AUBURN — Maine’s new acting education commissioner, Tom Desjardin, visited Edward Little High School on Wednesday, introducing himself to students as a former Red Eddie.

He graduated in 1982, the same class as Auburn Schools Superintendent Katy Grondin.

Meeting with students in the music room, Desjardin said his family is from Auburn. His sister still lives near where they grew up on Sunset Avenue.

He attended Washburn Elementary, Lake Street, Webster and Walton schools. When he graduated from Edward Little, it was the second-largest high school in Maine; his class had 435 graduates.

“I wandered these halls before the addition enclosed the courtyard,” Desjardin said, adding students then walked across the building to a class or had to cut across the outdoor courtyard. “When it was two below, you moved quickly.”

After high school, Desjardin attended Florida State University where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. He said he went to Florida to experience new cultures and new people. Since then, he’s taught at Bowdoin and other colleges and became a historian and author. He spent more than a decade as the historian for the Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry.

As he spoke, his cellphone rang. He turned it off, musing, “The governor can wait.”

Desjardin accepted the commissioner’s job, he told students, because he’s interested in education. In a state with 180,000 students, it’s more possible to bring about change than in states such as New York or California that have millions of students.

Desjardin invited questions from the audience.

One student asked what a commissioner of education does.

Monitoring, budgeting and providing, Desjardin said.

“We give away $1 billion a year,” Desjardin said, which is about half of what’s spent on prekindergarten to 12th grade public education in Maine. “The work we do stops at the schoolhouse door. We don’t dictate curriculum. Maine is a local control state.”

The state’s job is to make sure “students here are getting the same quality of education as students in Kittery or Fort Kent.”

Another student asked what Desjardin’s first plan of action is.

To carry out new assessments that students will take on a laptop or iPad, Desjardin said. Annual tests give the state a glimpse of how students are progressing.

“This year we’re changing everything about the tests,” he said. “It’s a gigantic challenge. For the first time ever, kids will take tests on a laptop or tablet.”

Getting the new system worked out will be a chore for networks, servers and teaching people how to administer tests, he said. The new tests will be “adaptive.” The tests “will ask a whole bunch of questions, the next question is based on the last one. It hones in on your skills. That’s different.”

The tests will rely heavily on technology. “We might flip a switch on the first day and half of it’s not working, or things aren’t working the way they’re supposed to,” he said. He’s hoping by June he can report the new online testing went well.

The change will be worth it, he said. “We’re have better data on where you folks are, your learning path.”

Desjardin also talked about the state’s new proficiency-based diploma which will impact the Class of 2018, except for schools such as Auburn’s that asked for more time. Auburn’s sixth-graders will be the first class graduating with the new proficiency-based diploma.

The reason for the new diploma is because schools have been graduating students before they knew all they needed. “In some schools, 50 percent of the kids graduating from high school weren’t proficient in math,” Desjardin said. “The proficiency-based diploma is designed to make sure you can’t grant a diploma until a student has met a certain set of standards.”

Another initiative is the department is trying to encourage more high school students to take college courses while in high school, Desjardin said.

Some who take advantage of the early college programs can get a year of college done while in high school, “without debt,” Desjardin said. “We’re doubling the money in those programs. We’re trying to expand it.”

Desjardin will serve as acting commissioner pending a confirmation by the Legislature’s Education Committee and Senate. He replaces Jim Rier, who is on indefinite medical leave.

Desjardin: Auburn ‘will get there’ on new school funding

AUBURN — It was the question many wanted to know from Maine’s new education commissioner who graduated from Edward Little High School.

Can he help, or give any encouragement, about when “we’re going to get our letter of commitment to build a brand new high school?” librarian Patricia Gauthier asked.

“I can’t,” Tom Desjardin answered.

As he spoke, the school’s heating system spoke too, sort of. The system made a lot of banging and clanking as it worked to generate heat.

Desjardin explained how the funding for new school construction works, that as loans for projects are finally paid off, more money becomes available. Typically, the top 20 projects on the list get funded; Edward Little has been No. 16 for several years, but it’s moving up the list as other projects have been approved to start building.

Lewiston’s new elementary school, which was No. 8, has the green light to start. Last year, then-Education Commissioner Jim Rier told Auburn residents not to lose hope because they would get funded perhaps in a year or two, though exactly when he couldn’t say.

“At some point we’ll get there,” Desjardin said Wednesday. “At any point the Legislature could float a bond and put more (school construction) money in there.”

“So you don’t have any pull is what you’re saying?” Gauthier said.

Desjardin didn’t react, other than saying there’s a lot of schools with dire needs.

“I have to tell a little tale on your superintendent,” he said with a smile. The day after he got appointed he heard from Grondin. She said, “‘Congratulations! When are we getting a new school?'”

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