FRENCHBORO — If you were a teacher who received a $750 grant for “outdoor learning” from the Maine Environmental Education Association, what would you do with it?
MOUNT DESERT — Gloria Delsandro, principal at Mount Desert Elementary School for the past seven years, will be teacher/principal for the Cranberry Isles schools this coming school year.
Zero insurance hike saves schools $400K
BAR HARBOR Schools in the Mount Desert Island Regional School System (MDIRSS) will save a combined $399,819 because there will be no increase in the health insurance rate for the coming year.
Typically, in April, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield tells school superintendents across the state how much their rates are going up. But schools must have their budgets set weeks earlier, so they plug in a placeholder amount for health insurance.
For several years now, the MDIRSS schools have initially budgeted for a 10 percent rate increase, with the expectation that the actual increase would not be more than that. However, for next fiscal year, which starts July 1, the schools budgeted for an 8 percent increase.