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BY MATTHEW STONE
Staff Writer 06/30/2008

Staff Writer

As Steven Lavoie prepares to take charge of Hall-Dale High School, he is joining a growing group of public school administrators in the area who are assuming double duty.

Instead of relinquishing his position as the district's middle school principal, Lavoie will serve as principal of both schools.

The move by School Administrative District 16 -- which serves Farmingdale and Hallowell -- to put one principal in charge of the schools makes Lavoie the latest in a string of administrators who are assuming two sets of responsibilities.

In Winthrop, middle school principal Karen Criss is preparing to add the responsibilities of high school principal to her job description for the coming school year. Since October, School Union 133 Superintendent Greg Potter has served as principal at Palermo Consolidated School while continuing to oversee the three-town school district. And four years ago, Mount Vernon Elementary School Principal Cheryl Hasenfus began splitting her time between Wayne and Mount Vernon Elementary schools.

The pattern comes at a time when the state is pushing school districts to merge to save on administrative costs. And the trend is becoming more common this year after the state cut $34 million in aid to local school districts.

SAD 16 Superintendent Donald Siviski said Lavoie's new assignment is related to the 2007 state law requiring school administrative units' central offices to reorganize. The Hallowell-based district in 2009 will combine with schools in Dresden, Monmouth and Richmond.

"We're reorganizing our administrative function, too," Siviski said, also citing recent appointments of assistant principals at the middle and high schools.

Lavoie said his oversight of both schools -- whose buildings are attached -- will allow the school system to better coordinate curriculum.

"As far as providing a cohesive six-to-12 program, I think it's very good," Lavoie said.

And, Siviski said, seeing a familiar face in the principal's office should help freshmen transition into their first year of high school.

"With one standard and one administration," he said, "we're hoping to ease that transition to prepare kids for the rigors of the secondary curriculum."

The change in SAD 16 is not necessarily a money-saving move. The system's 2008-09 budget boosts the middle school administration budget by 4.4 percent, to $159,000 from $152,000. The high school administration budget will jump 7.7 percent, to $170,000 from $157,000. Together, approximately 600 students attend the two schools.

In Winthrop, school board members billed the departure of two principals this year as an opportunity to reorganize administration and save tax dollars in an age of declining student enrollments.

The single-town district will now employ two principals, rather than three.

"People saw this as an opportunity to step up and look at restructuring and how it can benefit students and taxpayers," John Mitchell, the school board chairman, said in April.

Richard Durost, executive director of the Maine Principals' Association, said the pattern of administrators taking on additional duties can largely be traced back to the 2003 start of the state's Essential Programs and Services funding formula.

State funds are awarded to local districts based in large part on student population. At elementary and middle schools, the formula distributes funding based on a ratio of one administrator for every 305 students, according to Maine statute. In high schools, the state recommends an administrator for every 315 students.

"I think the way that we fund schools in Maine, it doesn't give real value to the number of administrators needed in this day and age," Durost said.

If school districts decide to maintain their administrator-to-student ratios, he said, taxpayers become responsible for the cost.

"What you're doing is putting an extra load on the local taxpayers if you're going to fund the position," Durost said.

Potter, the Union 133 superintendent and Palermo Consolidated School principal, said he splits his day between the 150-student Palermo school and the district's Whitefield central office.

"I certainly wouldn't be able to do it without help," he said, citing the district's decision to award a sixth-grade teacher a $7,500 stipend to assume some assistant principal duties.

The arrangement began in October when former Palermo principal Jason Tarr left the district. School board members recently renewed Potter's contract as principal through the end of the 2008-09 school year.

"We try to be fiscally responsible and be efficient," Potter said. "Sometimes it means doing more with the same."

Durost said forcing administrators to travel between two buildings often creates no-win situations.

"When you're working in multiple buildings, it almost always seems like you're in the wrong building," he said.

The setup is not ideal, Potter said, but became a realistic solution to a $115,000 drop in Palermo's state subsidy for the 2008-09 school year.

"It's certainly not the best of circumstances," he said, "but we're getting the job done."

Matthew Stone -- 623-3811, Ext. 435

mstone@centralmaine.com

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