Educators deserve as much praise and encouragement as we can muster, but not at any cost.

Maine will witness, on Oct. 18, a colossal waste of the public’s money.

The Augusta Civic Center will be the site of a two-hour party, with music, food and prizes, organized to “lift the spirits of school people.”

The day of the party? A Wednesday.

A school day.

Each of Maine’s schools – public and private – has been encouraged to send up to four representatives to the party, and as many as 700 home-school and college representatives have been invited. That’s a guest list of some 3,936 school people.

The food served and prizes awarded during the $250,000 celebration will be paid for by private donations. However, taxpayers will foot the estimated $100,000 bill for mileage (which will be considerable for those farthest from Augusta) and hiring substitute teachers.

That’s a lot of money for Mainers already overwhelmed with the climbing cost of education.

Organizer Linda Hogan defends the public cost, suggesting it’s a “small price to pay” for teachers to gain some much-needed recognition.

She asks, “What is the price of appreciation?”

That’s a question for which Hogan may not want to hear the answer, especially from residents who toil to pay their taxes to support our schools every day with no expectation of an extravaganza in recognition of that effort.

The planning for this event is already well under way for this year, but we suggest that Celebrate ME – which has the blessing of the Blaine House and the Department of Education – be limited to this single year.

The event has been organized by a nonprofit arm of a private video and event production company. What better outfit could there be to produce a video for statewide distribution to celebrate and praise the work of school people? Districts could screen the video for all of their staffers, not just a select four, accomplishing the goal of honoring school people and eliminating the cost to taxpayers entirely.

The secondary cost to this celebration is the impact felt in the classroom. To reduce costs to attend, some districts are asking teachers who aren’t going to the party to take on additional student load and cover their colleagues’ classes. That doesn’t serve students, at least for one day, very well.

Union 44 has the right idea. While Superintendent Susan Hodgdon commends the concept of the celebration, she’s practical about the cost.

There will be no school people from Litchfield, Sabattus or Wales attending Celebrate ME. They’ll stay in school with students that day, where the real celebration of educators unfolds every day in the minds and imaginations of youngsters.