Successful satellites share senior college concept

Maine’s relatively late entry in the senior college world has worked in the state’s favor.

Few states have institutionalized their senior education programs, creating a formal network with a state coordinator and legislative funding, as Maine did last year.

Kali Lightfoot, a former Elderhostel manager, was hired to expand the senior college model throughout Maine and to distribute the $150,000 in University of Maine System funds that legislators set aside last session for development of senior colleges.

Within the past two years, the University of Southern Maine has founded satellite programs in Sanford, Lewiston-Auburn, Bath-Brunswick and Bridgton.

And recently, UMS campuses at Farmington and Presque Isle have begun developing senior colleges.

The flagship campus at Orono has yet to add a formal senior college to its Continuing Education program.

But Lightfoot said she would like to see Orono, Augusta, Bethel and Fort Kent favored for senior college startup grants.

One of the first such grants was $3,000 to found a senior college at UMaine’s Hutchinson Center in Belfast. Like Mount Desert Island, the midcoast region has drawn increasing numbers of retirees in recent years.

Pat Strauss, head of the college’s steering committee, said the group hopes to attract 200 members by its first fall semester. A public meeting April 5 will kick off recruitment efforts.

“We feel that we need to be serving all the folks that live here,” Strauss said.

The personalization of senior college programs is what makes this approach so successful, Sparks said. Although they make a loose network, each college is distinctive, Lightfoot added.

At Acadia Senior College, courses run four to six weeks, to keep them manageable for the active civic volunteers. The college will go on summer hiatus so its members can fully enjoy the nearby national park.

In Belfast, courses will meet primarily on Fridays because that’s when the parking lot at the Hutchinson Center is empty.

“The blend of people, the culture in these particular communities – they’re guiding what different senior colleges look like,” Sparks said.

From Acadia’s bus tours to USM’s theater company, Maine’s senior colleges will take on countless new forms in coming years.

Frank Barnes, a Somesville resident and member of Acadia Senior College, is up for the challenge.

“Just about anything new is interesting,” he said.