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Home ยป News ยป News ยป Maine School District Will Explore Restructuring Elementary, Middle Schools to Improve ‘programmatic equity’
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Maine School District Will Explore Restructuring Elementary, Middle Schools to Improve ‘programmatic equity’

Edward TomicBy Edward TomicMarch 11, 2024Updated:March 11, 202414 Comments3 Mins Read3K Views
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Reeds Brook Middle School
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Later this month Maine Regional School Unit 22 (RSU 22) is set to consider various options for “restructuring” the district’s elementary and middle schools in line with the recommendations of its 2020-2021 “Equity Audit Report.”

RSU 22 serves the towns of Hampden, Newburgh, Winterport and Frankfort, and approximately 2,270 students across seven schools — four elementary schools, two middle schools, and one high school.

The district’s “Equity Audit” reported that RSU 22 having multiple middle schools (Reeds Brook serving grades 6-8 in Hampden and Newburgh, Samuel L. Wagner serving grades 5-8 in Winterport and Frankfort) creates “structural, educational, and experiential inequities.”

[RELATED: South Portland School Board May Restructure Elementary Schools to Improve โ€œDiversityโ€…]

The report recommends “systemizing programmatic equity” across RSU 22 schools and grade levels by having all students districtwide attend Samuel L. Wagner Middle School for grades 5โ€“6 and Reeds Brook Middle School for grades 7โ€“8, to ensure that all students “receive a comparable educational experience.”

Other recommendations put forward in the “Equity Audit Report” include developing a “diversity-hiring strategy,” to establish “curriculum guidelines related to racially, ethnically, and culturally diverse content and instruction,” and to increase funding and investments in “equity” initiatives.

RSU 22’s Ad Hoc Restructuring Committee is slated to hold a “Community Conversation,” in which several school restructuring options both at the elementary and middle school level will be discussed, on Tuesday, March 26, from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at Samuel L. Wagner middle school.

Agenda for the March 26 RSU 22 Community Conversation regarding district destructing plans.

Three options are set to be discussed at the meeting, with each getting a 30-minute presentation on how it would restructure the district’s schools.

The fourth option, which will not receive a 30-minute presentation during the meeting, is to not restructure the district’s schools and to keep the status quo.

Restructuring Committee Co-Chair Jessica Barnes said during the district’s Feb. 28 Board of Directors meeting that the process of considering possible restructuring plans began in May 2023.

“To be clear, we are a information gathering committee, and so we are just gathering all the information that we possible could get to see if any of these scenarios — you know, we would feel comfortable moving forward,” Barnes said.

Barnes told the Board of Directors that the presentations will include both the “positives and the concerns” that could arise with each possible restructuring option.

RSU 22 is not the first Maine school district to consider overhauling its current grade-level configurations for the sake of equity.

In December, the South Portland Board of Education considered ways to improve โ€œdiversityโ€ and reduce racial and socioeconomic โ€œsegregationโ€ across the cityโ€™s five elementary schools.

Essentially, the South Portland Board of Education was exploring ways through a steering committee in which it could forcibly equalize the demographics of its elementary schools along racial and socioeconomic lines.

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Edward Tomic

Edward Tomic is a reporter for The Maine Wire based in Southern Maine. He grew up near Boston, Massachusetts and is a graduate of Boston University. He can be reached at [email protected]

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Ryan J Murdough
Ryan J Murdough
2 years ago

Whatever happened to that Mohammed character from south Portland? Did he go back to the Middle East where he belongs?

White Mainers need to start acting in the interests of their own people. I assure you, โ€˜equityโ€™ is not in your best interest. The best thing for White kids is to be as far away from diversity as possible.

10
cheshire cat
cheshire cat
2 years ago

Ryan J Murdough

I couldn’t disagree more. The best thing for ALL kids is to be as far away from diversity as possible.

7
Rooster
Rooster
2 years ago

I pick #4, This whole thing sounds like a solution looking for a problem. There must be money involved somewhere.

9
Carl Mason
Carl Mason
2 years ago

Equity does not mean equality. It is incorporation of Marxism. From those according to their means, to those according to their needs. .

7
Beachmom
Beachmom
2 years ago

It is not possible to have equal outcomes, regardless of the race numbers.
They used to try this with poor kids vs more well off.
Now it’s skin color and citizen vs illegals.
Equality is not equity.
Liberals opened the door to illegals and now the problems that causes are piling up and they’re trying to come up with ways to put band aids on the issue.

7
Jennifer Na
Jennifer Na
2 years ago

They stopped teaching kids Civic for the most part in the 70s. Now kids canโ€™t even respect themselves let alone elders. Letโ€™s focus towards reintroducing Civics so those of us against this gender and equality INSANITY can know how to properly fight back against it. As far as this legal illegals bit, keep this route and soon theyโ€™ll be lobbying to allow 6yo brides be wed to pedophiles because Muhammad allows it. ๐Ÿคฆโ€โ™€๏ธ we are ONE nation under God. Remember that and your constitutional rights. Also, Vote Red. Maga2024 ๐Ÿ’ช Godspeed and well wishes over Trump. In Jesus name, amen.

5
PHG
PHG
2 years ago

Sounds like a created solution trying to find a problem. I thought schools already were operating to provide a quality education full of opportunity for all students???

5
Sandy
Sandy
2 years ago

But they are the elected folk not you, they make the rules not you Maine folk.

1
Not 2day SB
Not 2day SB
2 years ago

Rule of thumb, when someone starts a sentence โ€œTo be clear”, there’s fuckery about to happen.

2
Chris
Chris
2 years ago

โ€œTo be clear, we are a information gathering committee, and so we are just gathering all the information that we possible could get to see if any of these scenarios โ€” you know, we would feel comfortable moving forward,โ€ Barnes said. 

What she means is we are chomping at the bit to move forward.
What a crock of Marxist garbage. How about you teach math, history, English, grammar, spelling, sciences, and maybe even a little morality. Oh, and a dress code would be nice. Does this mean I’m a racist, bigot, homophobe?

2
Jerome
Jerome
2 years ago

A vital lesson for Mainers:

Down Boston, in 1974, Judge Arthur Garrity’s infamous Morgan vs. Hennigan decision mandated Boston Schools be desegregated by means of busing school children, from poorer white Charlestown, across the city to poorer black Roxbury and visa versa; children cried in protest, parents screamed in protest and everything spiraled out of control fast. Oh, the Devil loves chaos! What would your reaction be to this kind of state force, if it was your child? Yup, I thought so, pretty much the same…sounds normal to me, right?

Well, the media coined the riots, Racial Hatred. As for the white, tony towns of the likes of Wellesley, Weston and Newton, life in suburban schools remained status quo. It was a Boston issue, really? You see, the DEMOCRAT Boston politicians created purposeful havoc, an equity plan to integrate children of all colors, as easy, they figured, as arranging and delivering a Martha Stewart floral bouquet. The violent rage, social disruption and destruction was out of control; some say it has never healed. By the way, the President Johnson appointee, Garrity, stated his regrets before he died in 1999. Imagine that? What a hideous legacy! The salacious pulp media perpetuated Boston’s reputation as a racist city. Hey, it sold newspapers, right? To this day, they and the tricky, slick politicians will never admit the fact that Boston was used as a very much failed social experiment.

And the beat goes on in Maine. History does repeat itself, sometimes in the name of social justice, carried out by social justice crusader invaders.

Maine is being grossly toyed and egregiously tampered with before our eyes, torn apart like an ill-fated political social experiment. Our children are the tight squeeze chess pawns on the big money making industry chess board, both foreign and domestic, with the likes of the horrendously evil LD1619, the anytime abortion Bill, to this year’s flavor of the month, LD 227, the grand transgender tourist attraction Bill. Good bye lobsters!

Stop the insanity, stop their trickery, Mainers! Vote out ALL the no good Democrats, next chance you get!

2
Marxism is racism
Marxism is racism
2 years ago

What does “equity and socioeconomic ” have to do with teaching our children , reading writing math science and the history of our country !? NOTHING! it’s about indoctrination, plain and simple. And it’s racist and demeaning on its face! LEAVE OUR KIDS AND SCHOOLS ALONE YOU AMERICA HATING MARXIST BUNCH OF BEAUCRATICS!

1
Corey
Corey
2 years ago

Antiwhiteism

1
Boxcar
Boxcar
2 years ago

I done grajiated and I don’t know how to write cursive, and/or even sign my name. But…I know my pronouns.

0
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