Wiscasset Middle High School students Owen St. Pierre (left) and C.J. Marcus pull pieces of wire out of a rowboat being built by their maritime studies class on Friday, May 30. The 32-foot boat is the first in a fleet of boats the school hopes to have students build, according to teacher Alyson Graham. (Piper Pavelich photo)
Wiscasset Middle High School is bringing its students to the sea through a maritime studies class that not only teaches the basics of sailing, but includes building a rowboat to explore local waterways.
Teacher Alyson Graham and her 12 high school students have been working on building a 32-foot craft since March. The boat was donated by Sail Tall Ships Maine and arrived at the school “in a bunch of boxes,” said Graham.
Sail Tall Ships Maine, a nonprofit dedicated to youth character and skill building through sailing, has been partnering with Wiscasset Middle High School over the last two years to send students on five-day summer sailing excursions for free on the schooner Harvey Gamage, which is owned by Phineas Sprague.
Graham said two of her maritime studies students have taken excursions, and students in grades 7-12 have the opportunity to climb aboard again this summer.
The boatbuilding project and partnership with Sail Tall Ships Maine was spearheaded by Graham, who has over 20 years of experience living and working on schooners and has sailed on the Harvey Gamage with Alex Agnew, of Sail Tall Ships Maine.
In the fall, she approached Agnew about the possibility of a donation of a boat to the school, as he previously donated a boat to the Bowdoin College rowing team, she said.
Graham first alerted the community about the boatbuilding project in January, when she requested and received approval from the Wiscasset School Committee to move forward with it.
Since March, Graham’s students have been working on building the rowboat, taking time every other day to put the pieces together, sand it down, and apply epoxy, or a type of polymer resin, to seal any spaces in the boat that should not take on water.
Graham said she had originally hoped the boat would be completed by the end of the school year, but that work will likely continue into the beginning of the 2025-2026 school year.
The project has been a learning curve for her and her students, Graham said, but everyone has discovered what they enjoy working on, whether it’s mixing the epoxy solution, operating a sander, or designing a paint scheme.
“I think they’re finding some skills that they are really good at that they didn’t know they had before,” Graham said. “I’ve done very little, I’m happy to say.”
Sophomore Emma Bailey said that while she didn’t quite understand what the maritime studies class was when she signed up for it, she has no regrets about joining. Bailey also never imagined she and her classmates would build a boat, but it has been an easier experience than she thought it would be.
“It really just takes patience and there’s no wrong way to do it, because you can always fix it if you’re still in the moment,” she said.
Bailey said that while there have been “some difficulties” in the building process, it has been enjoyable.
The ultimate goal of the project and the partnership that gets students aboard the Harvey Gamage is to connect Wiscasset students with the water, Graham said. Whether a student wants to learn maritime history and marine science or build a career in Maine’s maritime industry, Graham’s class, the boat building project, and the time spent on a schooner can teach life skills that will be helpful no matter where her students go.
Graham’s hope is that the school will build a fleet of boats for students to access the Sheepscot River and other local waterways for educational and extracurricular purposes. She said the addition to the school can assist with place-based learning in multiple subjects, such as history and science, and can provide a blueprint for schools up and down the coast who may be interested in starting their own projects.
