|
Summer wanes. The breeze is cooler, the sea is bluer, the leaves are beginning to turn. The summer people pack up and head home with their children; the island gets quieter by the day. On Cliff Island, however, there are kids everywhere - laughing and calling as they play or ride their bikes to and from school. It is a most welcome change. Publicity last spring (with all its associated headaches) rewarded the island with five new families - with children. Cliff Island has 12 students enrolled in its one-room school this year, spanning all grades except fourth. It s a far cry from last May's expected 1997/1998 enrollment of one, which caused Portland to threaten to close the school. Nina Alberto came from Massachusetts with her four children, Jeanine, Andrea, Vanessa and Rachel. Her family has owned a summer home on Cliff for many years. Jeanine commutes daily to school in Portland. Andrea and Vanessa attend the island school. Rachel stays at home with Nina. Husband John visits on weekends but must work in Massachusetts. He is self-employed, with established customers that couldn't join them in Maine. Nina chose to move to get away from a hectic lifestyle for a while. She and John hate being separated, but they agree that the move was good for the children. The commitment to live on the island is for 10 months. Liz and Dennis Maillet lived in Portland. They wanted to get their children, Jessica, Joe4, and Jonathan, out of the city and into an area that was quiet and safe. Liz's mother had rented on Cliff in the summer and learned that her daughter could rent the same house year-round. They were impressed by the one-room school, with its multi-grade environment, which all three children attend. Dennis lives on the mainland during the week. His shifts as an apprentice electrician do not coincide with the ferry schedule. The separation is hard on all of them, but Dennis calls his family several times a day and they exchange e-malls. Liz loves the island because the people are friendly and the atmosphere is relaxed. Kim and Joel McCann, from Falmouth, came with their children, Patience and Robert. Both children attend the island school. They had read an article about Cliff Island's population-building efforts in Yankee magazine and gleaned more information from Cliff Island's website. Joel has always wanted to live on an island and says that now he is living his dream. He owns O'Neil Company, which supplies commercial cleaning products to laundromats and dry cleaners in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Massachusetts. Column 2 |
He drives one of the delivery trucks because he likes to. "It's a little different, now," he said. "I get off the boat in Portland at 7:30 a.m. When I lived on the mainland, I would already be meeting with a customer at that hour." But the customers have been supportive of his decision and graciously accepted the necessary scheduling changes. Sometimes Joel doesn't make it home at night. Some of his treks to northern Maine do not allow him to catch the last ferry of the day. Asked if he thinks he will still be enthusiastic next spring, he replied, "After riding the ferry in the dark all winter, I may not be. But I look at it this way - on the mainland you work, go home, read the paper and unwind, and then have family time; on the island you work, read the paper and unwind on the boat, and then go home ready for family." The McCanns are renting their present home on the island for the school year but are already seeking a home to rent on a full, year-round basis. Faith Rawding moved to Cliff Island in June from Yarmouth with her children, Charlie, Loie, and Will. She secured a position providing in-homd care for an elderly resident. Loie and Will attend the island school and Charlie is being home-schooled by Faith. When Faith made the move, it was her understanding that the Portland School system would allow parents to request a waiver allowing their children to remain at the island school through grade 8. The School Department now says that it has revoked that option, though no one seems to know when, exactly. Unhappy with the mainland schools, Faith chose to home-school her oldest. Her neighbor, Mark Lombard, was also denied a waiver to have his twin sons, Joshua and Justin, remain at the island school. His next choice was private school, but the cost of two tuitions was prohibitive. Faith home-schools the Lombard twins, as well. Pat and Phillip Tounzen arrived from Ohio with their two children, Zachary and Noah. Pat had taught elementary school in Arkansas. Phillip works for Diebold. They moved to Oklahoma two weeks before their first child was born. Phillip was transferred to Ohio. He was then scheduled to be transferred to China. They lived in a hotel for a year and a half because the company kept them in limbo. He was finally able to get the OK to work out of his home, wherever that might be. They wanted to live in Maine, in a quiet rural area. They found Cliff Island on the Internet and spent six months researching the possibility of moving there. Column 3 |
They contacted the owner of a summer rental to see if was possibly a year-round home. It was, and they grabbed it. The house was furnished, so most of their belongings are still in storage. Pat says she doesn't care, "I love it here. And it is so nice to be able to cook a meal. We are sick of take-out food." Zachary has told his parents that he doesn't want to move again - he likes it on Cliff Island. Pat loves the isolation, the small community, the school, and the safe environment for her children. "It is so wonderful for them to be able to ride their bikes to school or a friend's house and be safe." Phillip is tying up loose ends and will join his family in a few weeks.
Despite the islanders' concern that new families might come with unrealistic expectations, all the families claim to have chosen Cliff for its serenity and remoteness. None seem to have delusions about island living. They put safety for their children at the top of the list, as well as the excellent and unique education the one-room school and its teacher, Earl MacVane, can provide. The school has five computers - two Macs that were provided by the Portland School Department and three PCs that were donated by islanders and island organizations - which provide an excellent student-to-computer ratio. The Parent Teacher Committee (PTC) pays for an America On Line account, which allows the students to do a lot their research online. There are four students commuting from Cliff to school in Portland; three in middle school and one in high school. Cliff Islanders realize that they know more about the new families than the new families know about them. The Cliff Island Association and the PTC planned a Welcome Party for the new residents for Wednesday, September 24. A similar event was held last year for two new families. Island residents are asked to write down their names, where their houses are, and what they do. Association President David Crowley uses scanned photos of everyone, together with the information they have provided, and prints booklets for the new families. It's a fun and easy way for them to get to know everyone. It has been a long six months. Replies to well over a thousand responses to Cliff Island's search for year-round families had to be compiled and mailed. Questions via phone or in person were answered or redirected. Swarms of curious day-trippers wreaked havoc with private landowners.
The experience seems a small price to pay for the community's apparent revitalization, however temporary. As children graduate from fifth grade and start commuting to Portland, the island school's enrollment will dwindle again. Faith Rawding is hoping that enough people will choose to petition Portland to change the status of the island school to K-8, as it once was. For now, though, people are focusing on the positive |
