The RSU 78 Board of Education met via Zoom and in person on February 8, 2022. The meeting opened with three presentations from RSU 78 staff.

The first was from Lynda Feins, Behavior Specialist, who shared an ongoing initiative in the K-5 grade span to create habits of good behavior, focusing on the RLRS “core” of Responsibility, Leadership, Respect, and Service.   This was presented to the students via an assembly and a call to school staff to “catch” kids making good choices. Once “caught” staff reward students with a 3D printed letter “R” which they can redeem at the end of the week for prizes. Middle school students are helping to run the store and other students are helping to create the Rs using the school’s 3D printer.

The second presentation was from Shawn Russell, Technology Coordinator. He shared a little about the 3D printers at RLRS. The printers were donated by Dave and Sandy Perloff. The Perloffs recently donated additional filament to RLRS. Retired science teacher Lucy Simonds frequently used the 3D printers in her classroom. Students generally use TinkerCAD to create their designs. Katie Willis, head of Gifted & Talented and Intervention is using the printers often with her G/T students, and middle school continues to use the printers in their science classroom. Looking to do more integration with the printers across all grade spans.

The final presentation came from PK-12 Physical Education & Health teacher Lindsay Richards, who provided an update on the WinterKids competition. RLRS is competing against 12 other schools across the state and is entering te final week of the 4-week program. RLRS is the only school in Franklin County on the competition track. First place receives $10,000 and prizes tier down from there. Thus far participating students have received water bottles, pedometers, snow shoes and other outdoor fitness equipment. Thank you to Ecopelagicon, Linda Dexter, Peter Christiansen, and Joanna Farrar for all your help and support. Thank you to teachers and staff for being so flexible and supportive of the program! WRGY is planning to cover the closing ceremonies. WinterKids updates, photos and videos are available at the school website.

Board Chair Mary Richards acknowledged the recent passing of former School Librarian Janet Waugaman, who had been at RLRS for more than 20 years before her retirement in 2020. The library is named after her. Janet’s husband, Reggie Hammond, has requested that any donations in remembrance of Janet be made out to the Janet Waugaman Library at Rangeley Lakes Regional School and sent to the school. To date $3200 has been donated to the school library.

Superintendent Georgia Campbell gave kudos to Lynda Feins for the new behavior incentives, Lindsay Richards for WinterKids coordination, and Joanna Farrar for stepping in at the last minute to help with WinterKids. Superintendent Campbell also shared the progress of the outdoor classroom, which was designed and is currently being built by former RLRS graduate Nels Christiansen, son of current staff member Nini Christiansen. Approximately 25 people from Stratton came for an informal information session about students attending RLRS. Barry London

(Stratton Superintendent) says there is excitement in the community and he will be presenting to his board. There was some discussions around transportation and costs.

Student Representative Mya Laliberte (Class of ‘22) shared that high school basketball teams had been playing a lot of games over the past few weeks to make up for earlier missed games. Ski team is doing well and looking forward to the Conference Championships later in the week. Music students participcated in the Kennebec Valley Music Festival. Congrats to Winnie Larochelle (Class of ‘22) for scoring 1000 points over her basketball career at RLRS!

Principal Seth Laliberte shared that RLRS again had a strong showing for the Scholastic Art Awards with many honorable mentions, silver keys and gold keys awarded to RLRS students. These awards and the works of art can be seen on the Scholastic Art Awards website. Work continues on the early release Tuesdays. Shawn has been providing technology trainings, middle school is working on classroom management and an interdisciplinary unit for the spring, high school is hard at work on The Project and Program of Studies, and Seth is doing a books study on reading curriculums with the elementary teams.

Committee reports were brief. Chris Farmer presented that the draft of the 2022-2023 budget will be ready to present to the board at the March meeting. Deb Ladd presented on a number of facilities updates. The communications committee is workshopping guidance from law and from policy to find the right plan for RLRS. Will be reaching out to other schools to discuss and compare. The curriculum committee continues to meet and is making progress.

All policy motions and discussions were tabled until the March meeting due to technical difficulties.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:15pm. The next board meeting was scheduled for Tuesday, March 8th at 6:00pm at the Rangeley Lakes Regional School.