Category: Newsroom Articles

Students Showcase Their Expertise at Annual SkillsUSA Championships in Bangor

(Pictured: A student operating heavy equipment in a simulator as part of the Heavy Equipment contest at SkillsUSA)

Career and Technical Education (CTE) is growing in Maine, and it was all the more evident at the SkillsUSA Maine State Championships held in Bangor recently. Students enrolled in the many career and technical education (CTE) programs found in schools across Maine gathered in Bangor for an exciting two-day event where they got the chance to showcase the skills they have mastered. (See Maine DOE’s 2023 CTE Infographic to learn about CTE expansion in Maine.)

SkillsUSA is a national career and technical student organization serving more than 395,000 high school, college, and middle school students, and professional members enrolled in training, trade, technical, health, and skilled service occupations. Maine’s Chapter hosts an annual Championship event each year where students get the opportunity to showcase their skills by competing in various contests that allow them to show off what they know.

Contests include everything from wedding cake decorating to firefighting, computer programing, auto tool identification, everything in between, and then some! There were over 70 different contests that students participated in over the two-day event that columnated with an awards ceremony at Bangor’s Cross Insurance Center.

For many of the students, coming to SkillsUSA is an incredible accomplishment that they take a lot of pride in, and this year was extra special because they got the chance to share it with family and friends for the first time in a few years. The event, held at United Technologies Center (UTC), Eastern Maine Community College, and Cross Insurance Center, was held in person and the public was allowed to attend for the first time since before the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The exciting event bustled with groups of students, educators, instructors, and administrators, as well as TV news crews, family members, and supporters observing, snapping pictures, and taking videos of students while they competed.

Culinary Arts
Television Video Production
Cake Decorating
Restaurant Services
Television Video Production
Criminal Justice Bowl
Auto Tool Identification
Construction
Plumbing
Plumbing
Welding

Braden Luce competed in the Welding Sculpture contest along with twelve other students this year. Braden is enrolled in school at both Madomack Valley High School and Mid-Coast School of Technology where he participates in the welding program. He says he loves the program because of the hands-on aspect of it. Braden tells us that he looks forward to school every single day and is even disappointed when school gets closed on snow days.

Welding Sculpture
Welding Sculpture
Welding Sculpture
Welding Sculpture
Braden Luce

Ahna Higgins competed in the Job Interview competition where she placed third earning a bronze medal. “I am very satisfied with my work in this competition because it helped me create connections in my technical center and become more confident in my interviewing skills,” she said. Ahna is a student at Somerset Career and Technical Center (SCTC) and Skowhegan Area High School. Last year she was enrolled in SCTC’s Certified Nursing Assistant Program and this year, her senior year, she has been part of the Early Education and Teaching program.

Higgins describes the work she does at SCTC as very fulfilling. “I get to spend my time in class doing things that really matter to me like working with children and learning about their development,” she said. “While preparing for SkillsUSA I also got the opportunity to prepare myself for an interview in the Education field,” she added. In the fall Higgins is planning to attend the University of Maine at Farmington to major in Elementary Education.

Ahna Higgins working in SCTC’s Early Education and Teaching program
Ahna Higgins at SkillsUSA
Ahna Higgins with friends at SkillsUSA

The Maine Department of Education congratulates all of the students who competed in SkillsUSA this year! We extend a special thank you, as well, to Maine’s Career and Technical Education schools for their continued dedication to providing quality career and technical education pathways to students across Maine.

Find the names of award recipients from the 2023 SkillsUSA Championships here.

Find more pictures from the conference, including the awards ceremony on the SkillsUSA Facebook Page.

See more media coverage of this event at the following links:

To learn more about SkillsUSA, check out Maine’s website here. To learn more about Career and Technical Education in Maine visit the Maine Department of Education’s website.

Comments Sought on Maine’s IDEA Part B Application

The Maine Department of Education (DOE) is seeking comments from the public on its annual application for federal funds under Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which covers services to children with disabilities ages 3-22.

The application, which covers Maine fiscal year 2024 (starting July 1, 2023) is posted on the Maine DOE’s webpage at https://www.maine.gov/doe/learning/specialed/ideapublic. The Part B budget is estimated/projected on the basis of Maine’s award for the State’s current award, pending the State’s receipt of the finalized federal award for the coming year. Both documents will be posted from March 24, 2023, through May 23, 2023.

Written comments will be accepted from, March 24, 2023, until 4 p.m. on Friday, April 28, 2023. Please send comments to Erin Frazier at erin.frazier@maine.gov or 23 State House Station, Augusta, ME. 04333.

Filing of Chapter 101: Maine Unified Special Education Regulation Emergency Rulemaking

The Maine Department of Education has identified a barrier to its obligation pursuant to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the Maine Unified Special Education Regulation (MUSER) to ensure the provision of a free, appropriate public education (FAPE) to all eligible students, including the availability of a continuum of educational placements. The current funding structure outlined in Section XVIII.3.C(2) of MUSER for private schools that serve exclusively students with disabilities (referred to throughout as “special purpose private schools”) is causing those schools to limit or cease operations, leaving some of Maine’s most significantly impacted children without the educational placements they are entitled to by law. Further breakdown of this critical component of the continuum of educational placements will leave the State unable to maintain compliance with IDEA and MUSER. 

The Department has determined that a rule change is necessary on an emergency basis in order to protect the public health, safety and general welfare by ensuring that there is a continuum of placements available for all students with individualized education programs (IEPs) in accordance with federal and state law as follows: 

  • Change #1: Section XVIII.3.C(2) is amended to change the required number of instructional days to the “sum of the days on which instruction was provided in accordance with the school’s calendar” rather than the actual days of student attendance for the year.  Rationale:  The current funding formula penalizes the private school when a student is unable to attend, even if the lack of attendance is due to a disability-related reason, despite the obligation of the private school to have staff and supports available for the student every day of the school year. 
  • Change #2: adds a section (2A) to allow the Department to “recalculate the number of student days for the remainder of the fiscal year 2023 and the entirety of fiscal year 2024 using the number of days on which instruction was provided in accordance with the school’s fiscal year 2022 calendar and recalculate each school’s allowable expenditures and 2023 tuition rate using the revised number of student days.  The Department shall notify each special purpose private school of its revised tuition rate, which shall be effective immediately and applies to the remainder of fiscal year 2023 and the entirety of fiscal year 2024.”  Rationale:  The current funding formula operates on a one-year delay – this change ensures that additional monies will flow to the impacted schools now, to prevent closures or cutbacks.    
  • Change #3: adds a section (4A) which provides that “nothing in subparagraph (4) shall limit any increase in the tuition rate resulting from the change in calculating the number of student days in subparagraph (2) from the actual days of student attendance to the days on which instruction was provided in accordance with the school’s calendar.”  Rationale:  This change ensures that any increase in tuition resulting from the change in 2023 does not get reduced by the cap on the percentage of increase from year to year. 

A period of public comment opens today, March 24, 2023. Due to the need to prevent imminent harm to the students who depend on these educational placements and the emergency status of this rule change, the public comment period has been reduced to 10 days.  

Written comments may be submitted to DOE Legislative Team member Laura Cyr, State House Station #23, Augusta, Maine 04333; 207-446-8791 or laura.cyr@maine.gov until 5:00 p.m. on April 3, 2023. 

In addition, a public hearing for the proposed new rule will be suspended due to the emergency nature of this change. As an emergency filing, the proposed changes become active upon filing and are in effect for a period of one year from the filing date.  

Timeline for Rulemaking for Chapter 101 – Emergency, Major Substantive  

Comment Period Begins: March 24, 2023 

Comment Period Ends: April 3, 2023 

Anticipated Date of Adoption: April 10, 2023 

The proposed amendment to Chapter 101 can be found here: https://www.maine.gov/doe/about/laws/rulechanges   

 

 

 

Maine DOE Child Nutrition Kicks off 2023 Farm-to-School Cook-off on March 27

(Pictured: Caleb Pratt & Gina Bailey from Team Son-Day- competing in last year’s Westbrook Regional Cook-off)

The Maine Department of Education, Child Nutrition team is kicking off their annual Farm to School Cook-off this month! The cook-off is a statewide culinary competition for teams of school nutrition professionals and students to promote local foods in school meals. This voluntary competition is made available to all school districts in Maine.

This year, two regional competitions will be held:

  • March 27th – Teams representing RSU 54 and RSU 21 will compete.
  • April 5th – Teams representing Lewiston Public Schools and RSU 17 will compete.

Both competitions will take place in the Child Nutrition Culinary Classroom in Augusta. The top team from each regional competition will face off at the final’s competition, also in Augusta, to determine the 2023 Farm to School Cook-off State Champion.

2022 Cook-off Champions- McMahon Tigers: Alain Lemesse & Alicia Smith
2022 Cook-off Champions- McMahon Tigers: Alain Lemesse & Alicia Smith

Each team, consisting of one student and one school nutrition employee, is tasked to prepare a breakfast and lunch meal using specific recipe guidelines and time restrictions and will present to a panel of judges. At least three local ingredients and one USDA food must be used in each meal. Local rolled oats donated by Maine Grains and local carrots donated by Emery Farm will be used as “challenge” ingredients in the competition. All recipes will later be shared in a Maine farm-to-school cookbook to be used in future school meals programs.

For questions about the Farm-to-School Cook-off, contact Maine DOE Child Nutrition Supervisor, Stephanie Stambach at stephanie.stambach@maine.gov. For more information on Maine’s Farm and Sea to School program, visit https://www.maine.gov/doe/farmtoschool.

Exciting MLTI Student Conference Updates!

Registration is NOW Open for Virtual and in Person MLTI Conferences

We’re excited to announce that registration for the 20th annual student conference is now open! To ensure that you and your students will receive an MLTI t-shirt, please complete the registration form no later than April 4th. We are asking for one lead teacher to complete the registration for the student conference. We’ve streamlined the registration process to ease the task of registering your entire group. Click here to access the registration form.

Conference Proposals Deadline for Submission – March 28th

We’re still looking for conference proposal submissions for the MLTI student conference! If you are interested but would like to know more, all information for both the virtual and in-person student conferences can be found on our website. Click here to access the submission link.

USM Location Cancelled

We are not having an MLTI Conference at the University of Southern Maine due to limitations of parking and conference space.  Unfortunately, the campus doesn’t have space for the agenda we have planned for this exciting conference.  Our conference schedule is now: Virtual Conference on May 18th and In-person Conference on May 25th at the University of Maine in Orono.

Family Engagement Grant Opportunity Information Sessions

Through the Centers for Engaging Families across Maine (CEFAM), ParentPowered will be offering an informational session about their evidence-based family engagement messaging curriculum titled Ready4K.  In partnership with the Maine Department of Education’s (DOE) Climate, Culture, and Resilience Team, this five-year grant is slated to provide a limited number of schools the opportunity to implement Ready4K.   

ParentPowered delivers an evidence-based family engagement curriculum that is delivered directly to families via text message, serving families from birth through middle school (8th grade) with trauma-sensitive tips and activities that are leveled for the child’s age and stage of development.  

The curriculum is aligned with the Maine Learning Results and leverages the unique parent-child relationship – making sure that the skills are always oriented around parents’ strengths – to help children thrive in all areas of life- academically, socially, emotionally (and so much more!). 

There is also an additional support stream that links families with critical local resources and supports to help ensure they have housing, food assistance, healthcare care and other essentials. 

Links to the webinars can be found below. School administrative units (SAUs) only need to attend one session in order to apply for the opportunity for selection. After the webinar, Family Engagement/Cultural Responsibility Specialist, Melanie Junkins, will provide a link for the application. 

March 30, 2023 10:30am 

Or 

March 30, 2023 3pm 

Contact for information: Melanie Junkins (melanie.junkins@maine.gov)

Sacopee Valley High School ELO Coordinator Making a Big Impact on Students’ Career Paths

“The best part of my day is working directly with my students,” said Elizabeth Sanborn, Sacopee Valley High School’s Extended Learning Opportunities (ELO) Coordinator. “It is a lot of fun helping them discover their interests and then create opportunities for them to explore careers.”

Sanborn is invigorated by the students’ excitement and commitment to their experiences with extended learning opportunities. The new initiative also helps reinvigorate schooling and reconnect the students, the school, and the community, especially following the health restrictions that felt like they separated schools and communities during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Some of Sanborn’s recent successes include helping a student make a connection with a local tattoo artist to learn more about the career, including how to run a successful business. Another one of her students got the opportunity to interview several registered Maine guides and is currently studying for his own test in the spring. “He attended a three-day training class back in January and sent in for his Maine guide license just last week,” said Sanborn.

Here are some more student success stories, directly from students:

“I decided to do an ELO to make connections in the law field before going to college for law next year,” explains Abigail Sanborn, a Sacopee Valley senior. “This past semester I was partnered with a local civil law firm, where I went twice a week for an hour. I got to participate in simple drafting of documents, acting as a witness for estate planning, and got to interview several clerks, judges, and lawyers. During this second part of the year I am doing day trips to the Cumberland County District Attorney’s where I’m job shadowing different prosecutors. I am also exploring other avenues of law by doing ride-alongs; I wasn’t expecting to like police work, but that is what ELO’s are for. It’s an experimental opportunity for students to determine what they like and don’t like. Mrs. Sanborn has been a huge part in helping me find these opportunities and is always willing to find you experiences that you may not think of!”

“My ELO journey has been sort of complicated, but Mrs. Sanborn has been the best at getting me where I want to be,” said Elise Hermance, an 11th grader at Sacopee Valley High School. “I started off knowing I wanted to be a dog trainer and breeder. I sat in on a few classes up in Conway, NH. I came back to Mrs. Sanborn after going around three times and told her that this wasn’t for me. I know I want to do something with animals, but I am not sure that dog training is for me. I then did a job shadow at the Sacopee Valley Veterinary Clinic with a vet tech and it was so fun. They were all so nice to me. Now I am applying for a volunteer position at the Animal Rescue League of Greater Portland. I am so excited to have this opportunity in my life. Not just the job shadowing and knowing what I want and don’t want to do but the fact that I have learned so many different skills. I know how to reach out to people that I don’t know. None of this could be possible without Mrs. Sanborn!”

“It is amazing to be able to help a student fulfill a lifelong dream that they weren’t sure how to navigate before Sacopee Valley High School had this program at our school,” said Sanborn.

Sanborn has started to make some great connections with area businesses and hopes to continue that work throughout the year. “We have a lot of industry professionals who are excited to work with our students, and it really will be a win-win situation for all involved,” she added.

Sanborn would like to extend a huge thank you to Dr. Chris Parent at Sacopee Valley Family Dentistry, Bonnie Gould of Heritage Law, Tasha Berouty at Hallow Point Tattoo, and Wendy McGary and Ashley Blanchard at Sacopee Valley Elementary School, just to name a few!

Are You Ready for the Week of the Young Child?

The Week of the Young Child, a national event sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) to celebrate the importance of high-quality early learning, takes place April 1st -7th.  The Maine Department of Education (DOE) and Maine’s Office of Child and Family Services (OCFS) are excited to celebrate the event with early childhood educators across the state.

The Week of the Young Child kicks off on Saturday, April 1st, and is followed by opportunities to celebrate using interdisciplinary daily themes throughout the week. How will you celebrate?

Visit the Week of the Young Child resource page on the DOE website for information on the daily themes, scheduled events, and resources for celebrating.  The page includes links to the NAEYC and MAEYC sites, MAEYC’s planning guidebook, and videos that the DOE developed to support early childhood educators in celebrating the daily themes and integrating them into their day-to-day practice.

Let’s work together to spread the word about the importance and value of high-quality early care and learning! Share photos of your celebrations on social media using the hashtags #WOYCMaine and #WOYC2023 to connect with MDOE, OCFS, MAEYC and NAECY.

Email photos along with the name of your program (use WYOC and the daily theme in the subject line) to Nicole Madore at nicole.madore@maine.gov for an opportunity to win a free registration to the Maine Statewide Early Childhood Education Conference which will be held October 27th & 28th at the Holiday Inn by the Bay in Portland.

Youtube logoCheck out the Maine Department of Education’s Week of the Young Child YouTube Playlist from April 3rd -7th to watch videos highlighting Maine early childhood educators in roles related to the WOYC daily themes.  See the amazing work going on in early childhood settings across the state and learn about the variety of roles there are in the field.  Have your ever thought about working with young children?  You might find a role that is just right for you from these inspiring stories.

State House Day Pic

Join us in Augusta on Wednesday, April 5, 2023, for Early Childhood Education State House Day.  Early childhood educators from across the state will work together to celebrate and call attention to the vital work they do.  For more information see the events section of the MAEYC website.

If you would like more information on the Week of the Young Child or careers in the field of early childhood education, please reach out to one of the Early Learning Team members from Maine DOE or to an Early Care and Education team member from OCFS listed below.

Maine DOE Early Learning Team

Maine OCFS Team

 

 

Making Math Meaningful For All: Math4ME is Accepting Applications for Newest Cohort

Math4ME is a free, three-year, whole-school project designed to support all educators (classroom teachers, special educators, ed techs, and interventionists) to strengthen math proficiency for all learners with a specific focus on increased math proficiency for students with math IEP goals.  The project will focus around building positive math school communities and classrooms, mathematical content and pedagogical skills, supporting inclusionary practices through MTSS, and formative assessment including the Early Mathematics Diagnostic Interview (EMDI).

For more details about the Math4ME project check out the informational video.

We are accepting applications for the newest cohort until April 15, 2023.  Math4ME Application

We will hold a virtual informational meeting on Tuesday, April 4, 2023 at 4:00 PM. Register here in advance for this meeting.

For questions or more information contact Susan Hogan, susan.hogan@maine.gov or Jen Robitaille, jennifer.r.robitaille@maine.gov.

Webinar: How to Utilize Local Historical Societies for Your Project or Place-based Learning Units

Are you planning a project or place-based unit and looking for primary sources?  Historical societies throughout the state are available to help you find and utilize these primary sources.  To learn more about this, join Kathleen Flynn Neumann from the Maine Historical Society for a webinar that focuses on finding primary sources and how you can partner with historical societies to create authentic learning experiences for students.  

Who: Appropriate for PK-12 grade educators 

When: April 5th 3:30-4:30pm 

Where: Zoom Registration Link 

For more information, please contact Jaime Beal at jaime.beal@maine.gov