Maine is no longer the top-ranked state in the country for student achievement on college placement exams, U.S. News & World Report said Tuesday.

The state fell seven places to No. 8 on the magazine’s 2015 Best High Schools list after earning the top spot a year earlier.

This year’s rankings are based on the performance of high school seniors during the 2012-13 academic year on both Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate tests, according to the magazine. Both tests assess knowledge and critical thinking skills and have other measures.

Of the 95 Maine high schools deemed eligible for the study, 17 were found to have superior student performance on college placement exams, representing 17.9 percent of all eligible schools.

High-performing schools earned either a gold, silver or bronze medal. Three high schools in Maine earned gold medals, and 14 were awarded silver medals. Bronze-medal schools were not considered for the purpose of state-by-state rankings. A full list of the Maine schools that earned medals was not available as of press time.

The previous year, only 90 high schools in Maine met the study’s eligibility requirements, which were loosened this year to allow more schools to be included. Still, that year four schools in the state earned gold medals and 16 were awarded silver medals, for a total of 20 schools, or 22.2 percent of all schools.

In 2014, the top-ranked high school in Maine for achievement on college placement exams was the Maine School of Science & Mathematics in Limestone, followed by Falmouth, Yarmouth, Cape Elizabeth and Kennebunk high schools.

The No. 1-ranked state in the country for 2015 was Maryland, in which nearly 29 percent of high schools earned medals. Of the 232 eligible schools, 20 were awarded gold medals and 47 earned silver medals. It was followed by California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., Florida and Ohio. After Maine, New York and Virginia rounded out this year’s top 10.

Gov. Paul LePage has been critical of the overall preparedness of Maine students for college and work, saying K-12 schools need to do a better job. In stumping for his budget and tax reform package this year, he has repeatedly cited the high number of Maine high school graduates who need remedial classes once they get to college.

The Westbrook schools’ former athletic director, who resigned last year after a controversy about the overturned suspensions of student-athletes, will receive more than $125,000 in a settlement agreement reached Monday with the school department.

Marc Sawyer stepped down last spring, after less than two years on the job, citing “the incestuous culture of the community.”

The settlement agreement says Sawyer made workers’ compensation claims that the school department denied.

In addition to a $125,364 payment to Sawyer, the department and its insurer, MEMIC, agreed to pay $35,637 to the law firm representing him, Troubh Heisler.

Sawyer’s attorney, Jonathan Goodman, declined to comment on the agreement, which bars Sawyer from making any “derogatory or defamatory statement” about the Westbrook School Department, its employees or school officials. Any violation of that provision entitles the school department to collect $5,000 from Sawyer.

Sawyer’s resignation came at the end of a year of turmoil for the school department, starting with the suspension of about 30 student-athletes who attended a party with alcohol in the fall of 2013.

Because administrators differed in their interpretation of the school’s alcohol policy, the suspensions were overturned. That enabled several members of the football team to play in a playoff game, which triggered accusations of favoritism from the community.

An investigator hired to look into how the discipline was handled found the high school administrators lacked experience, confidence in their decisions and support from their superiors and parents.

In the spring, police broke up another underage drinking party attended by Westbrook student-athletes, who were suspended from their teams. Soon thereafter, Sawyer, who had planned to step down at the end of the school year, went on leave and decided not to return because “personal challenges have hampered his ability to fulfill (his) duties” as athletic director, a staff memo said at the time.

Goodman said Sawyer has found other employment, but declined to be specific other than to say he does not work for a school department.

A 1991 Westbrook High School graduate, Sawyer worked as a health and physical education teacher and baseball coach at Bonny Eagle High School before he was hired as Westbrook’s athletic director in 2012.

Westbrook Superintendent Marc Gousse said Monday he had no comment on the specifics of the settlement.

“The matter has been resolved by mutual consent of all parties involved,” he said.

The agreement is subject to approval by the Maine Workers’ Compensation Board.

Portland voters approved the school district’s $102.8 million school budget Tuesday night, with fewer than 1,000 of the city’s roughly 54,000 registered voters casting ballots.

The vote was 653 for the budget, 317 against. The 970 voters represent less then 2 percent of those registered in Portland.

The budget, a 1.2 percent increase over the previous school budget, has been described as “modest and austere” by school Superintendent Emmanuel Caulk. It increases the school portion of Portland’s tax rate by 23 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value, adding $46 to the annual tax bill for a $200,000 home.

The budget makes some presumptions about the state budget being debated in Augusta.

Under Gov. Paul LePage’s proposed state budget, Portland’s state education funding decreases $920,000, or 6.5 percent. The district also is adjusting for the added cost of funding teachers’ retirement, a change made two years ago by the LePage administration.

The budget also eliminates $250,000 in direct payments to charter schools that enroll Portland students. LePage signed a bill last week spreading charter school costs across all districts instead of directly billing them to charter school students’ home districts.

The budget includes money for a 1.6 percent increase in staffing, for a student population that increased about 1 percent.

The budget adds 17 additional locally funded staff positions, including two previously grant-funded teachers at East End Elementary School, a community engagement coordinator position, and 14 positions that were added since the last budget, bringing the total staff to 1,101 positions. The district also has 93 grant-funded positions.

Enrollment for 2014 was 7,034 students, up 56 students from 2013.

Voter turnout for school budget referendums has been lower than for general elections. Last May, 1,492 or 2.9 percent of the city’s registered voters cast ballots in the school budget referendum.

WASHINGTON — A report on student testing released Thursday finds big gaps in most states between the percentage of students shown to be proficient in reading and math on state tests and the much lower number found to be proficient on a national benchmark test.

Dozens of states showed significant gaps between their state tests in the 2013-14 school year and the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress on tests of reading and math in fourth and eighth grades.

The picture is expected to change in upcoming years because many states have raised their academic standards and started using new tests to measure them this year.

“Too many states are not leveling with students or parents. They’re being told students are proficient, but by external benchmarks they’re not prepared at all,” said Michael Cohen, the president of Achieve, the education reform group that conducted the survey.

Achieve helped the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers develop the Common Core, the standards that define what students should know and be able to do in math and English in each grade.

In a compromise designed to settle differing ideas about how to provide online learning resources to Maine students, the state Department of Education would create a Web-based digital content library under a bill unanimously supported Thursday by the Legislature’s Education and Cultural Affairs Committee.

“I’m OK with this as a pretty good start,” said the committee’s Senate Chairman Brian Langley, R-Ellsworth, who had sponsored one of two online learning bills this session. The education department proposal replaces the language in his bill, L.D. 1230, which included specific requirements such as having content providers apply to have their materials and classes made available on the state website.

Instead, the department would work with a task force to create a digital library to be in place by the start of the 2016-17 school year. The group would establish criteria for what material to include, create a rating/feedback system, and create a way for educators to add their own materials and access other materials on the site.

The bill would allow the education commissioner to approve and oversee the project, and to contract out any work to implement any recommendation of the task force.

The committee also added language to require the department to give the committee an annual report on the project.

The bill now must still get the approval of the full Legislature.

Rep. Brian Hubbell, D-Bar Harbor, who had also proposed a similar online resources bill, said he was happy with the new proposal.

“What counts is that we start moving on this,” Hubbell said. “If this gets it going, it seems like a good outcome.”

Hubbell and Langley both emphasized that their overall goal was similar, to create a single website that pools materials that have been vetted and approved by the state and has a user-review system, something Langley compared to Amazon and its feedback section.

Such a site could list a generally available Khan Academy math course, for example, but also inform users that the course had been reviewed and specifically meets Maine’s seventh-grade math requirements.

Online educational resources are already available to Maine students, from free websites to educational cooperatives such as the fee-based Virtual High School, which already serves about 50 Maine high schools.

The Maine Department of Education also lists preapproved online learning providers. The eight schools currently on the list include New Hampshire’s Virtual Learning Academy and the two for-profit education providers working with the state’s virtual charter schools.

CONCORD, N.H. — William Shakespeare and Robert Frost made an appearance in the New Hampshire Senate on Thursday, as lawmakers approved a measure requiring schools to give parents at least two weeks’ notice if a teacher plans to use material related to human sexuality or sexual education that some could consider objectionable.

Sen. David Watters invoked the Bard and New Hampshire’s favorite literary son to oppose the bill, which came in response to an angry father’s complaint last year that he didn’t know his high school-age daughter was reading a novel that contained sexually explicit material.

Watters, an English professor at the University of New Hampshire, said the bill opens the way to censorship where classic works of literature could suddenly find themselves on the objectionable list.

“Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo,” Watters said, gesturing to the Senate balcony before riffing on the Shakespeare tragedy. “Yo, Juliet, I’ll have to get back to you in two weeks. We’re talking about teenage sexuality here.”

Alas, Watters, who also recited part of Frost’s poem “Putting in the Seed,” couldn’t carry the day as the measure passed by a Republican-led, party-line vote, 14-10.

It follows a controversy last year when William Baer complained that his daughter, a student at Gilford High School, had read a novel about bullying that contained a sexually explicit passage. Baer said the book “Nineteen Minutes” by New Hampshire author Jodi Picoult read like “the transcript for a triple-X-rated movie.”

The Gilford school board later apologized for not sending home prior notice.

Supporters of the measure rejected the censorship argument.

“It was offensive to him,” Republican Sen. Kevin Avard said of Baer’s reaction to “Nineteen Minutes.” “He couldn’t read it in front of his daughter. Parents have a right to know.”

Parents already can object to material in a school’s curriculum; the bill adds the two-week notification and specifically identifies human sexuality as a topic. Parents have to identify, in writing, the specific material they consider objectionable and agree with the school on an alternative to meet educational standards.

Besides the two-week notice, the bill calls for schools to make the material available to parents when practical. It strips language from a similar House bill that allowed for reprimand of teachers who don’t give notice. The amended version now goes back to the House.

If all goes as planned, Demetri Maxim will have figured out a way to grow a human kidney from skin cells by the time he is likely to need his own transplant.

Just 17 years old, the junior at Gould Academy in Bethel already has used skin cells to grow kidney tissue that functions in mice.

And his quest is winning national recognition.

Maxim’s project was named the best in the cellular and molecular biology category at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in Pittsburgh on Friday.

Maxim was one of 20 winners out of 1,700 students – selected from 422 fairs in more than 75 countries – to participate in the world’s largest high school science research competition.

The great-great-great-grandson of Hiram Maxim, the Sangerville native who invented the first portable machine gun and battled with Thomas Edison over the patent for the lightbulb, Demetri Maxim has won the Maine State Science Fair the past two years. Both projects were designed to help patients with kidney failure, the disease he saw his mother almost die from when he was 5 years old.

Polycystic kidney disease, a genetic disorder that killed Maxim’s great-grandfather, forced his mother to get a kidney transplant and has him getting checkups every six months to make sure any developments are caught early.

It’s also inspired Maxim to devote his time to finding a solution, at least when he’s not pursuing his other goal: skiing in the Olympics.

A dual citizen of Cyprus and the United States, Maxim hopes to represent the Mediterranean country in the 2022 Winter Games. But after breaking his ankle this winter, he had more time for his scientific passion. And it paid off.

Maxim left Pittsburgh on Friday with nearly $10,000 in scholarships and cash from awards he received at the fair, as well as a trip to India.

“It was probably the best day of my life,” he said – the opposite of how he felt a year ago, when he came home from the Intel fair empty-handed.

Last year, Maxim developed a non-intrusive test that could determine whether a transplant patient was rejecting a new organ. The disappointment of not winning inspired him to go further.

Maxim is a day student at Gould, a private boarding school. His parents live in Bethel and in Lexington, Mass.

Working at Harvard Medical School, he spent last summer and then vacations and weekends during the school year – sometimes staying up all night – to grow functioning kidney tissue from patients’ skin cells. That would mean people needing kidney transplants could grow them from their own cells and not have to take the immunosuppression drugs that his mother will be on for the rest of her life.

He’s also investigating the possibility of using gene editing to ensure that the disease won’t attack the new kidney.

As far as he knows, he’s gone the furthest with that research, but he doesn’t have a great guess as to when he’ll be able to achieve the ultimate goal of a human transplant.

“I wish I knew so I could save my mom,” he said, but it will probably be at least another decade or two. Still, that’s likely long before he’ll need his own kidney transplant.

His mother, Lefki Michael-Maxim, said she told her son he should pursue whatever career makes him happiest.

“He shouldn’t feel responsible for me, as his parent,” she said.

But she couldn’t be prouder of his awards Friday or of his work on a deserving cause.

“He wants to help people and help himself in the process, and I’m very, very happy he’s doing that,” she said.

Maxim said some young scientists see a win at the international fair as their greatest achievement, but he says it’s just the start of his work.

He hopes to follow in the footsteps of his legendary ancestor. “He was the ‘wow’ of the family,” Maxim said.

Getting a patent in March for last year’s project was a first step.

Talking about what’s next, Maxim sounded more like a regular teenager than the groundbreaking scientist he’s become.

“I just want to keep doing cool stuff,” he said.

The number of new students planning to attend the University of Maine System this fall is down about 5 percent from the same time last year, but some of the smaller campuses are showing big increases, according to the latest data.

The number of first-time and transfer students putting down deposits by the May 1 deadline is up at four campuses, including a 34 percent jump at the University of Maine at Presque Isle and about 15 percent increases at both the Fort Kent and Machias campuses. UMaine Farmington posted a 9 percent increase, according to data as of May 11, and compared to the same time period last year.

Numbers are down at the three biggest campuses: the flagship University of Maine in Orono, the University of Southern Maine, and the University of Maine at Augusta.

Deposits at USM, which has been in the spotlight in recent years for financial problems that have led to program and faculty cuts, are down 15 percent. At Orono, which has typically had strong enrollment numbers even when other campuses lagged, deposits are down 4 percent. Augusta, which has a large number of older students who tend to enroll late, is down 24 percent.

The figures do not include returning students.

Rosa Redonnett, chief student affairs officer for the system, said all of the campuses are tackling the enrollment issue aggressively.

“They’re on the right track,” said Redonnett, adding that each campus has unique approaches to recruitment depending on its market and offerings. “They’re doing all the things you can do. It’s such a complicated mix and the competition is so fierce.”

Redonnett said the Presque Isle campus has launched several recruiting strategies, from touting its new proficiency-based curriculum to hiring a recruiting firm.

“It’s really paying off,” she said.

The final fall 2014 student headcount was down 2.5 percent systemwide from the year before.

The system has faced years of financial shortfalls. On Monday, the system’s board of trustees will vote on a $518 million budget for the fiscal year beginning in July that includes cutting 206 positions systemwide and using $7 million from emergency reserves. Last year’s $529 million system budget required using $11.4 million in emergency funds and cutting 157 positions.

Officials say the budget deficits are the result of flat state funding, declining enrollment and three years of tuition freezes. This year, the governor has proposed increasing state funding for the university system, but the state budget is still being debated.

Attracting out-of-state students is a high priority, since they pay about $30,000 in tuition and fees, three times the in-state rate.

Last year, out-of-state enrollment was up more than 10 percent systemwide. So far this year, out-of-state deposits are up at Farmington, Presque Isle and Machias, and down elsewhere.

Maine’s declining youth population means the in-state pipeline for state colleges is shrinking.

“Some of (the deposit numbers) are still a reflection of what’s going on with demographics in the state,” Redonnett said. “That’s a problem that doesn’t go away.”

At USM, turnaround efforts include a $1 million ad campaign, $1 million in additional scholarship money and aggressive recruiting out of state, including the northern coastal areas of Massachusetts and New Hampshire areas, USM spokesman Chris Quint said Friday.

So far, the number of out-of-state transfer students is up 33 percent, from 46 students to 61.

“This isn’t going to turn around overnight,” Quint said. “We’re going to continue to see enrollment down into fall, but we’re really happy seeing pockets of improving numbers. We just have to continue to be aggressive.”

A spokeswoman for the University of Maine in Orono said the school has a fall 2015 enrollment target of 2,065, roughly the same size class as last fall.

“While gains and losses experienced over the summer months make our final fall 2015 enrollment difficult to forecast, we are pleased to be running ahead of our target at this time,” Margaret Nagle said in an email. The school’s in-state enrollment is stable, she noted, and Orono continues to recruit out-of-state students, which are down 5 percent from last year.

WASHINGTON — Nearly 1 in 4 surveyed U.S. students say they have been bullied in school. That’s an improvement, but the prevalence reinforces just how difficult the problem is to solve.

The survey from 2013 found that 22 percent of students age 12 to 18 said they were bullied.

That’s a 6 percentage point decline from two years earlier, when 28 percent of students said they’d been bullied.

It’s the lowest level since the National Center for Education Statistics began surveying students on bullying in 2005, the Education Department said Friday in announcing the results.

Educators and researchers praised the decline, but said the large numbers of students still reporting that they are victims reflects that the issue is difficult to understand and address, particularly in a world of rampant online social media where malicious statements can be made anonymously and shared quickly and broadly.

Among respondents, 9 percent of girls and 5 percent of boys said they’d experienced cyberbullying either in school or outside of school.

Unwanted text messages were the most common way students said they were cyberbullied, followed by hurtful information posted on the Internet.

Overall, bullying can be physical, verbal or relational – such as leaving someone out on purpose.

Respondents said that being made fun of, called names or being insulted was the most common way they were bullied at school. Being the subject of rumors or threatened with harm was also common.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan praised the news of an overall decline but with a caveat: “Even though we’ve come a long way over the past few years in educating the public about the health and educational impacts that bullying can have on students, we still have more work to do to ensure the safety of our nation’s children.”

Surrounded by a sea of University of New England graduates lining up for commencement Saturday, Kerri Szolusha made last-minute adjustments to her mortarboard, decorated with daisies against an aqua green background.

“It’s so outrageously decorated,” said Szolusha, of Woodstock, Connecticut, a neuroscience major with a minor in art therapy.

Szolusha was among 1,449 graduates – about half of whom sported decorated mortarboards – who received bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees at the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, where the university’s 180th commencement ceremony took place.

A couple of miles away, 60 graduates of Husson University received diplomas at the school’s southern Maine commencement at Woodfords Congregational Church in Portland. Husson’s commencement in Bangor was held last Sunday.

University of New England graduates said decorating their mortarboards helped personalize the ceremony at the arena, where graduates, faculty, families and friends filled up most of the 9,500 seats.

David Hague of Middletown, New Jersey, wore a mortarboard with a plastic snowy owl and a snow leopard on top.

“These are my two favorite animals,” said Hague, an environmental studies major who is headed for an internship on the Hudson River with the National Park Service.

Brittney Painter of Charlottesville, Virginia, about to receive a master of science in nurse anesthesia, said she couldn’t pass up making a reference to her field of study on her mortarboard, which read, “Keep calm & bolus the Propofol,” which refers to a dose of a common surgical anesthetic.

Painter has landed a job at Maine Medical Center.

Kiera Latham, a biology major from Byfield, Massachusetts, put a quote from the “The Lord of the Rings” on her mortarboard.

“Little by little, one travels far. I am a really big fan of the Lord of the Rings,” said Latham, who is headed to Boston University for a master’s in public health.

UNE President Danielle Ripich told students to expand their aspirations and connect to their surroundings.

“Find a way to merge your personal expertise and ambition with the capacity you possess to brighten the lives of others,” Ripich said.

UNE gave honorary degrees to Michael McCarthy, who has worked as principal of King Middle School in Portland for 27 years and twice received the Maine Principal of the Year award, and Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, president and chief executive officer of Goodwill Industries of Northern New England.

Roosevelt, the granddaughter of Franklin D. and Eleanor Roosevelt, was also the commencement speaker. She told graduates the world needs them.

“This world depends on each of us to keep thinking about, caring about and considering the implications that our decisions and actions have on our economy, our environment and our neighbors,” Roosevelt said.

The Husson graduation featured Robert Montgomery-Rice, president and chief executive officer of Bangor Savings Bank.

During a one-year pilot, Athens Community School teachers will share administrative duties.

ATHENS — When their principal resigned a few months ago for medical reasons, teachers at Athens Community School wondered what to do.

The school in Somerset County has 14 teachers and about 120 students in pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. It shared its principal with another school, so she was in the school only a few days per week last year.

“She was splitting her time and it seemed like when we needed something or something came up, she wasn’t available for us,” said Tammy Moulton, an eighth-grade teacher who has taught in Athens for 30 years. “Between obligations at another school and meetings she had to attend, she wasn’t often available, and we found ourselves doing a lot of things anyway. We had to make decisions and get things done on a daily basis.”

One teacher saw an article about a “teacher-led” school – there is no principal and teachers are fully responsible for all decisions – and they decided the model was something they wanted to explore.

In March, a small group of teachers formed a steering committee to look into the idea and visited Portland’s Howard C. Reiche Community School, the only teacher-led school in Maine. There are 70 such schools around the country, according to the Teacher-Powered Schools Initiative, which is run by two nonprofit groups, Education Evolving and The Center for Teaching Quality.

With so many years of experience as a teacher, Moulton said she and a few others were approached about taking over as principal, but she didn’t like the idea of not teaching. The teacher-led model was an alternative.

After getting approval from the school board last week, the teachers of Athens Community School are launching a one-year pilot program as a teacher-led school.

“We thought it kind of looks a lot like what we’re already doing; what about looking into it?” Moulton said.

MOVEMENT GAINS MOMENTUM

Teacher-led schools date back to the 19th century and one-room schoolhouses led by a single teacher. The title “principal” is derived from “principal teacher,” often known today as a “lead teacher,” said John Wright, director of strategy for the National Education Association.

More recently, teacher-led schools have become popular in the charter school movement. In 2009, the Math and Science Leadership Academy in Denver became the first teacher-led school started by a teachers union and functioning in a public school district, Wright said.

In Maine, Reiche School, a public elementary school serving kindergarten through grade 5, became teacher-led in 2011 after it had a high turnover rate of principals.

“Teacher-led schools have gained momentum,” Wright said. “I wouldn’t say it’s a tidal wave, but there is certainly a movement.”

He cited Reiche School as one of the most successful instances of a school converting from a traditional principal-led leadership to a teacher-led one.

Yet the overall success of the school is debatable. The Department of Education gave the Reiche school an F letter grade in 2014, and data show that only 50 percent of students were proficient in mathematics in the 2013-2014 school year and only 55 percent were proficient in reading. The statewide average was 63 percent proficiency in mathematics and 71 percent in reading.

However, there are notable differences between Reiche and the Athens school. The Portland school has more than 400 students and about three times the number of teachers. It is also in an urban area where 78 percent of students qualified for free and reduced-price lunch this year. Enrollment has grown by more than 70 students since 2011 and crowding is a concern.

Athens got a C from the state last year, with its students exceeding proficiency in mathematics, but falling just below the state average in reading. The school is in a rural area where enrollment has been consistent and poverty rates are lower. According to the Education Department, 64 percent of students in Athens qualified for free and reduced-price lunch this year.

The Athens teachers who visited Reiche noted differences in the two schools, including their sizes and staff numbers, but still believed the model would work for them.

In an anonymous poll taken by teachers and staff at Athens Community School, 16 people voted in support of the teacher-led model, while two rejected it.

“We cannot say who was opposed to the idea,” said Amy Bown, a second-grade teacher and member of the steering committee, a group of four teachers who explored the model. “We can surmise that those opposed were reluctant to take on additional responsibilities, or feel a need for a traditional structure, but this is speculative.”

Being a principal is not easy, and it has become increasingly more demanding in recent years with additional education requirements and standards such as the Common Core curriculum, state assessments and teacher evaluations, said Dick Durost, executive director of the Maine Principals’ Association.

Durost wouldn’t comment directly on the teacher-led model except to say, “We believe it is important to have a traditional principal in every school.”

“The job has become so much more involved in the last 10 to 20 years than it once was, and we believe there needs to be that go-to person in the building,” he said.

Yet members of the Athens school board and the superintendent of Alternative Organizational Structure 94 said they support the idea, after hearing a presentation from the teachers on the model and approving the one-year pilot at a board meeting last week. The school has been part of AOS 94 since leaving the Madison school district in 2013.

“I was actually against it from the beginning,” School Board Chairman Alan Linkletter said. “But all the teachers were really for it, and we trust their judgment. I’ve been in other schools, and the teachers here really are exceptional and extremely professional.”

Linkletter said he initially opposed the idea because he was concerned that there would be a lack of leadership – that no one would be available during the day to discipline students, speak with parents or handle administrative paperwork – but then he realized that many of the Athens teachers already were performing those tasks. When the school shared a principal last year and at the beginning of the current school year, she was in the building at most 2½ days a week, he said.

Cynthia Streznewski resigned earlier this year, and since then the school has been running under the leadership of a single lead teacher, with others pitching in to help.

“It’s kind of what they’ve been doing anyway,” Linkletter said. “We know it will be a lot more work, but I think they’re willingness to step up to the plate was what convinced us.”

THREE-TEACHER LEADERSHIP TEAM

The new model, which will be similar to the Reiche School’s, will use a three-teacher leadership team responsible for discipline, paperwork, budgeting, teacher assessments, communication with parents and attending meetings.

Other teachers will be divided into four committees: the steering committee, responsible for teacher-led school research, communication between committees and updates on the model to the school board; a professional development committee, responsible for workshops, educational development and webinars; an instructional leadership committee, responsible for data, assessment and curriculum; and a climate committee, responsible for personnel, wellness and school safety.

Next year’s inaugural leadership team hasn’t been decided yet, but the steering committee, the only committee formed so far, is hopeful that the three chosen teachers will come from three varied areas of the school: elementary education, middle school education and special education.

“I think by playing to everyone’s strengths and what they are good at, it will actually make the leadership stronger,” Bown said. “Right now our biggest concern is time. We will need time to do all the committee work and make sure everything is done, because maybe there were things done behind the scenes before that we didn’t know about.”

The lead teachers will be given $6,000 stipends and be required to work extra hours, while committee members will get per diem stipends totaling no more than $4,000 per committee. The cost of a full-time principal would be about $60,000, so the school is saving about $30,000 under the teacher-led model, Linkletter said.

“I think there will be a cost savings, but that’s not our main focus,” said David Hatch, a special education teacher who has taught in Athens for two years. “Principals come; principals go. They have their agendas. They have their educational initiatives. It’s all good stuff. But these people know this house and that’s why they said, ‘We want to take care of our own house. We don’t want somebody to come in and tell us how to run our business for a couple years and then go on to something else.'”

The Maine Department of Education does not have requirements for school leadership structure, and in general it is a decision that is made on the district level, said Rachelle Tome, the department’s chief academic officer.

The district is asking the leadership team teachers to take classes to work toward an assistant administrative certificate, AOS 94 Superintendent Kevin Jordan said. Harmony Elementary School, which is also in the school district and shared a principal with Athens through this year, is currently hiring for a teaching principal, someone who works as a part-time teacher and part-time administrator.

Rachel Ohm can be contacted at 612-2368 or at:

rohm@centralmaine.com

Twitter: rachel_ohm

BANGOR — A new graduate center expected to unify the University of Maine System’s business and law schools may eventually expand to include other graduate programs, but project leader Eliot Cutler is urging the system to use caution so that the planned center doesn’t grow too fast.

“I don’t want to blow it. I don’t want to see us taking on so much that we’re overloaded,” Cutler told the system’s trustees in a briefing Sunday, seven weeks after being hired to oversee development of the center, which would be based in Portland.

“There are a lot of other programs that fit neatly, frankly, in the center,” he said, adding that he personally would like to see the Muskie School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine included immediately with the business and law schools. “But I’ve always felt strongly that you’ve got to crawl before you walk.”

Cutler, a lawyer and businessman who has run twice unsuccessfully for governor, was hired in late March for an 18-month assignment as chief executive officer of the graduate center initiative. He is charged with finishing the planning and program development process, building partnerships with Maine businesses and law firms, and present his proposal for the center to the trustees and the Harold Alfond Foundation in September 2016.

Chancellor James Page said Cutler’s final report must also make the business case for the center, and define how to measure its success.

“We have a very aggressive timetable,” he said of Cutler’s task.

Cutler said his initial assessment found that the center needs to reach four principal goals. It must be of sufficient size and variety to be academically distinctive, have a flexible curriculum that attracts students and meets market needs, have sufficient physical space and have sufficient funding.

“We don’t start with any of it,” Cutler said.

Cutler said he has spent most of the past seven weeks with people both on the campuses and in the legal and business communities building support and understanding about the center, and also laying the groundwork to attract future financial support.

The Harold Alfond Foundation provided $500,000 to pay for a market study on the center and an additional $1.25 million for its early-stage development r, which includes funding Cutler’s $195,000 annual salary.

The foundation’s board “has been very supportive so far,” Cutler said. “They have a deep interest in seeing this happen. It’s fair to say we anticipate and hope they will be the lead investor” in the center.

After his remarks, system officials made it clear the Harold Alfond Foundation has not made any future funding commitments.

Cutler said he has found broad support for the center in his recent conversations.

“I have been astonished as well as encouraged by the outpouring of support and enthusiasm from the legal and business community in the state,” he said.

Cutler said there was support from many faculty members, but also some “apprehension and uncertainty,” which he attributed to “rumors” about the center.

“I want to assure faculty that we need and welcome their serious engagement in the process,” he said.

He also announced that there would be two new pilot courses offered this fall using a combination of graduate program resources, something he has said would demonstrate the value and premise of combining and unifying different graduate programs. One, a course on negotiations, will involve the business schools at the University of Maine in Orono and at USM, as well as the University of Maine School of Law. Another, an environmental law course, will be taught by faculty from the USM business school, the law school and Muskie, along with guest lecturers, Cutler said.

Also Sunday, the board honored USM Acting President David Flanagan, who ends his tenure July 1 when new President Harvey Kesselman takes office.

In accepting a plaque, Flanagan said he was “bullish on USM” but acknowledged it had been a difficult year.

“The job you gave me was triage. (USM) was in financial free fall and my job was to stop that and reverse it. I think we’ve done that,” he said. “This has been, safe to say, the most difficult job I’ve had in my life. But it’s been very rewarding.”

The trustees meeting will continue on Monday, when the board is scheduled to vote on a $518 million budget for the fiscal year beginning in July. The budget includes cutting 206 positions systemwide and using $7 million from emergency reserves. Last year’s $529 million system budget required using $11.4 million in emergency funds and cutting 157 positions.

Thornton Academy Headmaster Rene Menard will be honored at the White House on Monday for the Saco school’s success in enrolling overseas students.

The President’s “E” Award recognizes efforts to increase U.S. exports, which in Menard’s case is exporting education.

“It’s counterintuitive,” Menard said with a laugh.

But recruiting and enrolling 155 students from 22 countries, bringing in $7 million in tuition and fees, is no laughing matter. It has transformed the school financially, academically and culturally since the international program was launched in 2008, Menard said.

“We are preparing our students for a changing world. What better way than to bring the world to Thornton Academy?” Menard said.

Thornton Academy started seeing declining local enrollment years ago, and decided to add dorms and a residential program to boost enrollment at the academy, which serves as the local school for Saco-area residents but charges tuition for students outside the school district.

Tuition for in-state boarding students, set by the state, is $10,300 a year. Foreign students pay $42,000 a year for room, board and tuition.

Implementing the plan required building the dorms, setting up a new admissions office, hiring more staff and launching a recruitment process that included overseas travel to trade shows to talk to prospective students and their families. The two new dorms filled up quickly and today the school books every available bed, and has about 40 more international students who stay with families in the community.

“This strategy was a leap of faith and we decided we are going to take the risk,” Menard said.

It’s an idea being pursued by many Maine schools, from public K-12 schools to the University of Maine System. Maine is the oldest state in the nation with declining numbers of young people, and that has severely hurt local school budgets. Gov. Paul LePage recently announced an October trade mission to Japan and China for both business and educational institutions.

But visa regulations limit foreign students to just one year at a public school, whereas there is no limit to how long students may attend private schools.

Menard said the additional revenue from the international students has been used to expand academic programs. Before those students arrived, Thornton Academy offered six Advanced Placement courses; today there are 24. It also offers seven foreign language courses and a full symphony orchestra, he said. In turn, those expanded academic offerings become a recruiting tool to attract new students, he said.

Menard said the school may expand the international program in the future. There are two sites – located between the existing dorms – on the school’s 88-acre campus that are already permitted by the city for the construction of more dorms.

“For now, we’re really focused on refining the program (and) providing support for these students,” Menard said.

Most of the international students are from China, and all of them attend Thornton Academy because they want to get into an American college, he said. Attending a high school gets them familiar with American culture, strengthens their language skills and can ease the transition to college.

“The demand for an American education in China is massive,” he said. Parents’ sending their children to Thornton Academy or another U.S. high school is “the best way” to give them an advantage, he said.

Noel K. Gallagher can be contacted at 791-6387 or at:

ngallagher@pressherald.com

BANGOR — The University of Maine System board of trustees voted Monday to freeze tuition and approve a $518 million budget for the fiscal year beginning in July that uses $7 million in emergency funds despite cutting 206 positions systemwide.

The budget reflects a “significant drop in revenue,” down 3 percent from $531 million last year to an estimated $515 million, due in part to fewer students enrolling and the campuses offering tuition breaks to attract students, according to Rebecca Wyke, the vice chancellor for finance and administration.

Trustees voted to freeze in-state tuition for the fourth year in a row, if the governor’s two-year proposed budget is approved.

Tuition at the University of Maine remains higher than the national average of $9,139 annually. At the flagship campus in Orono, in-state tuition and fees are about $10,606. Tuition and fees at the University of Southern Maine are $8,540 a year.

Trustee Jim Erwin noted that enrollment is declining faster than the state’s demographic decline, a sign that not only are there fewer potential students, but that some students are choosing to attend other higher education institutions.

“This budget holds us functional, but work lies ahead,” Irwin said. “We haven’t hit bottom yet, in my opinion.”

Last year’s $529 million system budget required using $11.4 million in emergency funds and cutting 157 positions.

Wyke said ongoing financial problems could result in the system’s bond rating being downgraded by Standard & Poor’s. A lower credit rating would mean the system would have to pay higher interest rates on any future borrowing.

In February, the New York credit agency downgraded its long-term outlook for the system from stable to negative, citing declining enrollment and high turnover among leadership at the seven campuses. S&P left the system’s credit rating unchanged at AA- on outstanding revenue debt, and also assigned a rating of AA- to the system’s $46.24 million in 2015 bonds.

Wyke said the system does not have any cash flow issues now, and does not plan to go out for a bond anytime soon, but S&P will at some point reassess the system’s ratings.

“My view is, yes, we should brace ourselves,” Wyke told the trustees. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say that if things didn’t turn around for us, we would be downgraded.”

Enrollment was down 2.5 percent systemwide last fall. Overall, enrollment is down 7.5 percent over the last five years, and five campuses have interim presidents.

The University of Maine System faces a potential $90 million deficit by 2020, based on trends in its current budget.

Also Monday, system officials announced a new credit transfer agreement with the Maine Community College System. The agreement will automatically allow students to seamlessly transfer 35 units of general education courses.

“This is the first time in 45 years we have had this degree of cooperation, coordination and integration between the two systems. It should be of tremendous benefit,” Chancellor James Page said, announcing the agreement at the board of trustees meeting on Monday.

A signing ceremony will be held in the upcoming weeks, Page said.

The agreement is important because students have complained that credits earned at the community colleges did not easily transfer to the state’s four-year universities.

CONSOLIDATION PLAN APPROVED

The trustees also approved a plan to consolidate financial and administrative functions across the system, as part of the decision to move toward working as a single, unified system instead of as seven distinct, separate universities overseen by one central office.

As part of the reorganization, the system’s central office in Bangor will close, and the various systemwide administrative units will be located at whichever campus makes the most sense, Page said.

The system already consolidated information technology and purchasing functions into single, systemwide units in the past two years, and the trustees approved consolidating human resources functions last fall.

In other business, the trustees approved a five-year strategic plan for the University of Maine at Augusta that focuses on distance learning and serving students across the state.

They also approved the creation of a new multi-campus Bachelor of Science degree in cybersecurity, offered through a collaboration between the University of Maine at Fort Kent, UMA and USM.

SKOWHEGAN — Bright orange ribbons marked the rough outline of a path through the Whitten Brook Conservation Area on Monday morning as a handful of local students worked to clear trees and pull roots.

The conservation area, a small portion of the brook’s 300-acre watershed, is one of just a few urban wild brook trout streams in Maine, but has been damaged over the years by urbanization along the Route 201 corridor, which has brought metals and other pollutants into the brook through runoff.

Restoration efforts have been going on since 2012, including a new trail that was started by the students on Monday.

“The more this area gets cleaned up, the more it gets treated well,” said Derek Ellis, a member of the Skowhegan Conservation Commission and the park director at nearby Lake George Regional Park. “People are here anyway, and the trail will help keep them focused.”

Over the last year, Ellis has been working with a group of students from the Marti Stevens Learning Center, the alternative education program in School Administrative District 54, on conservation projects at the lake as part of an “outdoor classroom” project.

While most of the work the students have done so far has been at Lake George, on Monday they visited the conservation area to start on a new project. The conservation area, which many students said they didn’t know existed before Monday, is located off Russell Road.

The trail will help to better preserve the pond for the trout because it will keep people focused on a designated area of the woods and prevent littering, Ellis said. It will also help stabilize the steep bank around the pond, preventing erosion and protecting the fish’s habitat.

Restoration efforts at Whitten Brook have been underway since 2012, when the town received an $88,649 grant from the Maine Environmental Protection Agency to change the flow of runoff from downtown Skowhegan that was carrying pollutants into the brook.

Since then, retention ponds have been built behind Madison Avenue to collect polluted stormwater runoff from downtown and prevent it from entering the brook. The water quality, which is monitored by the Skowhegan Conservation Commission, has improved, but there is still work to be done, Ellis said.

“It has come a long way. With the creation by the EPA of those retention cells, that’s cleaned it up significantly. It’s an ongoing thing. It’s a lot bigger project,” he said.

The students will also be working on trail restoration at the Yankee Woodlot behind the University of Maine Cooperative Extension on Wednesday, Ellis said. They will complete the two projects in the fall.

“This is the type of stuff I like to do even when I’m not in school,” said Benton Stamper, 18, a senior who will be graduating in a few weeks. He said he hopes to find a job in landscaping or a similar field.

In addition to the two projects the teens are working on with Ellis, their teacher, Josh Harris, said he hopes they can take the skills they’ve learned and apply them to restore a trail behind the Marti Stevens center next fall.

“I hope they can take the skills they’ve learned at Lake George and out here and work on the trail that we have,” he said. “Not only that, but they’re building a connection to the community.”

Former speaker of the Maine House Glenn Cummings will become the next president of the University of Southern Maine, filling a void left when the school’s first choice for the post said he couldn’t take the job because of upheaval at his current university.

Cummings will be the fourth president at USM since 2011, and takes over as the campus and the state’s university system continue to struggle with financial problems caused by declining enrollment, flat state funding and three years of tuition freezes.

Cummings replaces Harvey Kesselman, the system’s first choice for president, who was supposed to start work at USM on July 1. Kesselman said unforeseen circumstances at Stockton University, where he is now acting president, were behind his decision to stay in New Jersey.

Stockton’s president stepped down in April after two Atlantic City casinos blocked the school’s plan to open a campus in a shuttered casino on the boardwalk that the university had purchased for $18 million. A legal covenant with Trump Entertainment and Caesars Entertainment required that the building be operated as a casino hotel. That prompted a hearing by a legislative budget committee, a no-confidence vote by the faculty at Stockton University and the resignation of President Herman Saatkamp.

“While I eagerly anticipated being part of USM’s resurgence, the tremendous sense of obligation I have to Stockton University means I must forgo the opportunity to lead the University of Southern Maine,” Kesselman said Wednesday.

University of Maine System Chancellor James Page said Wednesday that he understood Kesselman’s decision.

Kesselman first notified Page two weeks ago that he might not take the job, and earlier this week the chairwoman of the Stockton University Board of Trustees sent Page a letter formally requesting that Kesselman be permitted to withdraw from his contract with USM.

“Harvey Kesselman’s long, capable service and dedication to Stockton University were among the qualities that made him such an appealing choice to join our leadership team in Maine,” Page said in a prepared statement. “While we sincerely enjoyed getting to know Dr. Kesselman and looked forward to working together, we respect his decision and admire his devotion to Stockton.”

Cummings referred to Kesselman’s decision and took a good-natured jab at Page in the process.

He noted that Page was presented two finalists for the USM presidency and opted not to choose Cummings. Then the “Creator intervened,” Cummings said, to reverse the chancellor’s decision. “I didn’t think that Creator would use a casino scandal.”

On Wednesday, Page described Cummings as a long-serving USM faculty member with longstanding ties to the state.

While interim president at UMaine-Augusta, Cummings helped lead a successful strategic plan and capital campaign, quickly developed an expedited bachelor’s degree program for displaced workers at the Verso paper mill in Bucksport, and strengthened the school’s veterinary technician degree program to provide Jackson Labs with the skilled workers it needed, Page said.

“I have every confidence President Cummings will be the leader to build on USM’s existing strengths and to realize the enormous potential and promise that is the University of Southern Maine,” Page said.

System officials decided not to reopen the presidential search because they thought the original search “was a resounding success in terms of community and campus engagement,” said system spokesman Dan Demeritt.

Cummings said Wednesday that he would strike a balance between developing better relationships with students and the community to attract students, and tackling difficult financial challenges.

“I appreciate all the nice-guy comments, but unfortunately the common welfare has to come first and is more important than anyone’s popularity. … We’re going to have to work hard to get ourselves fully out of the woods,” Cummings said during a news conference announcing he would fill the role as of July 1.

“Having said that, I think we’re in a good position as long as we’re moving forward to be able to make this university grow,” said Cummings, who will be paid $235,000 a year.

For several years, USM has made deep cuts to deal with multimillion-dollar budget deficits. Multiple protests and marches were held last year, including a brief takeover of a trustees meeting by students, when 51 faculty positions and five academic programs were eliminated in cost-cutting measures.

Cummings acknowledged those challenges Wednesday.

“The evidence is emerging that like a Maine spring, USM is slowly but beautifully surviving a dark Maine winter and it is going to get brighter and brighter,” Cummings said.

Cummings succeeds interim USM President David Flanagan, who was appointed to a one-year term in July, replacing Theodora Kalikow, who stepped down after two years as interim president. Kalikow came out of retirement to fill the position after Selma Botman stepped down amid faculty unrest.

The university system has had a string of top leadership changes at its seven campuses in recent years.

Currently, the system has only two permanent presidents, Kate Foster in Farmington and Linda Schott in Presque Isle, who were both hired in 2012. The other campuses have temporary presidents, serving terms of up to two years.

The leadership changes were cited in a February Standard & Poor’s report downgrading its long-term outlook for the system from stable to negative, citing declining enrollment and high turnover among leadership at the seven campuses. A lower credit rating would mean the system would have to pay higher interest rates on future borrowing.

Faculty leaders said they were happy about the choice of Cummings, who before joining the system was president and executive director of Good Will-Hinckley and the Maine Academy of Natural Sciences in Hinckley, one of the first charter schools in the state.

The head of the USM Faculty Senate said Cummings brings “educational experience and leadership at every level.”

“The time Glenn has spent in classrooms in Maine high schools, community colleges and right here at USM will be very valuable as we work together to attract and retain the students we are committed to serve. On behalf of the faculty, I congratulate President Cummings on his new job and offer assurances that we are ready to get to work on USM’s future,” Faculty Senate Chairman and music professor Dr. Thomas Parchman said in a prepared statement.

“Glenn Cummings will be a great leader for USM,” said Susan Fiener, economics professor and president of the USM chapter of the Associated Faculties of the University of Maine System.

Portland Mayor Michael Brennan said Cummings would be a strong advocate for creating an educational partnership between USM and Portland, and would help transform the public education system in the state’s largest city.

“Today (Cummings) is accepting responsibility for current students at USM, but also for the next generation of Maine students and for the next generation of Maine citizens,” Brennan said.

State political leaders also praised the choice.

“Students and faculty alike have a champion in Glenn. He has the skills and relationships to take USM to its full potential,” Senate Democratic Leader Justin Alfond of Portland said in a prepared statement.

House Republican Leader Ken Fredette of Newport cited Cummings’ work at Good Will-Hinckley.

“As a USM graduate, it is my hope that this appointment will lead to stability and continue to build upon USM’s growing reputation and potential for a great urban campus,” Fredette said in a prepared statement.

Marpheen Chann-Berry, a student at the UMaine School of Law, said Cummings was a promising choice, given his background as a former state legislator and an official at the U.S. Department of Education.

“I hope that he goes beyond simply ‘managing’ USM and uses his experience to be an advocate, not only for USM, but for the surrounding communities, towns and cities that are impacted by what happens at USM,” Chann-Berry said in an email.

Staff Writer David Hench contributed to this report.

A legislative committee is expected to vote Friday on a bill that would make it more difficult for parents to opt out of the vaccinations required to attend public school in Maine.

The measure, which drew scores of supporters and opponents to a State House hearing last week, will likely win a recommendation from the Health and Human Services Committee. However, it faces an uncertain future because of opposition from Gov. Paul LePage, and proponents may not be able to muster enough support on the floor of the Legislature for the two-thirds margin needed to overturn a veto.

The bill by Rep. Linda Sanborn, D-Gorham, would require parents seeking a philosophic exemption from vaccines to consult with a medical professional and obtain a signature before opting out. Maine has one of the highest rates in the United States of voluntary opt-outs for children entering kindergarten – 5.2 percent in 2013-14 and 3.9 percent in 2014-15. In at least 60 schools, voluntary opt-out rates exceed 10 percent.

While Maine allows parents to obtain non-medical exemptions on philosophic and religious grounds, almost all of the opt-outs in Maine are for philosophic reasons, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control data.

Rep. Richard Malaby, R-Hancock, said he’s against Sanborn’s bill, L.D. 471, and in favor of parental choice, although he had his own children vaccinated.

“I’m all for informed consent, but I don’t think it’s an appropriate role for the state to script this conversation,” Malaby said.

Dr. Dora Anne Mills, a former Maine CDC director and the vice president of clinical affairs at the University of New England, compared vaccines to the debate over second-hand smoke. It took several sessions before lawmakers agreed to ban smoking in indoor public places in separate laws approved in the mid- to late-2000s. While Mills said there always will be a minority who are skeptical of vaccine safety, or who falsely believe debunked claims that vaccines cause autism, general awareness that unvaccinated students pose a public health risk will help the bill become law, if not this year than in the near future.

“The culture has to change, where it’s no longer socially acceptable to send an unvaccinated child to school,” Mills said.

Scientific research overwhelmingly supports that vaccines work, and that immunization rates need to be as high as possible to reach “herd immunity,” which protects those who are not old enough to be vaccinated or those who are immune-compromised from an illness, such as leukemia. Herd immunity starts waning for some diseases when less than 95 percent of the population is vaccinated.

Several states have tightened vaccination requirements in recent years, and a measles outbreak that originated at Disneyland in California this winter put a spotlight on areas with low childhood vaccination rates.

California and Vermont are poised to eliminate philosophic exemptions, with governors in both states indicating they would sign bills making their way through state legislatures. In Vermont, Democratic Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin reversed his stance from 2012, when he vetoed a similar bill.

AUGUSTA — Maine parents would have to consult with doctors before exempting their children from vaccinations required by public schools, under a bill that won endorsement from a legislative committee Friday.

But despite Maine’s relatively high vaccine opt-out rates, the Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee voted unanimously to reject a separate bill that would have eliminated the philosophical exemption that has sparked a heated debate over vaccine safety and “herd immunity.”

The committee voted 9-3 in support of L.D. 471, the bill that would require any parent who seeks a philosophical exemption from vaccines to first consult with a medical professional and obtain a signature. Lawmakers from both parties supported the measure; the three dissenting votes were cast by Republicans.

“There are risks in every medical procedure and other things that we do in life, and I think parents have a right to weigh those risks,” said committee co-chair Rep. Drew Gattine, D-Westbrook. “But I think this is an important step to make sure that important conversation happens with respect to something that doesn’t just protect the child being vaccinated, but other children as well.”

The bill could face tougher votes in the House and Senate, and a potential veto by Gov. Paul LePage.

Maine now allows parents to opt out of required vaccines for their children on both philosophical and religious grounds. The vast majority of exemptions are for philosophical reasons, a trend that reflects concerns in some segments of the population that childhood vaccinations could trigger autism or health problems.

Medical professionals and scientific research assert that vaccines are overwhelmingly safe for recipients, and provide what is known as “herd immunity” – in which high vaccination rates help protect those who are too young to be vaccinated or those with weakened immune systems.

An outbreak of measles that sickened hundreds in California last winter has elevated the debate over vaccination exemptions to the national stage.

Maine has one of the highest voluntary opt-out rates for children entering kindergarten in the country, at 5.2 percent in 2013-14 and 3.9 percent in 2014-15. The opt-out rates at dozens of schools exceed 10 percent, raising concerns that the lack of “herd immunity” could lead to outbreaks of infectious diseases such as measles, polio and pertussis.

A Portland Press Herald analysis of Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention data showed that at 39 primary schools, 20 percent or more of the students had not had a measles shot, while at least 60 elementary schools had vaccination opt-out rates exceeding 10 percent.

Tonya Philbrick, who directs the Maine CDC’s immunization program, told committee members Friday that Maine’s overall vaccination rates have held steady or increased since 2009 and are comparable to national averages. But Philbrick acknowledged that there are pockets with higher opt-out rates.

“In any community where the immunization rates might not be up to the state average, I don’t want to say that there is an air of concern, but I think there are opportunities for education and dialogue to happen between parents and those (vaccine) providers,” Philbrick said.

KEEPING THE EXEMPTION

Committee members sent a strong message that they support the current exemption option by voting unanimously to reject L.D. 606, the bill that would have eliminated the option for parents of school-age children. The three members who voted against L.D. 471 – co-chair Sen. Eric Brakey of Auburn, Rep. Deb Sanderson of Chelsea and Rep. Richard Malaby of Hancock, all Republicans – opposed adding requirements on parents who are concerned about vaccinations.

Brakey said he felt the bill requiring parents to consult with doctors begins to encroach on parents’ ability “to make choices about what goes into their children’s body.”

“I”m very uncomfortable pushing a decision like that,” Brakey said. “When there is risk, there should be choice.”

Ginger Taylor, a parent who’s heavily involved in preserving the philosophical exemption, said she and others concerned about vaccine risk were “very, very pleased” with the overall results. While she hopes the Legislature will ultimately reject L.D. 471, she echoed comments from some lawmakers that she hopes it will lead to more open dialogue between doctors and parents.

“This is a difficult issue,” Taylor said afterward. “The committee listened to us and they heard us.”

WATERVILLE — In a world filled with chaos, debt and war, we can find hope by collaborating and working together, actor and filmmaker Robert Redford told graduates of Colby College on Sunday.

Redford, whose grandson is a member of the Class of 2015, delivered the keynote address at the school’s 194th commencement.

“After you leave this school, where you’ve had the security and the comfort of the school itself and your friends, when you step out of that, you’re stepping into a world that’s, well, it’s pretty rough, pretty chaotic,” Redford told the graduates. “It’s divisive. You have climate change. You have debt. Wars. It’s kind of a grim story, but I think the story can be retold and I think you’re the ones to do it.”

A total of 488 graduates were honored Sunday at the ceremony on the lawn outside Miller Library. Honorary degrees were given to Redford and four others.

“For two centuries, students, faculty and families have gathered in Waterville on days like this to celebrate achievements earned, to reflect on four years of personal and intellectual growth, and to look ahead to a future filled with possibilities,” Colby President David A. Greene said in a welcoming address. Greene, who took office as the school’s 20th president in September, also noted the importance to him and his family of being at their first graduation on campus.

“I hope you will recognize in your times of challenge and moments of exhilaration that the human spirit is nourished through collective wisdom, support and action,” Greene told the graduates. “We do not walk this world alone, and we do not succeed without the love, guidance and the occasional push from others.”

His message was similar to the one offered by Redford, who is known as the founder of the Sundance Institute and Sundance Film Festival and as a two-time Academy Award-winning actor and director.

Redford began his address by talking about the value of a good teacher. He described himself as an easily distracted elementary school student who would often draw stories for himself under his desk. Instead of punishing him for not paying attention, Redford’s third-grade teacher saw that his classmates were delighted with his drawings and allowed him to draw pictures weekly for the class, as long as he promised to pay attention. He then asked the graduates to focus on two words: hope and collaboration.

“Compromise is supposed to be the definition of politics. It’s the art of compromise, but we don’t see it. Obviously something has to change, and I think you’re the ones to do it,” he said.

Redford recalled the movie “All the President’s Men,” in which he plays Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward in the newspaper’s investigation of the Watergate scandal. The movie was released in 1976, but years later Redfrod said he was prompted to review archival footage when a television station asked him to consider revisiting the story.

“Looking at the footage, there was a moment that stunned me,” Redford said. “The Watergate hearing committee was made up of people from both sides of the aisle – Republicans and Democrats – and what really stunned me was how this panel was working together to get to the truth. I thought, ‘Wow, there was a time.’ It is possible. It can be done, and I think I’m putting it in your hands.”

Margaret Bower, the senior class speaker, reflected on the experience of the Class of 2015 in a humorous address in which she recalled her first visit to Colby as a child with her father, an alumus, and her brother, a member of the Class of 2017.

“It’s been exhilarating, exhausting, informative and really such a gift,” Bower said of her time at Colby. “How lucky have I been to be able to walk this campus, live here, learn here and meet people that I’m obsessed with for four years?”

The 488 graduates on Sunday included students from 43 countries and many from Maine. Honorary degrees also were given to Deborah Bial, the president and founder of the Posse Foundation; Andrew Davis, an arts, education and environmental philanthropist; Roger Ferguson Jr., president and CEO of TIAA-CREF; and Jose Antonio Vargas, a journalist, filmmaker and founder of Define America.

After the ceremony, Sara Gibbons, a graduate from Devonshire, Bermuda, said she plans to move to New York City to apprentice for the David Dorfman Dance company. “I’m going to miss the people and the community here at Colby,” said Gibbons, who was a theater and dance major.

Kaitlyn O’Connell, another graduate, said she will attends graduate school for biomedical science at Tufts University. She hopes to become a pediatric dentist.

“I’m definitely going to miss everything about it,” said O’Connell, who is from Danvers, Massachusetts, and played field hockey at Colby. “It’s been an awesome four years. I can’t imagine not coming back in August for the field hockey preseason.”

Acting University of Maine President Susan Hunter will stay on for an additional year at the Orono campus after her contract was extended to 2017, the University of Maine System announced Tuesday.

Hunter, who will continue to earn $250,000 a year, was named to a two-year term as president in June 2014 to succeed Paul Ferguson, who left for the presidency at Ball State University in Indiana.

Hunter, a cell biologist, previously was the system’s vice chancellor for academic affairs. She has also served as executive vice president for academic affairs and provost on the Orono campus.