GSA announces major donor gift and impending staff layoffs on same day

School announces $325k in layoffs but has not released details of affected positions.

Editor’s note: This story, first published on Dec. 15, has been updated.

By Tricia Thomas

BLUE HILL—George Stevens Academy announced on Dec. 15 that it plans to cut about $325,000 worth of jobs while simultaneously announcing in a separate press release that it has received a new major gift of $338,000 to expand its career and technical education program.

“George Stevens Academy’s Board of Trustees and Head of School today announced a strategic reduction in force totaling approximately $325,000 in staffing costs, necessitated by declining enrollment,” the school stated in a Dec. 15 press release. “This announcement is made with significant advance notice to prioritize staff well-being and responsible planning.”

A private town academy that serves as the de facto high school for Blue Hill and surrounding towns, GSA has been struggling with declining enrollment and budget shortfalls in recent years. The school did not specify in the press release which staff positions would be cut, or when the cuts would be made. The school’s website lists a total of 52 staff members, including teachers, administrators, food service workers, maintenance and support staff for its 200 students.

“The reduction in force has been carefully structured to minimize impact on students and educational quality—a key distinction from previous workforce changes. Core academic programs, student support services, and the individualized attention that defines a GSA education will be preserved,” the press release stated.

The news comes on the same day the school announced a $300,000 anonymous donation earmarked for career and technical education. That was on top of a separate four-year pledge, also from an anonymous donor, totaling $200,000 that was announced in November.

The month prior to that, in October, GSA closed on a deal to sell a former dormitory on 17 acres in downtown Blue Hill–along with an additional 38 acres owned by the school–to the town of Blue Hill for $1.8 million.

The dorm at George Stevens Academy that once housed foreign students who had come to study at the high school. File photo.

GSA head Dan Welch said in a telephone interview on December 16 that affected staff will be notified during the month of February 2026, with cuts to take effect before the start of the 2026-2027 school year.

Welch could not provide a specific number of staff or faculty who may lose their jobs.

“Anything I would say right now would be somewhat arbitrary.  Like any organization, we have different people at different levels.  We’re looking at all sorts of things. We’re looking for efficiencies in our personnel right now,” he said.  “This is about stabilizing our budget for next year and future years, about looking for efficiencies in how we utilize our human resources and ensuring the financial stability of the school for years to come.”

“We are making this announcement now, with substantial advance notice, because our staff deserve better than last-minute decisions,” Welch stated in the press release. “This transparency allows affected employees time to plan and to work with us on a thoughtful transition. It also reflects our commitment to the entire GSA community about the realities we face and the steps we’re taking to address them.”

His comments were an apparent reference to what many current and former staff lamented as chaotic and unexpected firings in 2023.

“Nobody likes to hear this information and I don’t like to give it. No one is happy about it. I’m sure there’s trepidation on peoples’ parts and some anxiety around that, but I also think that we’re handling it the right way,” Welch said by phone on December 16. “We’re handling it transparently, up-front and honestly with our employees. They know that it’s happening, they know how the process will work and I think they understand that, although we are the most unique business in the world as a school, we do have business-related necessities that we have to be cognizant of. We’ve got to get to a point where GSA is financially stable year in and year out so that we can continue to serve the students of this peninsula for years to come.”

Board member Kate Stookey said morale has been building in recent years but that financial challenges persist.

“People love the school, and they understand that there aren’t a lot of options right now unless enrollment changes,” she said.

Both Welch and Stookey said that increasing enrollment and stemming students’ exodus to other regional schools are key to the school’s financial stability and path forward.

“Significant dollars are flowing off of the peninsula to other high schools, and those dollars are then not being invested in our community’s high school. That’s part of the enrollment conversation that we need to have with sending towns,” Stookey said.

Welch said he was unsure if employees who are laid off could get their jobs back if enrollment increases.

“That certainly is a possibility, but we’re not operating from a standpoint of ‘hoping’ and having hope be our plan,” he said. “I’m a little leery, if we get a bump of five or 10 students, to make big changes based on that, because it can change again. There’s a real fluidity in which students access their secondary [school] options on this peninsula, so we need to make plans and enact initiatives that are going to put us in a place where we are not dependent on three, or four, or five students to make budget. We need to get to a place where we’re financially stable and can sustain the peaks and valleys [in enrollment] that may come.”

Stookey said that the decision to simultaneously announce both the pending layoffs and the recent anonymous donation, which totals $338,000, was a deliberate one.

“It’s unfortunate, but this is an opportunity…it’s a turning point for GSA in my opinion. That’s one of the reasons why we sent these two press releases out simultaneously,” she said.  “It does seem that there is more community support, more community interest in helping GSA move forward, and these gifts that we received are proof of that. So, our hope is to ultimately build back. That’s the long-term plan.”

The anonymous gift is one of two the school has received this fall to expand its hands-on, technical-based education. In November, the school announced that an anonymous donor had given $200,000 for the same use, bringing the total for the expanded curriculum to over half a million dollars.

“Across the nation and especially here in rural Maine, we face a critical shortage of skilled tradespeople. These career pathways allow our graduates to enter the workforce earning strong wages and building fulfilling careers right here in their home communities,” Welch stated in the Dec. 15 press release. “GSA’s new CTE programs will help address this workforce gap while giving students valuable options for their futures.”

“The first CTE certification class will launch in the fall of 2026 with other classes being added gradually, and facility upgrades are currently being planned,” the release also stated.

Both the November and December donations are “restricted,” and can be used only for CTE programs 

“Restricted gifts cannot be redirected to address general operating expenses or budget deficits,” the school stated in its press release. “This restricted gift allows us to invest in a critical new area of programming that will benefit our students and our region, while we continue to manage our operating budget responsibly through other means.”

Stookey called the potential layoffs a “low point,” but said she and the other trustees are nonetheless optimistic about the school’s future.

“I strongly believe that there is a very clear path forward for a sustainable future for GSA,” Stookey said. “We’ve had some hard knocks. There’s no question about it.  But we are building back and will continue to do so.”