On March 14, the Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor CSD School Committee heard from College Access Coordinator Hannah Johnson and her predecessor Kerrin Erhard on all the MELMAC activities this school year.

So far, students have had financial aid labs, visits to campuses around Maine and in Boston, a month-long string of activities and events to encourage applying to college, a Boothbay Region High School alumni panel, application help sessions, and a career day among other activities. Sixth graders have enjoyed a trip geared toward post-secondary education at Camp Kieve while seventh graders enjoyed a trip to Bowdoin College in Brunswick and eighth graders have undergone a three-day college counseling curriculum every quarter.

Future events include college fairs, PSAT and SAT preparatory sessions, college campus visits, and more for seventh and eighth graders, and a Senior Send Off Celebration. Erhard and Johnson reported seniors’ college application rate, to date, is 75 percent. 

Senior Lilly Sherburne and BRHS Principal Dan Welch proposed an honors-based system recognizing graduating seniors. The top 10 system recognizes only the 10 best grade point averages whereas the proposed honors system would work in two tiers – Magna Cum Laude (90-94 percentile) and Summa Cum Laude (95-100 percentile).

The proposal – originally brought forth by Page Brown through her Champions of Change project last year – sets forth an achievement-based honors system rather than a competitive one Welch and Sherburne said can disqualify high achieving students from certain scholarships and grants for college.

“What we're hoping to move over to is setting a threshold saying 'Any student can attain this if you meet this threshold,'” said Welch. “I'm all for competition, but each year it means something different. Some years the top 10 goes to someone in the mid-80's (while) in this year's class, the sixteenth student has a 96 GPA.”

Welch said about half  the conference’s schools already do this; for college admissions purposes, administration would still track and report top 10 students.

Members supported the proposal.

Boothbay Region Elementary School Principal Mark Tess reported several items of good news. The Boothbay Region placed exceptionally well in the 2018 State Winter Special Olympics Games with athletes returning with seven gold medals, four silver medals, four bronze medals, 11 fourth place finishes, 15 fifth place finishes, seven sixth place finishes, and one seventh place finish.

Three of Genie O'Connell's students were chosen to attend the District 3 Sixth Grade Honors Chorus Music Festival. Susie Edwards, Brianna Bryer and Jacob Taylor were among 100 students invited to sing in the district-wide chorus at Gardiner Area High School March 9.

Project Citizen, in which students from grades three through eight identify issues in the community and propose solutions, was postponed from Tuesday, March 13 to Tuesday, March 20. Tess said the program has been successful with some students taking solutions to their respective communities' boards.

Sherburne reported that since the Winter Carnival was postponed, students are thinking of hosting a new event, Spring Fling instead. Sherburne also reported that BRHS placed third at the Maine Drama Festival one-act competition.

“It was so fun and stressful and definitely worth it,” said Sherburne. “It was exciting to be around a lot of just cool and quirky people.”

The committee meets next at 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 28.