Asked if she has ever been around Wiscasset before she applied for Wiscasset Elementary School’s principal job, Amy Bayha said in an email interview April 13, her first visit was the night after her and husband Tim’s wedding almost 30 years ago.

“We were traveling up the coast to explore and spent our first night at a B&B in Wiscasset. (We) have been hoping to move to the area ever since, but our work kept us in southern Maine until now.”

Now works because Bayha got the job. Tuesday night, April 11, the school committee voted in Bayha, who interim Superintendent of Schools Robert “Bob” England Jr. said was one of eight applicants. The Kennebunk woman told the committee that night, she was greatly excited and appreciative.

She still was April 13. She wrote, “Thank you to the administration, interview team, and school board of the Wiscasset Schools for this amazing opportunity!” Bayha told Wiscasset Newspaper she had not been looking for a new job, “but when I saw the opening for a new WES principal, I couldn't resist applying. Joining the Wiscasset community is something I have thought about for 30 years. I love everything about the area, yet as a newcomer, I am fully aware I have a lot more to learn.”

She said her first priority is to learn everything she can about the school, as quickly as possible. “Our first priority as a family is to find a home to either rent (while we look for a home) or, preferably, to buy,” she added. “I am truly hoping to live within the community of Wiscasset. For 24 years I worked and lived in the same town, and though I understand that can sometimes be challenging for school employees, I love seeing families from school at community events, at the grocery store, etc.”

“Welcome to Wiscasset,” School Committee Chair Jason Putnam told Bayha two nights earlier, in the meeting at Wiscasset Middle High School and carried on Google Meet.

Bayha starts July 1, on a two-year contract with a starting salary of $95,000 a year, England said in a post-meeting phone interview. He said Bayha has most recently been a school administrator in Berwick. In June 2022, Maine School Administrative District 60, serving Berwick, North Berwick and Lebanon, hired Bayha as assistant principal of the kindergarten through grade three Vivian E. Hussey School in Berwick, according to rsu60.org

She and her husband like to hike and like to travel to see sons Will, 23, and Jamison, 21; and the couple still enjoys exploring Maine’s coast.

WES Principal Kathleen Pastore resigned in March, effective June 30.

Also April 11, Putnam said that at the previous night’s workshop toward a strategic plan, safety topped the priorities; others were sustainability, including student numbers and looking at what the schools can offer at every grade for a well-balanced education the town can afford; and an education model, including using data to inform instruction and meet students’ needs. 

Boothbay Region representatives gave many thanks for their seventh and graders getting to finish the school year at WMHS after being displaced by the Boothbay Region Elementary School flood. A father in the audience said adding the nearly 100 students to WMHS affects safety for the next two months and was wrong.

In administrators’ reports, Athletic Director Cameron Bishop said the East-West Conference wants all the teams to join, not just high school basketball as Wiscasset requested, and “our co-op arrangement with Boothbay does make this a bit more complicated ... Discussions with the conference will continue ...,” he wrote. And Bishop said the new soccer scoreboard has arrived at Neokraft Signs in Lewiston and is still projected to be installed at the end of June.

England said costs and revenue projections for the next budget are being finalized; and WES teacher Dane Dwyer’s move to WMHS and middle school math “is very good for the math program and for the (middle school) students as he knows them all. He is already working collaboratively with (math teacher) Chris Hammond getting the program reset for success.”

Special Education Director Andrea Lovell said Maine Department of Education would review records and visit classrooms April 13 as part of its audit; every month, more students are being served, Food Service Director Lorie Johnson said; WMHS Principal Gina Stevens said Madison Westrich attained the STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) endorsement for graduation and Grace Greene will study spoon carving at Haystack Summer Craft Institute; School Resource Officer Jonathan Barnes presented an “Outstanding Citizen” award to Isla Bickford for her input on school safety.

The committee passed a July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2026 support staff (educational technicians, food service, custodians and bus drivers) contract England said adjusted different jobs’ pay to market conditions. And the committee accepted longtime middle school teacher Susan Townsend’s retirement.