It is no secret that declining school enrollments are forcing educators to embrace changes that would have been heresy in years past.

For example, the Maine Principals Association has unveiled a new athletic conference for smaller high schools, Boothbay included. Next season, they will field eight-man football teams.

Here in Boothbay, we have just 480 pupils enrolled in two buildings designed to serve some 900 pupils.

Last May, when our local elected school officials hired Keith Laser to be superintendent for the five schools that make up AOS 98, the Rocky Channels School System, they told him his first job was to increase enrollment.

Laser knew that running the schools in Boothbay, Southport, Edgecomb and Georgetown was a challenge for the retired U.S. Navy helicopter pilot who spent the last 20 years in senior school administrative positions.

He quickly learned declining enrollment was more than a school problem. It was a complex situation involving other factors, including the local job market and a lack of affordable housing stock.

The superintendent knows his job involves more than the usual tasks, such as overseeing a $10 million budget, and dealing with a physical plant that needs a $5 million upgrade. He believes there is a “moral imperative” to prepare our kids to survive and thrive in the 21st century.

And that task brings out the “C” word. Change.

In meetings with parents, teachers and community members, someone often asks him why change at all. “Why can’t we do it like we did when we were kids? That worked for me,” he is often asked.

Laser has a simple answer. “Look around. Look at the technology. It is changing so rapidly. Who knows what will happen in the next five or 10 years.” Today, technology — television and computers — seem to dominate our homes displacing old practices, that fostered learning, like parents reading to their children.

Laser’s point is that today’s high school graduates need to be taught more than reading, writing, and arithmetic. They need to know how to think, solve problems and embrace technology.

As an example, Laser likes to show a photo of an auto factory assembly line from the 1950s showing dozens of workers crawling over, under and around the cars. Next to it, he shows a photo of a modern auto assembly line where most, if not all of the work is done with robots.

For example, some Maine towns saw their high school kids graduate in the morning and go to work in the paper mill in the afternoon. They could work there for years and make a good living. That is no more, he said.

The educational model we use came from the industrial revolution in England where kids would go from class to class as teachers lectured students in English, arithmetic, history and so forth. It is a model that served us well for years.

Laser says today’s educational thinking embraces things like “expedition learning” where kids are tasked with a subject, like protecting the watershed, and their instruction is geared to that topic. Today’s graduates need to think on their own and with others, using what educators call “habits of the mind.”

This includes the introduction of innovative programs focused on the needs of the future workforce, involving programs that integrate more technology and real-life experience into our classrooms, he said.

This could involve kids in programs encouraging innovative thinking, such as inventing products. It might invite business leaders to the classroom to promote entrepreneurial skills. He admits it is like the old Junior Achievement programs, but it is a J.A. on steroids. It might encourage students who are inclined to make and fix things.

As we debate local hot button issues, such as the redesign of highway intersections and proposed redevelopment of the harbor, many of us are as uncomfortable with the idea of change as we are of change itself. Laser says he gets that and admits his new ideas will take time.

“This is not the Navy. I can’t issue an order and get teachers, parents, and kids to comply.

“It might take seven years to get the schools and the community to buy into the concept. But, it is a moral imperative. We have to move forward. We have to prepare our kids for the 21st century,” he said.

While a student at the Naval Academy and throughout his military career, Laser studied the concept of leadership.

He learned that the skipper’s job is to set a course and lead. And he knows the toughest part of his job is to inspire the crew to follow his lead.