed quietly through controversy, state revenue shortages and rough political seas with conspicuous success.

The Academy’s steady course is testimony to teamwork, but at a time when leadership is in such short supply, it is a reflection on the competence of the man at the helm, former Gov. Kenneth Curtis, an MMA graduate who took over command of the floundering institution, restored its public image and morale, and revitalized its strong internal sense of mission.

The 1980s tested the Academy. The shortfall in projected tax revenue hit MMA along with everyone else in state government. The death of an MMA cadet in a foreign port, the public rejection of the referendum for bonds to reconstruct piers at Castine, and friction with the McKernan administration over appointments to its board of trustees added to the strain on the Academy to meet the public’s expectations.

As Maine enters the 1990s, it is clear that the Academy has exceeded those expectations.

Maine Maritime’s enrollment is projected to reach 600 students next fall. Following three successive years of entering classes in the range of 175 to 200 cadets, MMA will be at or near the ideal capacity envisioned by its board of trustees. The school continues to find favor with goal-oriented high school graduates, their families and increasingly with non-traditional students who want retraining.

A capital fund drive launched in January of 1989 has reached $8 million of its $10 million goal. Success here means better access to financial aid for students (a historic challenge for the Academy and its students), endowed chairs in important academic areas such as engineering, ocean studies and nautical science, and a major investment in computerized technology to challenge young men and women entering the regular programs while maintaining the school’s industry standing as a leading institution for continuing education.

There is no question that Superintendent Curtis’ success has required the range of experience, contacts and skill accumulated during his tours as an officer in the political trenches — first as governor of this state and later as United States Ambassador to Canada — but it also is an expression of a deep personal commitment, a rare quality in an era when the level of administrative competence is frequently and inaccurately equated with the size of salary demands.

MMA needed help. It definitely found the right man in Kenneth Curtis.