New RSU 16 leader wants 'a system that works for everybody'

POLAND — Kenneth Healey, Regional School Unit 16’s new superintendent, said it was a group of students from Poland, Minot and Mechanic Falls that created his first school administration job in Westbrook in the 1990s.

“I actually ended up having a job as a result of an influx of a couple of hundred students from this region,” Healey recalled in a recent interview.

In the 1990s, Auburn educational leaders discontinued taking high school students from the three towns, so education officials began looking to other towns, and the city of Westbrook agreed to accept some students. Because of the extra students Healey was hired as second assistant principal at Westbrook High School.

It was his first school administrative post after a 21-year career in the Marine Corps.

Healey spent five years in Westbrook, was principal at Lisbon High School for 11 years and superintendent of RSU 73 in Jay, Livermore and Livermore Falls until July 1 of this year.

Originally from Danvers, Massachusetts, Healey joined the Marine Corps after graduating from high school. “I didn’t have a focus in high school. I was immature. It really took the Marine Corps to mature me … it made a world of difference in my life.”

Healey said maybe a hint of a career in public education arose while he was in high school. The school had a small kindergarten and provided an instructional program to the high school students in early childhood development. Healey said he was the first male to graduate from the program.

“I got my college degree 17 years after I graduated from high school,” Healey explained. “It was the Marine Corps that gave me the confidence and skill set. I acquired my teaching experience through the Marine Corps. I was the officer in charge of the Marine Corps Ammunition School.”

Healey majored in political science and earned a master’s degree in public policy from the University of Southern Maine. To become a school administrator he had to take law classes at the University of Maine. He said he gained the required instructional and management proficiency from his Marine Corps service.

Healey has seen a major shift in public education learning since his vice principal days in Westbrook.

“When I first came in, everybody needed to be college educated. And that’s a wonderful goal, but not necessarily what the community, what our local businesses and organizations needed,” he said.

“What they needed was some college-educated people and they also needed some people to be able to still continue to work in industry,” he said.

The importance of acquiring a technical education cannot be overlooked, Healey said. Students in the technical fields “have as much sense and smarts than anybody going on to college … We’ve gone from ‘everybody should be going to college’ to ‘everybody should have further education’ and it’s absolutely OK to go into the tech and vocational areas …

“We can no longer afford to track people into certain occupations, because those occupations are not abundant as they used to be … We have to find a system that works for everybody, not for certain groups.”

Healey said the public education system has the responsibility of “making sure every student can learn” and said that responsibility is shared by students, teachers and administrators.

“(Education) used to be a burden that was put on students only … Everybody needs to be at a greater level of responsibility,” Healey said.

He said he came from the old traditional industrialized system.

“I was pushed through programs. If I just got a good enough grade I was pushed through. That meant I was lost or didn’t have certain elements in my education. Even to this day there are certain things that frighten me and I’m the superintendent. ‘I hope they don’t ask me that question because I don’t have the answer’ – because I was pushed through a system,” he said.

Healey said he is firm supporter of “standards-based education” and RSU 16 will continue on with that educational strategy. “To me, that’s the model of education that is most important, that’s most effective.”

Healey insisted “people need to learn basic skills and foundations … ‘So you got the multiplication right, that’s great, but division doesn’t work (for you)? Dividing fractions? Don’t worry about that. You’re really not going to use that.’ But in many regards you are going to use it. You use it every single day, even without your knowledge,” he said.