Consolidation: more questions than answers

All 290 school administrative units have filed their letters of intent with the Maine Department of Education as part of the new state law requiring school consolidation, but there’s very little time to consider the implications of the letters before planning for the new regional school units gets under way. It is difficult to come to terms with the reality of the RSUs when there is such a wide range of unanswered questions.

For example, who oversees and pays for the legal untangling of current school districts

from municipalities? Technically, it doesn’t matter because it will be paid for with tax dollars on some level. However, it is important to those who end up paying these bills directly.

There are several opportunities for the general public to vote in this process. But are the questions that are to be answered by voting resolved with a simple majority, or is there a proportional mechanism? Will municipal populations be weighted, or will bigger towns have a bigger say?

Here are some other questions:

. Why didn’t the state set up group purchasing agreements for all 290 school administrative units for buying and saving money via the power of purchasing in volume things such as oil, electricity, propane, phone services, transportation, roofing, basic supplies, textbooks, furniture and technology? This certainly would save the school administrative units money and facilitate “more efficient and effective use of limited resources,” as the law states.

. Why are districts that are trying to be creative being discouraged? The districts of Glenburn, Union 90, Veazie, Dedham, SAD 63 and Airline CSD have filed a letter of intent to form a K-8 RSU and enter into contracts for their high school students. The Department of Education is discouraging them from this approach.

Why not be really creative? Brian Callahan of Searsport wrote to me with this observation:

“If the town council picked them [school boards], and told them they are responsible for obtaining the ‘best education for the town’s children,’ and held them accountable for that, then that might free them to actually consider the children’s needs first, and not think about the constituency that elected them. I also feel that the folks who have the creativity to foster and adopt new ideas for improving our school systems, and for working with school staff, are not necessarily the ones who have a tongue glib enough to get themselves elected.”

. Continuing with the creative theme, is anyone looking at the feasibility of Stephen Bowen’s suggestion (BDN op-ed page, Sept. 1) of closing public schools and opening them as community private schools that contract with local municipalities to provide educational services? Could this work for high schools as well as K-8?

. Mary Kay Bramble, a reader from the Alexander School, wrote to me with this question: “It’s awfully hard to understand how a room full of politicians at the federal and state levels can make decisions about how to best teach kids without really knowing what they need. I assume they don’t know. Surely, they CARE about children’s development, right?”

. Why do we, the community, come together to discuss what we value in educational experiences for our children only when there is a perceived crisis – controversial book, budget crisis, teacher action or inaction, test results, schedule change, consolidation? Wouldn’t we be much better off if we engaged in these discussions continually?

. How could this dialogue continue after the hubbub of consolidation dies out? The discussions I have participated in via meetings and e-mails and at local eateries have been exciting, engaging and thought provoking. We need a way to continue talking about education in this manner.

In any case, the law has been passed and now we have to make it work, whether or not our questions are answered, not for our schools, but for our students.

If you want to see what your current school district has filed for letters of intent, log on to: www.maine.gov/education/supportingschools/index.html and click on Updated List of Notices of Intent filed as of Tuesday, Sept. 4. Do you have questions about school consolidation? E-mail me at: conversationswithateacher@gmail.com. This topic is too big and affects too many people to be limited to one column. This is one way for people to continue to engage in discussions about public schools.