When Margaret Morton takes attendance at her eighth grade class at the South Bristol School, it takes her less than 30 seconds.
It shouldn’t take any longer, for there are just four kids in her class.
Holly Stegna, Kasie Taylor and Forrest MacCready have been together since Kindergarten while David Frame moved in this year.
This year’s total is down from last year’s class of 16. There are just 63 pupils in the entire school.
“You know everybody,” said Holly.
Despite the tiny numbers, South Bristol boasts a modern school filled with computers, bright classrooms, shining hallways and a stylish gym featuring the school logo boosting the fortunes of the school teams dubbed “The Mariners.”
The school receives very little state support. Principal Scott White says the town provides most of the funding for the school. “They have been very supportive,” he said.
The school has an overall budget of $1.6 million and receives just about $50,000 in state subsidy. There are 12 full time teachers, seven part time teachers, one secretary and one principal.
Still, it is a full service school offering, in addition to the usual academic courses, art, music, programs for gifted and talented students and programs for special ed students.
“It is a full-time program,” said White.
“It is expensive, but the tiny community (just about 1000 residents) is proud of the school, their kids and is very supportive, said Robert Bouchard, the superintendent of the Central Lincoln School System.
Last week, the eighth graders and their seventh grade partners were exploring their new Apple lap top computers.
It is not a tough job, for they have been using computers since first grade and are very used to them.
“If you have a science question, you just look it up,” said Forrest.
“It makes it easy when you have to write something,” said Kasie.
Last year, the Fab Four participated in a science project where they were in contact, via computer, with astronauts at the International Space Station.
“They take the computers home when they have an assignment and they have a homework assignment most every day,” said Morton. “The computer is not a foreign language to them. It is a native language.”
The four eighth graders are grouped with the seventh graders for four days a week. On Friday, they are transported to the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath where they work in a boat building shop.
“First they learn about tools, then they build a tool box, then a half model, then a skiff,” Morton said. “They use math and other school skills in their building projects. It helps to build skills and confidence.”
Each year, the school raffles off a skiff built by last year’s class to help pay for a trip to Washington, D.C. The Fab Four are looking forward to the trip, planned for next spring.
“I have never been in a plane and am worried about the ear thing,” said Forrest who has never flown before.
“It is nothing,” said David, his better-traveled classmate.
For now, the biggest things the kids want to see in the nation’s capital are the White House, and the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. They all seem to want to do a bit of shopping too.
“We would like to go to the White House. Surely they can find room for the four of us. Can’t they?” asks Kasie.
Principal Scott White says the Fab Four are part of a school that is a lot like a family.
“The older kids take an interest in the younger kids, especially the older girls and their younger schoolmates. The younger kids seem to really look up to the older ones,” he said.
“There are not a lot of people problems. Everybody has a friend,” said Holly.
White says the family atmosphere helps to limit the time the teachers spend on classroom discipline issues. This leaves more time for instruction, said White.
It is a very safe school and the national ratings score it very well too, he said.
“It is a good group,” said White.
