To the editor:
I am a Littleton resident, with a child in the first grade at Wellington School and another who completed five years at Wellington and is now in the fourth grade at Houlton Southside School. I was at the SAD 29 School Board meeting on March 14, during which the subject of potentially closing the Wellington School was discussed and I would like to offer some thoughts on this matter.
During the meeting, School Board member Jennifer Johnston, a Monticello resident and Wellington parent, made a passionate plea for keeping the school open, citing, among other things, the benefits of smaller class sizes and the importance of a local, community school because it encourages family involvement in the child’s education, affording parents ample opportunity to participate in school-centered events both during the school day (e.g. Wellington’s annual Pumpkin Math event) as well as after-school events such as Wellington’s annual Valentine’s Day Social and the theater presentations by the students as part of Children’s Stage Adventures. She also noted that the small, community-based school allows for special activities such as the Children’s Stage Adventures productions and art lessons by local artists, which are paid for with funds raised by the PTC via fund-raising events which are supported by local families and businesses. Mrs. Johnston pointed out that the strong family involvement and special activities, which are beneficial to the development of the children’s education, would be greatly diminished if the school were closed and the children of Monticello and Littleton were bused into Houlton. She also expressed concern about over-crowding classrooms at Houlton Elementary School and the detrimental effects of subjecting young children, especially pre-K and kindergarten students, in Monticello and Littleton to excessively long rides on buses with much older students.
Superintendent Freve and some school board members acknowledged Mrs. Johnson’s passion for the school but emphasized that the decision to close Wellington would be based on “what’s in the best interest of the district”, implying that any financial benefits to closing the school would take precedent over the positive impact that the school has on the communities of Monticello and Littleton, their children and families and that emotional pleas by Wellington parents and teachers, although heartfelt and sincere, could not be considered when making this “difficult decision.” Apparently, “the best interest of the district” means balancing the school’s budget, no matter the cost to the education of the children.
We all know that we are in difficult economic times. Tax revenues are down and cuts are being made to school programs at the federal and state levels and there’s no question that difficult decisions have to be made and schools are being closed all over the country. However, Wellington School seems like an easy target. The populations of Littleton and Monticello are small and, although most of the parents in those towns will be upset if the school is closed, there seemingly aren’t enough of them to cause concern. And even if the benefits of a small, community school can be demonstrated numerically, why should the children of two small towns benefit from something that the children of Houlton don’t have access to? It is unfortunate that the benefits that a small, local community school can have on the early development of a child’s education cannot easily be measured quantitatively and that the Superintendent and the majority of school board, who are Houlton residents, seem so readily willing to disregard the testimonies of families in favor of purely statistical data.
I doubt that the school board would ever consider looking into whether or not cutting Houlton High School’s bloated music program could help balance the budget. Is this because the benefits of an unduly large music program can easily be demonstrated numerically with regards to academic test scores and college admissions? Hardly. More likely, it is because the high school’s music program is something that is entrenched in the community and many people have strong, emotional attachments to it, even though it’s benefits could never be demonstrated on a spread sheet. In fact, if it were ever put under the same scrutiny as Wellington School, the music program might prove to be an excessive misappropriation of district funds. However, it’s unlikely that that will ever happen. The small populations of Monticello and Littleton make Wellington School a much easier target.
Frank Sullivan
Littleton
