BRUNSWICK
The Brunswick School Board could partner with other school systems in order to save money.
A discussion about school reorganization options was the subject of a school board workshop on Nov. 29.
Superintendent Paul Perzanoski said after several discussions with board members this fall — and the state’s administrative push to have school departments consolidate — the school district requested information from law firm Drummond Woodsum regarding its options.
“We’ve dealt with a lot of different scenarios from dealing with our finances over the years, and it doesn’t seem to be any better,” he said, “so they wanted some options to talk with other districts with about whether we can share programs and the organizational structure or rebuild the regional structure — something to take the burden off taxpayers and, at the same time, continue to provide some creative programming for kids and families.”
Reorganization options include municipal school units, regional school units, alternative organizational structures and community school districts.
Perzanoski said the Brunswick School Department wasn’t required to consolidate as part of Maine’s 2007 law mandating school district consolidation, given its student enrollment and level of performance.
As a result of consolidation of neighboring districts, however, Brunswick lost close to 200 tuition students from Durham who had attended the high school to Regional School Unit 5.
“Which was a real big blow,” Perzanoski said, “because it was the time of the base closure and we lost their impact aid and then lost more state aid because the number of students had dropped.”
While the district has stabilized over the last few years, its enrollment has not increased significantly. Perzanoski believes the creation of public charter schools and the growing popularity of home-schooling in Maine are contributing factors.
When the former Navy housing went on the market after the 2011 closure of Brunswick Naval Air Station, it was anticipated school enrollment numbers might increase.
Perzanoski noted there are some fairly big developments planned in Brunswick over the next couple years, as well as businesses moving in at Brunswick Landing — the former base property.
“It is possible that we may see an increase,” he said, “but at this point, I would not predict that we’d ever get back to the 3,200 students we had back in the early 2000s.”
Meanwhile, school officials continue to wrestle with facility needs.
In June, Brunswick voters approved a $28 million bond to fund a new elementary school. This school, slated to open September
2020, will replace the 62-year-old Coffin Elementary School, which has structural and safety issues.
The new school will be constructed at the site of the now-defunct Jordan Acres School. It will serve grades kindergarten to second, but can accommodate up to an additional 200 students and two pre-K programs.
Brunswick has also applied for funding through the Maine Department of Education’s latest school construction application cycle — the first time the state has called for applications for school construction funding since 2011 — for the junior high school. The state should release the project priority list in June 2018.
Not only are school officials trying to plan for school debt, Perzanoski said, they also face fast moving state initiatives. One would have school districts take over Child Development Services, currently supervised by the DOE, which serve children ages 3-5 who have been identified as having disabilities, by July 2018.
The state also wants to implement between 9 and 12 regional service centers in Maine within a year, in an effort to economize on and maximize educational services.
Perzanoski said the school board has directed him to send letters of interest to neighboring school departments.
“We’ll wait to hear from folks as to whether they’re interested in getting a meeting together to talk about what options they have,” he said. “Why not be ahead of the curve.”
He doesn’t anticipate any such meeting will take place until after the holidays.
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