Calais High School joins information highway

CALAIS – The high school is on the information highway with a Web site that tells all.

Some efforts by staff, students and a parent mean information about what is going on at Calais High may now be found at www.bluedevil.org.

Principal Jim Underwood said last year the faculty and staff discussed the possibility of a Web site as a way to improve communication with the public. “We decided we ought to put stuff out there for parents,” he said. Parent James Knowlton, whose daughter attends the high school, volunteered to pull it all together.

Social Studies teacher Rick Chaffey designed an information form that was sent to staff, and information was collected and placed on the Web site.

Connection to the site begins with the “Calais High School, A Tradition of Success, Home of the Calais Blue Devils.” Under the title are several subheadings that can be accessed. With the click of a mouse, a searcher can get information about the school, including its latest enrollment figures and the ethnic composition of the student population. (It’s 79 percent white, 10 percent American Indian, 1 percent African American, 0.3 percent Asian, and 0.3 percent Hispanic.)

Of the 289 students, 34 percent are tuitioned from outlying towns.

The profile includes information about graduation requirements and offers a list of colleges and universities that Calais graduates have attended, including all the Maine schools of higher education, as well as such ivory towers as Harvard and Dartmouth.

The Web site also offers a profile of the school’s administrative and teaching staff as well as other information from the Calais High News Brief, a monthly newsletter.

“English teacher Lynda Duplissea is the one who mentioned it at the first faculty meeting, and she talked with me about it. Everyone agreed,” Underwood said.

Business department teacher Sandi Sawyer and some volunteer students were responsible for layout and design. “But everyone in the school contributes periodically to that newsletter, so it is a whole school function,” Underwood said.

Each month, the newsletter is sent home with students, but parents who miss it can read it with a simple click on the Web site.

The newsletter includes information on everything from what’s happening in class to the latest news on after-school activities.

Last year, students in the 11th and 12th grade English classes had just finished reading John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men” when one of the teachers discovered that fellow teacher Jon Bragdon, the computer-electronic technology instructor, grew up in California’s Salinas Valley, where Steinbeck lived and wrote.

“In fact, his family has a Steinbeck connection. His father worked with the author on Cannery Row. In addition, Steinbeck’s first job was for Mr. Bragdon’s maiden aunts, who he later incorporated [taking some fictional liberties] into the story, Johnny Bear,'” the newsletter said.

Underwood said the Current Events section of the Web page is his favorite. It includes information about all upcoming events, including basketball games, the date of the next school drama production and the dates of the first semester exams.

“We want to keep [the current events section] updated from month to month. I use that myself. When I get home, I get on the Internet and check current events,” he said.