Blue Hill’s George Stevens Academy plans to lay off staff positions totaling $325,000 annually next school year as it continues to face declining enrollment and revenues.
The private school doesn’t know yet how many jobs that will mean or in what areas, but plans to try to spread reductions across departments following the decision by its board of trustees, Head of School Dan Welch said Wednesday.
“I’m hoping that we will do this in a very thoughtful, intentional way, and the desired outcome is that we will not have to do this again,” he said.
A private high school where towns on the Blue Hill peninsula with school choice have historically sent their secondary students, GSA has grappled with financial challenges and a downward trend in enrollment for years. It also cut 12 staff positions in 2023 and turned seven full-time positions into part time jobs, according to past BDN reporting.
Welch said he doesn’t anticipate cutting more staff after this year, and though the layoffs could change student programs and extracurriculars, it won’t eliminate them.
“Our main focus is trying to do these cuts in a way that has the least impact on student learning and the student experience as possible,” he said.
Declining enrollment spurred the layoff decision, according to Welch; the school now has about 200 students but lost 40 in the last two years, representing roughly $700,000 less in revenue. When it cut staff in 2023, the high school had an enrollment of 275.
As a town academy, GSA depends on tuition revenue for most of its funding. Since 2019, it’s asked towns to contribute additional funds per student above what the state requires, which they have done, but can’t request more from taxpayers directly like a public school.
The private school has recently opened parts of its board meetings to the public in a bid to boost community engagement among other efforts and has worked harder to recruit students in sending towns following tensions about its management and rising tuition requests to towns.
Overall, the peninsula’s school population is also declining – the seven elementary schools that typically send students to GSA only had 72 eighth-graders altogether last year, according to Welch. Other area schools also appear to be increasing their recruitment, he said, and a “significant” number of local students leave the peninsula for high school.
Welch is still optimistic about GSA’s future, and noted shrinking enrollment is also an issue for other high schools in Maine and beyond.
“Part of it is establishing ourselves from the standpoint that we are going to be a smaller school, and living within those parameters,” he said, though he still wants to see enrollment increase.
At the same time, recent donations of more than $500,000 will help the school start technical education and workforce training programs, he said, which they plan to start rolling out next fall. Those include preparing students to be certified nursing assistants, expanding partnerships for welding education and, in future years, formalizing carpentry and electrician programs.
GSA is also seriously considering becoming an International Baccalaureate school and could expand its homestay program for international students if more host families became available, according to Welch.
The school recently discontinued the residential program for international students that once helped subsidize other costs because that program was losing money. The school has since sold its dormitories it used for those students.