JAY — School Committee student representative Courtney Webster suggested Thursday that students from Jay and Livermore Falls high and middle schools hold activities together.

Jay School Department and Regional School Unit 36 are working on a plan to consolidate their schools. Voters will act on the proposal Jan. 25.

The sooner the students are brought together, the easier it will be to work together, she said.

If voters approve the consolidation plan, the students at each high school will work together to establish school colors, school names, school mascots and more.

One recommendation is that the Livermore Falls Middle School be closed and students from Livermore and Livermore Falls attend the Jay Middle School. Another recommendation is to close the Livermore Falls High School during the second year of consolidation, if approved, and those students attend Jay High School.

In another matter Thursday night, Jay High School Principal Gilbert Eaton said the opening of school was taxing on everyone due to technology issues. The summer transition of the computer system from one to another was not smooth, he said.

“Faculty did not have ready access to their grading programs or our Schoolmaster software,” Eaton said. “Faculty and students had to wait into the second week before their (computers) had Internet access. The front office and the counselors could not retrieve significant amounts of our software files. Throw in some hot weather, and it was a test to say the least.”

Now five weeks later, this seems like ancient history, he said.

The network system is stable and teachers and students are accessing what is needed.

“We are back to normal and improving daily,” Eaton said. The board should be very proud of the faculty, staff and students, he said.

“Resourcefulness was evident everywhere daily,” Eaton said. “And attitudes, though taxed at times, did not waiver far from the positive throughout the beginning of school.”

Everybody had to find ways to solve problems, he said. It would have been very easy for attitudes to go south, he added.

Parent access to student grades will hopefully be back in two weeks, Eaton said.

“We want to make sure the system is robust enough so it can’t be compromised,” he said.

Webster and Eaton also noted that seniors will be doing community service around the area while the juniors and sophomores are taking PSATs on Wednesday, Oct. 13.

Freshmen will give a presentation focusing on healthy relationships and how to recognize and respond appropriately to those that are unhealthy, Eaton said.

In another matter, the School Committee members took no action on a bus stop complaint from a parent who said it is dangerous for a younger child. Instead they directed the parent, who raised the concern about winter road conditions, to ask the town to make the area safer during the winter.

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