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Nonprofit cuts Madison school's grant

By Erin Rhoda erhoda@mainetoday.com
Staff Writer

MADISON — Administrators will continue work to restructure the ninth grade and boost academic achievement, despite losing a $400,000 federal grant in January.

This fall, Madison Area Memorial High School was one of four schools selected nationwide by a Minneapolis nonprofit called the Search Institute to revamp its freshman class over four years.

The institute notified the school in January, however, that it faced too many outside challenges, which created more uncertainty about the success of the program than the U.S. Department of Education would like.

Although the institute pulled back the federal grant, it has provided School Administrative District 59 — serving Madison, Athens, Starks and Brighton Plantation — with $40,000 to pay for teachers' professional development, a program coordinator and some travel and supplies.

The decision to rescind the grant was made after Search Institute officials learned that Starks is trying to secede from the district, the high school principal has no prior experience as a principal, and the district faces a $200,000 noncompliance penalty for not consolidating with another district, according to Sara Thompson, communications manager for the institute.

School officials said they were surprised and disappointed by the grant's revocation, but they will continue with planned improvements and will apply for other grants.

Superintendent Lyford Beverage told the school board this month that he and school staff "were really quite shocked" when they learned the grant would be eliminated.

But "we are going to go forward; we aren't changing our plans," said Principal Steve Ouellette. The institute has "gone above and beyond to help us to still work within the guidelines to help our ninth grade transition be a better process."

Although the plan is not final, blocks of freshmen students next year may each be led by a small group of teachers, who will have time set aside to discuss each student's performance. Teachers would, therefore, be able to quickly identify students who should be accelerated or who need more help.

The high school plans to add a component to the curriculum called "I Time," where teachers talk with students about grief, loss, communication and relationships.

Administrators also plan to pay for teachers' professional development, form a ninth-grade parent advisory group, and involve community members.

The changes will likely be institutionalized at a faster pace, said John Krasnavage, site coordinator of the program and a former principal of Skowhegan Area Middle School. He has agreed to a reduced pay rate and said the funds provided by the Search Institute should last more than a year.

"I'm very excited about still working with this because I believed in it when we first got into it," Krasnavage said.

The biggest loss, he said, is that the high school will no longer be part of the institute's four-year study.

The institute, which awarded the grant to three other schools and plans to announce the fourth soon, is hoping to prove the success of an academic improvement model that began 12 years ago at St. Louis Park High School in Minnesota, Thompson said.

The program in Minnesota focused on teaching students in a way that worked with their developmental process and emphasized improving student motivation, bonding to school, reading for pleasure, a caring school climate, parent involvement, service to others and participation in after-school programs, among other things.

As a result, the school's failure rate was cut in half, and remained low. At the same time, the number of students taking advanced course-work at the school increased 10-fold.

The institute wants to prove the model can be duplicated. To do that, it is using a mix of private and public funds, including money from the Investing in Innovation Fund, established under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Krasnavage doesn't agree the grant should have been revoked, but, "statistically, we're kind of a risk," he said. "It's kind of like, 'How much do you want to bet on us?'"

Because it's a federal grant, "this project is highly, highly, highly visible and very much under the microscope," Thompson said.

The U.S. Department of Education is seeking schools that could be future models of improvement, she said, so "this then becomes a model that any other school district could pick up and implement and have the same kind of success."

Schools in Bucksport; St. Louis Park, Minn.; and Hemet, Calif., will receive funding.

Krasnavage said he expects to reduce the freshmen failure rate, truancy rate, number of disciplinary incidents and chemical use, despite not receiving the federal grant.

"I think we're going to be successful," he said. "I see a staff that's ready to embrace change."