The first round of RREV (Rethinking Responsive Education Ventures) Awardees were announced in August of 2021. RREV is an initiative of the Maine Department of Education, funded by the Education Stabilization Funds through the US Department of Education’s Rethink K-12 Education Models, that bolsters Maine educators’ innovative efforts to support their students with agile, effective, and resilient learning experiences that improve learning outcomes for all students. Now, after a year of experience and development, the Department of Education would like to thank the awardees for their dedication to innovative education and highlight their achievements that have resulted from the RREV contracts over the past year. Continue reading to learn more about the ways in which MSAD 28 has used their RREV funding this past year.
When MSAD 28 (Camden-Rockport Schools) first received funding in August 2021, they wanted to create outdoor learning spaces and offer programming for students and teachers that would enhance their educational experience, an idea that was informed by research regarding the positive impacts of outdoor learning. However, like most organizations (and people), MSAD 28 encountered some issues as they navigated their way through the pandemic. The implementation of their RREV project over the past year has been impacted by labor shortages and supply chain issues, and the creation of outdoor structures for classes was put on hold. However, even with delays in their plans, the district still found enormous success. Despite not having outdoor structures as soon as they planned, educators were still able to teach outside, and the district found great success in their community collaboration model.
In the fall, they introduced their first Pre-K program grounded in nature-based learning experiences for young children. While the district had been hoping to create a Pre-K program since 2017, the RREV funding provided the opportunity to implement it. Last school year, MSAD 28’s first Pre-K class started school in an entirely outdoor-based program. “They are learning the letters and they are doing it all outside, despite the weather,” Assistant Superintendent Debra McIntyre said. According to her, the impacts that the outdoor education has had on students is profound. The growth they have seen in them, she said, is “unbelievable.”
It’s not just Pre-K classes that are taking their learning outside, though. Every single teacher and student had at least one class outside at some point in the year, even without outdoor structures to teach and learn in. The effects of the outdoor learning, McIntyre says, are evident throughout the student body, as being outdoors has helped lessen many behavioral concerns.
McIntyre believes none of it would be possible without their collaborative model, though. “Collaboration is essential,” she said, “It has been the underpinning to support the work.” The district has collaborated with regional organizations including Hurricane Island, to provide ongoing professional development and coaching to prepare them to teach outside. Teachers use these community collaborators as experts, co-planning and co-facilitating student learning activities. McIntyre believes this “residency” model provides the expertise, support, and confidence the staff needs to make outdoor learning a common part of curriculum.
Moving forward, the district is excited to construct the outdoor spaces and classrooms before the June 30, 2023 funding deadline and continue providing opportunities for their students to learn through play, exploration and have opportunities to utilize a variety of tools and materials to enhance and extend their learning. They also look forward to continuing with the partnerships, collaborations, and connections they have created throughout this year to provide their students the most beneficial and experiential education possible.
Martin Mackey, the former RREV Project Director who tragically passed away in April of this year, embodied the RREV spirit: to think and act boldly to meet the needs of students. His passion was to “change lives.” As such, he challenged each and every RREV participant to do just that as they designed pilot ideas that would ultimately have a lasting systemic impact on students. After 18 months of leading RREV, Martin’s passion had been passed on to almost 200 educators who had participated in innovation professional development. From those educators, 27 Pilot ideas were brought to fruition and have received over $5.7 million in RREV awards. Through their pilot ideas, these educators have pledged to commit themselves to innovation.
The Maine DOE encourages all schools and districts across the State of Maine to learn more about these innovative educators and their RREV pilots through the RREV website and the online RREV collaborative platform known as EnGiNE. It is through EnGiNE that we all hope to continue the Martin Momentum to change students’ lives through innovative and responsive educational programs.
Maine has long been a leader in integrating technology and learning, and that holds true with computer science education. Instead of computer science being a separate course only some students take or an “add on”, Maine provides the support and resources to encourage all schools to provide interdisciplinary, project-based computer science learning experiences that incorporate computational and critical thinking, innovation and design processes, and applied learning at all grade levels and across all subject areas.
The Computer Science Education Showcase illustrated the state’s approach, with VR headsets transporting users to Maine State Parks which a student developed over the course of last summer, 3D printing demonstrations, a full-size arcade game developed by students, 6th graders demonstrating their block coding skills, a wide array of apps and websites around difference content areas created by students, and a robotics room with world champion level robotics teams. All Pre-K through 12 grade levels were represented, with educators highlighting how they were incorporating computer science education at younger grade levels, including having 5th grade students partner with kindergarten students to teach them basic coding skills and a new mobile makerspace that will rotate between elementary schools offering computer science education for Pre-K through fifth grade students.
Maine Department of Education Commissioner Pender Makin, University of Maine President Joan Ferrini-Mundy, 2022 Presidential Scholar Sirohi Kumar, Bethel second grade teacher Alice Lee, Jackson Labs Vice President for Education Charlie Wray, and the Roux Institute’s Chief Administrative Officer Chris Mallett participated in a panel discussion on how Maine is paving the way for students and teachers to be successful in the world of computer science. The discussion focused on reaching more students, making computer science more accessible to all, taking an interdisciplinary approach to computer science education, and how the critical and computational thinking, collaboration, and creative design skills developed through computer science education are critical to success in nearly every career and 21st century life.
“Computer science is about approaching a problem with optimism, logic, critical thinking, design thinking, creativity and vision. We need to make computer science accessible for every educator and every student and continue this tradition that we’ve started in Maine of interdisciplinary, project-based computer science education across all grades that is really contextualized in a way that is meaningful for kids,” said Education Commissioner Pender Makin.
“We now live in a world that is immersed in big data and the amount of data being generated is so tremendous that this next generation has this great opportunity to enter so many career fields where computer science has a touchpoint. It’s not just being a software engineer or computer scientist, but all of us can learn and solve problems with big data and the amount of careers that can come out of good computer science education is endless,” said Jackson Labs Vice President for Education Charlie Wray. 
Maine DOE Newsroom 