Maine’s movement toward school consolidation is sounding more and more like political campaigning. Proponents of bigger-is-more-efficient are seemingly oblivious of mounting evidence that merging school districts won’t save the money they claim it will. Worse, they continue to ignore the achievements of small community schools, including many on Maine’s islands. Maine’s commissioner of education has gone so far as to suggest that bigger schools can be more responsive than small ones to the differing needs of students, conveniently forgetting that it’s the small schools that have the flexibility to innovate and respond to changing circumstances.
“Ironically,” writes Danielle Hall in this month’s story about consolidation, “the one-size-fits-all education [the commissioner] is opposed to is least likely to be found in small schools. Much of what educators identify today as ‘best practices’ for schools originated in small, rural schools.”
But the campaign goes on, as big-district advocates do their best to convince the rest of us that consolidation means money will be saved, children better educated. What’s missing here is convincing evidence that those things will happen. Even in an election year when talk is cheap and evidence is often twisted to build a case, we deserve a better case for such a sweeping change in the state’s education system.