Dexter high school students to have an additional day in the building

DEXTER — Students at Dexter Regional High School will receive an additional day of in-person instruction every other week with groups called cohorts coming in on alternating Wednesdays starting Dec. 9. Since the beginning of the school year the students have been divided into two cohorts with one coming in on Mondays and Tuesdays and the other group attending in-person Thursdays and Fridays. Wednesdays have been remote learning days for all and classes feature a mixture of students in the room and others participating remotely.

Across town, the schedule will remain the same at the Ridge View Community School. Under the current green designation for SAD 46, kindergarten to grade five students attend classes five days a week. Class sizes have been reduced from years past and the number of classes has been expanded to allow social distancing protocols to be in place. Grades six through eight students will continue with a hybrid method of instruction by attending two days of in-person classes via their cohorts and the other three featuring remote learning.

During a Nov. 4 school board meeting at Ridge View, Superintendent Kevin Jordan said conversations on the change — which was approved by the directors that eventing — with staff discussed the adjustment and administrators heard how teachers and students felt that in-person learning was better than online.

“Our sense talking with the staff is yes they’re tired and they’re stressed but they want to get the kids in front of them more,” Jordan said.

Special Education Director Denise Hamlin said the 81 special education students at the high school need the hands-on instruction of being in the classroom. “That at-risk population really, really needs that access to their teachers,” she said.

“Wednesdays were set aside for extensive cleaning days, but we are doing extensive cleaning every day,” Jordan said.

Earlier in the meeting, directors heard from a trio of teachers representing each grade level on how the 2020-21 school year has been going.

Kelly Gay, who is teaching a kindergarten class made up of both in-person and remote students and has taught in SAD 46 for 28 years, said, “Teaching in the midst of COVID-19 has taken me through all the range of emotions.” 

“In my opinion our response to this pandemic has been extraordinary,” Gay said, explaining a new system of learning was rolled out in a very short time and students are being kept busy in meaningful ways. She said the technology has been a challenge, especially using it to instruct 5-year-olds virtually as she would do otherwise in the classroom.

Ridge View grade eight science teacher Nancy Strauch said with the new technology and hybrid learning, “It’s just like being a new teacher.”

“I’m happy to say, certainly compared to the spring, things are better,” Strauch said, as her students have adapted to learning in the pandemic.

Dexter Regional High School science teacher Alyson Saunders mentioned concerns she has heard include recording Zoom lessons, students not being seen because of zero support at home, isolation, teacher burnout, safety heading into the winter and overall fatigue of the pandemic.

“We all will be better teachers when this is over — I 100 percent believe that,” Saunders said about one positive. She said the amazing support received and the fact the system is working for students are other examples.

Saunders mentioned challenges include not being able to reach all students, not being able to provide the same level of content and determining how to prioritize.

“As you can tell we have got a whole district of phenomenal teachers like these three,” Jordan said.

In other business Jordan said, “We have had a similar conversation about snow days that we just had about Wednesdays.” He said some staff felt having a day off due to weather would be a good stress reliever while others would prefer not to extend the school year into mid- or late June if possible.

Jordan said the plan is to have the first snow day be a comp day for teachers with no instruction and the second snow day would be a remote learning day “and then we will adjust from there.”

In his report, Dexter Regional High School Principal Stephen Bell said the fall sports season was nearly finished with one more 7-on-7 football game set for the next day. He said the season was not ideal but students had the chance to play.

He said the winter season is currently on hold. There were plans to start practices in December and then games in January “but that was the talk before this recent spike.”

Bell said the high school hybrid approach is going as well as could be expected. He said he has been amazed sitting in on classes to see the mix of in-person and home learning, even through science labs and English read alouds.

“School’s happening and the learning is real,” Bell said.

Tri-County Technical Center Director Brian Leavitt reported funding has been approved for firefighting science and computer science programs to start next year. He said the Sanford Regional Technical Center has donated firefighting equipment for the forthcoming program, valued at $30,000-$40,000.

Jordan told the board that on Tuesday, Nov. 17,  representatives of SAD 46, along with those from SAD 4 of Guilford and the Milo-based SAD 41, are scheduled to take part in a Zoom meeting on a comprehensive high school project with Scott Brown, Maine Department of Education director of school facilities, major capital school construction program.

“It’s more just an update from the DOE on this project,” Jordan said, calling the meeting a first conversation.

Several years ago a comprehensive high school project application between SAD 46, SAD 4, SAD 41, Greenville and Jackman schools and Tri-County Technical Center — the application is non-binding for the participants — was ranked third on the state scoring list behind a pair of Aroostook County projects. 

The 145 points for the application trailed the 150 points for the proposed project in the Houlton area and surrounding school districts in southern Aroostook County and the score of 160 points for a possible facility in the Fort Kent and Madawaska areas in northern Aroostook County.

During a meeting of the state board of education earlier in the fall, the decision was made to move the local project up to second and therefore allowing a start to the planning process.

Under the Integrated, Consolidated (grade) 9-16 Educational Facility Pilot Project a regional comprehensive high school or possibly two or even three schools would be funded by the state with approximately ​$200 million set aside for the program. The facility is intended to serve as a model for the rest of Maine by encouraging neighboring school districts with declining enrollments to work together to combine resources and reduce costs.

The school would offer a variety of academic programs from high school to college — through the University of Maine and Maine Community College systems — and training and certifications in various industries via a number of business partnerships. Similar education models are used in other states.