Indian Island School


Indian Island School is a K-8 school located in the Penobscot [Indian Island Reservation], Maine. Indian Island School's school administrative unit is the Indian Island School District.

History

In 1978 the State of Maine asked the school to stop having instruction on religion.
In 1986 a new school facility began operations. At that time the enrollment was about 100. It was designed by Webster-Baldwin-Rohman-Day-Szarniecki. That company received the Architectural Portfolio Award for this school design that year. At the time the school covered grades preschool through seven, and it planned to have up to grade 9.

Governance

It is one of three schools in the Maine Indian Education school district system, supported by funding by the Bureau of Indian Education. There are three school boards, one for each school, and each school has its own principal, while MIE has a collective superintendent. The MIE is akin to a main "union of towns" school system where multiple school administrative units share a superintendent but otherwise operate separately.
The funding for the school comes from the federal government and the state of Maine; no local tax-based funding is given to the school.

Campus

The school has a building for cultural performances, and it has murals depicting indigenous culture. The stone in the school has a motif based on basket weaving.

Feeder patterns

common feeder public high schools in the same county as Indian Island School include Old Town High School and Orono [High School (Maine)|Orono High School]. Some students attend John Bapst [Memorial High School], which is a private school in Bangor. Linda McLeod, then the principal of Indian Island School, and later MIE superintendent, stated that some graduates of Indian Island Elementary encountered problems at Old Town High, to where she said "when they go to Old Town High School, they are lost."
High schools which take students from this school include, in addition to Old Town, Orono, and Bapst: Bangor High School, Brewer High School, United Technologies Center, and Stillwater Academy.