Amy Gerry of the Harrison Education Options Committee speaks at a recent meeting to Andrea Lavery and Chairman Mike Giuffre at the Congregational Church on Main Street. The committee meets Thursdays at 4:30 p.m. at the church. Nicole Carter/Advertiser Democrat

HARRISON — Public hearings on options to educate Harrison students have been postponed while the committee in charge of the possibilities resets to a less harried, more meticulous research process.

The Select Board formed the Education Options Committee as an official group at the end of 2024 to research all feasible alternatives – join another school district, become an independent school unit that pays tuition for its older students to attend in other districts, or stick with Maine School Administrative District 17 based in Paris.

Committee Chairman Mike Giuffre confirmed the team has called off public hearings scheduled for March 18 and 19.

The committee was convened in response to the Oxford Hills School District developing a consolidation proposal that would close Harrison Elementary, Waterford Memorial and Norway’s Guy E. Rowe Elementary schools in favor of a school for grades prekindergarten to five.

The Harrison committee and the SAD 17 elementary school construction committee have been working within a rigid timeline determined by the Maine Department of Education, set to culminate with a districtwide vote by November.

Recently, however, the DOE has granted SAD 17 a six-month extension to complete its site research, concept and architectural design, and community engagement work.

That reprieve allows Harrison to take a more measured approach toward its mission.

In some communities, such as Harrison, the prospect of closing a small elementary schools is a fundamental and emotionally charged change, making it difficult to discuss a more equitable education structure and fiscal facts that support consolidation.

Unofficially, Harrison officials began talking secession from SAD 17 last summer when they learned their elementary school could eventually close, with its prekindergarten to fifth grade students moving to a new consolidated school closer to Norway and its sixth-grade students attending a new middle school with seventh and eighth grade students in the Paris-Oxford-Norway area.

The location of a new consolidated school, and whether the eight district towns even approve building it, will have implications on Harrison’s decision. Many in Harrison wish to maintain their elementary school independence, with much of the opposition centered on long bus rides for its youngest students.

While some residents continue to suggest Harrison and Waterford, which already share consolidated elementary schools, break away to form their own district, officials and taxpayers in Waterford have taken no steps to oppose SAD 17’s school construction plans.

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