AUGUSTA, Maine — Two Maine charter schools have been cleared to start contract negotiations with a state commission and hope to open for classes in 2016.
The Maine Charter School Commission on Tuesday approved applications from Acadia Academy, a school in the Lewiston-Auburn area that would start by educating students in pre-K-grade 2 and expand to grades 3-6 in future years, and Snow Pond Arts Academy, a high school with a heavy focus on performance arts, based at New England Music Camp in Sidney.
If both contracts receive final approval and the schools open their doors, there will be just one slot left for a new charter school in Maine. The state’s charter school law, which passed in 2012, limits the number of schools to 10 in the first 10 years.
The commission backed Acadia Academy in a 6-1 vote. Commission Chairwoman Shelley Reed, who cast the lone dissenting vote, said she was concerned that the school and its staff wouldn’t be prepared to face the challenges of educating the diverse and often impoverished student population in the Lewiston-Auburn area.
The commission unanimously supported the Snow Pond Arts Academy application.
“We’re anxious to get started, that’s for sure,” said John Wiggin, director of the New England Music Camp. “We know the difference this school will make.”
Acadia Academy officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday.
Both schools have a list of requirements they’ll be expected to meet before any contract is approved. For example, Acadia will have to show the commission that its plans for a facility will meet the mission of the school and needs of its students, and Snow Pond will have to provide a clear picture of how its “blended” model of classroom instruction augmented by Web-based curriculum provided by K12 Education will work.
The schools will be expected to report back with responses to those questions by Feb. 1.
This year, the state’s second virtual charter school — and the only charter approved for 2015 — Maine Virtual Academy, began educating its first crop of students. The other virtual charter is South Portland-based Maine Connections Academy, which opened in 2014 and graduated its first seniors at the close of the last school year.
The physical charter schools are Baxter Academy for Technology and Science in Portland, Fiddlehead School of Arts and Science in Gray and Harpswell Coastal Academy, each of which opened in the fall of 2013.
The state’s first charters, Cornville Regional Charter School and Maine Academy of Natural Sciences in Hinckley, welcomed their first students in the fall of 2012.
Together, the state’s charters educate about 1,540 of Maine’s 184,000 students, according to the Department of Education.
In October, the commission voted to end talks with Inspire ME Academy, which hoped to set up shop in the Sanford-Springvale area in York County, and Peridot Montessori Charter School, which sought to establish a school in Ellsworth or Trenton. The vote effectively denies their bids to open for the 2016-17 school year.
Follow Nick McCrea on Twitter at @nmccrea213.