Dear Editor:

Thanks to everyone who turned out from Boothbay and Boothbay Harbor to attend the annual meeting of the Community School District ( the CSD) to discuss and approve the school budget for next year. All of the votes represented resounding support for our schools.

Our schools support a wide range of educational service known to have positive benefits for our kids as they go through life. Those services include two classes of pre-kindergarten, when youngsters are making huge gains in their understanding of the world. They include college level classes in calculus; boatbuilding; advanced placement in English other languages. They include regular classes all the way from grade one through the eighth grade with outstanding teaching in math, science, social studies and English. They include classes done in collaboration with the University of Maine.

Like every school district these days we also have our challenges with kids, some due to lingering effects of the pandemic, and some due to the well-known issues in general state of our society; disinformation; misinformation; overuse of online games and social media; and not enough physical activity to mention a few.

Your public school teachers and support staff are called upon daily to meet all these needs. They do so using the resources we, as a community, provide. Those resources are what we provide through the budget. Once again, thanks to all who came to the meeting and voted so strongly to support great K-12 education here on our peninsula.

Bruce MacDonald

Member

Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor CSD School Committee