LIVERMORE FALLS – SAD 36 directors voted unanimously Thursday to apply for a five-day waiver for seniors to allow them to graduate on June 4.
Seniors are five days short of the 170 instruction days required by the state because of school being canceled by snowstorms.
Superintendent Terry Despres said he would cite family hardship, a major financial impact if the days have to be made up, and contractual issues. He said it would cost thousands of dollars if the students had to make up the days.
“I don’t think it is appropriate to ask seniors to make up the days,” Despres said, at this late stage in their education.
He plans to send a letter to the commissioner next week.
In other business, Livermore Falls Middle School students Jayde Purington and Mary Gosselin gave a PowerPoint presentation on the student-prepared Civil Rights Activity Day.
Forty-one students volunteered to facilitate activities to peers on Feb. 1. The program included making posters, giving a laptop presentation, role play, and teaching about the Maine Civil Rights Act and ways to prevent bullying.
When asked if the program has helped, Purington said, “It helped a little bit but some people are still doing it.” But the numbers of those who bully has decreased, she said.
Civil Rights Team adviser Grace Eaton said the program has made a difference.
Purington said the students volunteered to try and stop bullying in the school. Eaton said students are being made aware that it is not OK to bully others.
In a second presentation, curriculum coordinator and Middle School Assistant Principal Darren Akerman presented the newly developed Livermore Elementary School’s mission statement for the school accreditation process.
Akerman said the four-page document that took four or five drafts represented a lot of work by staff members. He focused directors’ attention to a computer monitor that showed a picture of the school on Gibbs Mill Road.
“What you see is a building, what you don’t see is what is going on inside,” Akerman said.
The mission of the school “is to provide a safe, consistently structured, and enjoyable learning environment where students master their academic skills and strive to become productive citizens and lifelong learners in their communities and the world beyond,” Akerman said.
The document outlines the expectations and how the mission is to be accomplished.
Directors had their own task to do as part of accreditation process for the high school during the meeting. They were to take part in an online survey on culture, climate and the community among other topics. High school students would be taking a similar survey in the future, Akerman said.
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