Revisiting the Sinclair Act...

Kennebec Journal, October 15, 2007

(excerpt) Rod McElroy is still moved by the memory. A disparate group of students and teachers from throughout the region, strangers just weeks before, seamlessly gelling into a cohesive unit.

He was a 33-year-old guidance counselor at the new School Administrative District 3 high school that summer of 1964, but McElroy had been around long enough to know he was witnessing greatness.

"It was absolutely positive because of the leadership of the principal, Charles Cosgrove, and it was positive because of the staff coming together," McElroy said. "I'm sitting here talking to you about that situation and I've got goosebumps 40-plus years later. By Christmas that school was operating as Mt. View High School."

Stories like McElroy's unfolded throughout the state after the Legislature passed the Sinclair Act in 1957. Sponsored by then-Sen. Roy Sinclair, R-Pittsfield, the bill was crafted to equalize educational opportunities for students and streamline costs by offering incentives for communities to combine schools. The Sinclair Act led to the most comprehensive school consolidation effort in state history until this year's reorganization legislation, which will force the 290 school units throughout Maine to combine into 80 regions.