OXFORD – This fall, for the first time, all of SAD 17’s elementary schools will have after-school programs for students.

A $125,000 grant from 21st Century Community Learning Centers will be used to create after-school programs at the Mildred Fox Elementary School in Paris, the Madison Avenue School serving Paris students in Oxford, the Otisfield Elementary School and the Hebron Station School.

The grant comes a year after a $150,000 grant from the same source supporting existing after-school programs in Oxford, Harrison and Waterford, and allowing the start-up of new programs in West Paris and Norway.

Melanie Ellsworth, project director, and Luba Green, project manager, updated the SAD 17 board on the program Monday.

They said the program has evolved from a kind of day-care service several years ago to a place where the focus is on learning.

The learning centers of the after-school program offer staff trained in teaching and the goals of the Maine Learning Results, Ellsworth said.

Green said the students learn while having fun, doing such activities as cooking, martial arts, and learning about animals and the Maine woods.

“The staff can help them with their homework,” she said. “A lot of academics are happening.”

The after-school programs work in partnership with local libraries, recreation departments, Healthy Oxford Hills, and the University of Maine Cooperative Extension program to offer activities from 3 to 6 p.m.

Several of the schools, including those in Oxford and Waterford, also have begun offering a program before the start of school, they said.

Ellsworth said program officials are aware that the grant funds will eventually dry up, and are forming one non-profit organization to serve as the umbrella organization for all the after-school programs.

THe goals for that organization will be to mount a fund-raising campaign and increase volunteer participation. Most parents pay to have their children in the program, but there are scholarships available for certain students identified as needing the extra support of an after-school program.