A fresh look at the plan for schools

While I’ve been educated in what I’m proud to say is one of the greatest public education states in the country, I now go to college in the nearby state of Massachusetts. Upon my convivial migration for winter break, I unwittingly drove straight into the great chaos that is school consolidation. I found madness running through the streets – parents with pitchforks and pictures of Susan Gendron with squiggly mustaches plastered on every street corner. My curiosity was piqued. It is times like these, when I have a month to watch reruns of “The West Wing” and experiment with new culinary masterpieces to try on my girlfriend, that I begin to wonder what the meaning of life really is.

I decided that I would use my vacation to do something productive. I have read a copious amount of news articles and scholarly papers on school consolidation, met with public officials and been to a local regional planning committee meeting. This is what I have found.

There is an extremely relevant need for change in the organization of our public schools. The Maine Department of Education has statistics that describe a falling enrollment rate. While there were as many as 250,000 students in the 1970s, Maine now has fewer than 200,000 – and it is expected to have 20,000 fewer within the next decade.

Although this has not brought us to closing many of our schools, it has brought a substantial increase in administrative costs – about a 406 percent increase per pupil since the Sinclair Act, says The Maine View, a publication of the Maine Heritage Policy Center. We must reduce that number, which is making our education system top-heavy. The state agrees, and has chosen to begin using its resources more efficiently, but we mustn’t think we are destined to lose our schools. (There are many scholarly papers that expound why we should not close our schools, especially our primary schools.) I believe we can do both.

This fear seems ubiquitous across the state. There have been many states that have chosen to consolidate similar to Maine, such as Arkansas and West Virginia. And honestly, states that consolidated have chosen to close their diminishing schools. That should come as no surprise; this new structure prepares school systems that can no longer afford to be open, or no longer need to be open, for a seamless integration into nearby systems – and saves millions of dollars.

I had the opportunity to speak on this issue with a regional planning committee representative from one of the smaller communities. He believes that it is the responsibility of the committees and regional school units to abate any impetus an external force may have for closing a school before it wants to be closed. That means removing cost shifting, which the state is doing. Then the only people who would even desire to close a school would be the taxpayers of its community, which they would do through a referendum. And that is no different from where we were before this legislation.

I don’t pretend to think that there is nothing wrong with this legislation. I see many things causing towns across the state trouble. But that is not my greatest concern. My greatest concern is not with Education Commissioner Susan Gendron or Gov. John Baldacci, or any other public official. It is with each of us. It is my concern that humans tend to approach change with hostility and aversion. When I attended meetings, or asked people what they thought of proposed policy, or read people’s articles on the matter, I found very little factual information being discussed.

Many of us choose not to address this issue with research or empirical evidence. I find most people are reaffirming fear with their own emotion. My recommendation for anyone who finds himself getting a little heartburn when it comes to school consolidation – and all other issues, for that matter – is to do the necessary research to make a fully educated opinion. When we can stop responding with emotion and begin analyzing with the requisite information, we will make agreeable progress.

Not to mention eschew probable riots.

Joshua Foster is a junior at Bentley College in Waltham, Mass., where he is majoring in economics and mathematics. He is originally from Fort Fairfield.