Lachance to leave Washington Academy in June

EAST MACHIAS — Washington Academy Headmaster Roger Lachance will close the books in June on a 41-year career in public and private education.

Lachance, who came to the academy in East Machias in 1984, said Friday he first told school trustees last year that he planned to retire when his contract expires in June 1993. However, Lachance approached the 15-member board in September with a request to extend his contract through June 1995. The board voted against the extension 7-6, with one member abstaining.

“With the talk of school expansion in the spring, new teachers and other things, I thought I should stay on,” Lachance said. “But the board refused.”

Lachance, who was born and raised in Cambridge, Mass., completed student teaching in 1948. His first full-time teaching assignment was in a private Catholic school in Detroit, Mich., four years later.

Lachance moved to Van Buren in 1960, teaching school in SAD 24. He became a school principal there in 1965 and remained in Van Buren until 1968. Lachance also has taught or served as a school administrator in Mount Desert Island and in SAD 74.

The academy “was pretty much a jock school,” Lachance said of the school’s emphasis on athletics when he arrived eight years ago. “We now stress academics first with sports as a supplement.”

The school’s facilities have been improved since his arrival, Lachance said. “If you come to a school that’s neat and clean, you will feel neat and clean,” he said. “Our program was not very clear, either, so we’ve concentrated on things like improving reading and writing.”

A five-year advanced placement mathematics program has been initiated, Lachance said. Washington Academy was “among the first schools in the county” to establish an academic computer laboratory five years ago. The lab now boasts 26 computers for use by students.

“Our library is as good as any school library here,” he added. The academy also received an almost unheard of 10-year accreditation by the state after an inspection in 1990. The average accreditation period is five years, Lachance said.

“The teachers are glad to be here and our students genuinely want to come to school,” he stressed.

A growing enrollment, from 283 students in 1985 to 373 this year, has resulted in a school that is squeezed for space. Academy trustees are moving ahead with plans to expand the school. Three new teachers were added to the staff this year to meet the teaching needs of a growing student body.

“The academy is being looked at by engineers who will determine what we can do to meet our needs. (Expansion) will offer us the opportunity to do more,” Lachance said, “perhaps even offer an honest program in art and advanced placement programs in calculus and physics.”

According to Lachance, a prevailing sense by students that they are somehow inferior because they attend and graduate from a small school remains one of the major obstacles the school administration faces.

“Those who go on to college do well,” said Lachance. “We need to get rid of the inferiority complex.”

Asked about his plans after June, Lachance replied they were “pretty much up in the air right now. I had hoped to stay at least another year.”

Asked if he might seek another education position elsewhere, Lachance replied, “Ask yourself who’s going to hire a 69-year-old man.”