"After treating your superintendent ... the way that she's been treated, good luck" getting another one, Wiscasset Middle High School parent and past school committee member Desiree Bailey said April 8. Bailey was addressing the committee in public comment a week after Vice Chair Jonathan Barnes floated saving money by changing to a part-time superintendent shared from another district.

"Good luck, because I've never seen a more supportive superintendent, that will sit here and do what the board has asked her to do and be so patient ...," Bailey said of Superintendent of Schools Dr. Kim Andersson. "You're not going to get that with another superintendent ... You (would be) asking another town's superintendent to take you on after they have watched Wiscasset get torn to shreds ... You think another town wants to come in and join forces and take her job? Good. Luck." 

Bailey said that when she was on the committee and took part in superintendent searches, she learned it was hard to get the superintendent you wanted or even get them to apply, and that was before all the drama, Bailey added.

Bailey, Wiscasset Boosters' president but not speaking on its behalf, also described the impact she said she has seen in school after last year's losing budget and subsequent smaller one that passed: Her job got harder because she was going to have to raise more money, and because some staff and coaches became unsure they should ask for things.

"Either pass the (next) budget and support your superintendent, or take us back to an academy," with investors who would then make sure it succeeded, Bailey concluded.

Chair Tracey Whitney thanked Bailey and the committee made no comments on Bailey's.

After Bailey's comments got mentioned on a local social media community page, the number of views, or watches, for the meeting recording on the department's YouTube channel climbed. By Friday morning, a day and a half after the meeting, the recording had broken 500 views, a standout number for Wiscasset school committee meetings. 

A week earlier, Barnes and member Brycson Grover opposed the $11.2 million budget offer Whitney and members Doug Merrill and Christopher Hart passed to go on to a special town meeting April 29.

In the April 8 meeting, Grover recalled a six-digit mistake Barnes caught in time on one of the special town meeting warrant articles. Grover also said he lost sleep after the committee's recent executive, or closed door, session that was followed by the committee's vote to extend a number of administrators' contracts. (Those were for Special Education Director Andrea Lovell, Wiscasset Elementary School Assistant Principal Danielle Harris, WES Principal Stacy Clements and Wiscasset Middle High School Athletic Director/Assistant Principal Brandon Rogers, Andersson said.) Grover said he was not questioning those administrators' performance, but felt the committee should have had performance and other information. 

Grover then suggested the committee be able to view students' report cards, with the names redacted. Seeing the cards would help the committee evaluate the education the schools are providing, he said.

Whitney told Grover that, before he joined the committee (to finish Victoria Hugo-Vidal's unexpired term), the committee received the annual curriculum report. As for the report cards suggestion, Whitney said, "I would like our admin team to look at that first and think about how they would do that. I think that there might be some problems with seeing redacted report cards. It might (instead) be a printout ... some kind of way of bringing that together. I don't know that there would be a comfort level from —"

Andersson then suggested the matter go on the next agenda so that the public would know it is going to be discussed. "I'm just concerned that there might be people who would be interested in this conversation who aren't having the opportunity to tune in because we didn't publish (that topic) on the agenda ... We are inadvertently ... excluding people from what should be a really public and transparent process."

Bailey then spoke from the audience: "I just had two people message me that are watching from home. One said 'Thank you Kim.' The other one said, 'Looking at report cards, really?' So you are dead on, other people are concerned and would like to be a part of it."

Also April 8, Andersson praised efforts toward getting the budget offer. "I want to commend this school committee for so many hours of work in a two-week period. The school committee met for almost 15 hours working on the budget. That was pretty incredible. We went through it with a fine-tooth comb fully twice and in some sections more. I also want to commend our amazing and supportive staff. We had a large turnout of teachers and ed techs and other support staff from the elementary school as well as the middle high school who came to every single one of those meetings and I think that that was really valuable."

Clements, in her monthly report, said anyone looking to enroll their child in kindergarten or PreK for next year should contact Nadine McCoy in the main office.

And WMHS Principal Sarah Hubert said Drama Club came third in Class B in a regional One Acts competition last month. And "MATIlDA: The Musical" will be performed April 17 at 7 p.m. and April 18 at 2 and 7 p.m., with a cast that includes students from WES and WMHS, and adults from the Wiscasset community.