AUGUSTA — Madison Area Memorial High School and Nokomis Regional High School in Newport will not be getting federal cash from a grant program available to the state’s 10 low-achieving schools, the Maine Department of Education announced today.

In a release, state education officials said four schools in three school districts were approved for more than $5 million in federal School Improvement Grant funding during the next three years. The money, according to the release, will “support locally developed plans aimed at improving student achievement.”

The schools whose grant applications were approved are:

• Regional School Unit 24, Ellsworth High School ($1,489,328) and Mountain View School ($337,131).

• Portland Schools, East End Community School ($2,748,663).

• RSU 27, Fort Kent Community High School ($846,140).

In the release, state education officials simply said that the applications from Madison and Newport schools did not meet the grant program’s requirements.

The federal money comes with caveats: schools must enact turnaround plans laid out by the Obama administration. One such “transformation” plan calls for changing the way material is taught, increasing the amount of time students spend in class and replacing the principal if he or she has worked at the school more than two years.


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