School consolidation is like owning an old house. One can tinker with it forever, and it still won’t be perfect. It’ll be drafty in places, musty in others. Floors and walls won’t quite be straight and level. Now and again, major improvement projects are needed.

Yet after awhile, the nuisances become lovable quirks. It’s home, for better or worse. There’s a sense of pride and ownership. This is where the analogy breaks down, though, because although school consolidation is built like an old home, the public thinks it’s as romantic as a cookie-cutter modular. There hasn’t been enough time for local people to have that sense of ownership over the process.

Yes, this is a touchy-feely take on an important policy issue, one that requires in-depth analyses of contract negotiations and funding responsibilities and…wait for it…STRONG LEGISLATIVE ACTION.

This is true, and about every think-tank, policy wonk and lawmaker from Calais to Coburn Gore is jostling for a seat before the Education Committee to present some “fixes.” In the meantime, another group lurks like a submarine, waiting to torpedo the whole thing with a repeal petition.

And the governor says there’s no going back.

Consolidation needs a touch of humanity. That’s the crux of apprehension about the plan, after all. Everybody is for saving money and reducing administration costs (well, maybe not administrators), but the concern is about small schools, community schools, where real Maine children are taught by dedicated Maine teachers.

The opposition is against what consolidation might do unintentionally, not about what it intends to do.

Bringing consolidation home to fearful communities is integral to its success. There’s a simple way to help do this: giving the new districts a name.

Bureaucratic titles such as “RSU 1” to define the new regional school units are so antiseptic it could clean wounds. There’s no local pride in an “RSU,” which sounds like something cribbed from a Soviet-era civics textbook. It’s a dispassionate name for a system that is all about the human interaction between parent, pupil and teacher.

These new entities must name themselves. The state will only give a number; the community can give these new districts an identity.

Leave the policymaking in Augusta, for now. This shouldn’t distract Mainers on a local level, who wish for nothing else but to keep their local schools local. They have been detached from the process, and worry the bureaucracy will run amok and close schools, regardless of stated intentions.

They must be reassured. Local naming of these new regional districts is a smart, easy step toward instilling local ownership over the final consolidation product.

Lawmakers have tough sledding ahead, dealing with all the recommendations and criticisms about consolidation. And no matter what they do, it still won’t be perfect.

But if local communities will at least give it a name, their name, then it just might start feeling like home.