This fall, the University of Maine at Presque Isle will begin offering a new Associate’s degree especially designed to prepare, and provide quality training opportunities for, individuals who want to work in the Special Education field as teacher aides in the State of Maine.

The University is offering the state’s first ever Special Education Paraprofessional Associate of Arts Degree. The new degree will prepare students to work as teacher aides/educational technicians – also known as special education paraprofessionals – in K-12 classrooms throughout the state. The degree is aimed at satisfying federal mandates for ‘highly qualified personnel’ in the field of Special Education, both under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 2004.

The University of Maine at Presque Isle is pleased to announce that it has hired Daniel Hotham as its new Head Golf Coach.

Hotham recently retired from Northern Maine Community College, where, in addition to his work as the institution’s longest serving faculty member, he served for more than 20 years as the first head coach of the varsity golf team. During his time as golf coach at NMCC, the Falcons were members of the Maine Small College Conference, which included community colleges from around the state and the University of Maine at Augusta. During his 22 years of coaching at NMCC, the Falcons won the conference title three times.

Officials with the University of Maine at Presque Isle officially announced Tuesday that they have hired Paul Stone as Head Coach of their NCAA Nordic Ski Team.

Stone comes to UMPI from the University of Vermont, where he served as head Nordic Coach for the past four seasons, and where he was named NCAA Eastern Coach of the Year in 2009. He also has been the interim head coach of Colby College (2004-2005 season) and Williams College (2003-2004), prior to taking over the UVM program in 2006. He was also the head coach of southern Maine-based Coastal Nordic Ski Team for the 2005-2006 season. Stone has coached two NCAA Champions and placed skiers in the top 10 at Junior Olympics, NCAA Championships and U.S. National Championships.

With its summer enrollment numbers nearly doubling since last year, the University of Maine at Presque Isle has the highest percentage increase within the University of Maine System of students taking summer courses. Officials are attributing the increase in large part to summer online course offerings and efforts to respond to students’ needs.

This year’s summer enrollment is at 886 students, compared to 488 students in 2009, an increase of more than 80 percent from last summer. UMPI officials say the significant increase is due to two major factors – a wider variety of online courses being offered at the campus than ever before and a large number of students throughout the state of Maine and beyond who are taking advantage of these courses because they fit conveniently into their busy summer schedules.

Officials with the University of Maine at Presque Isle and Northern Maine Community College officially announced on Wednesday, July 14, a partnership between the two institutions that will benefit NMCC students preparing for jobs as Head Start teachers and early childhood educators and help them to meet new state requirements for teaching in their field.

Recent state requirements have increased the qualifications for preschool teachers. Educators who teach children from birth to age 5 – and who earn their Maine teaching endorsement after July 1, 2009 – must have or be working toward a Bachelor’s degree in order to teach. Right now, NMCC offers an Associate’s degree program in Early Childhood Education, but there are no colleges or universities in northern Maine that offer a four-year Early Childhood Education degree.

The partnership between UMPI and NMCC will create a pathway for NMCC students in the Early Childhood Education program so that, upon graduation, they can transition seamlessly into UMPI’s Elementary Education Bachelor’s degree program. Officials have worked for the past year to develop a new Early Childhood Education concentration within UMPI’s Elementary Education degree program that will allow these students to meet the state requirements.

Dr. Stuart R. Gelder, Emeritus Professor of Biology at the University of Maine at Presque Isle, and Ms. Bronwyn W. Williams, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Canada, recently returned from a research trip in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park [GSMNP] after being awarded a $4,940 grant from the Discover Life in America [DLIA] fund.

The grant supported the very first survey of crayfish worms in the national park and may also lead to a much larger research project that would involve multiple scientists and potentially could be funded through a National Science Foundation grant.

Three hundred and forty seven students at the University of Maine at Presque Isle have been named to the Dean’s List for the spring semester, according to Dr. Michael Sonntag, Vice President for Academic Affairs.

The University of Maine at Presque Isle today announced the reassignment of administrative duties in its Athletics Department as part of campus efforts to balance the budget for the 2010-2011 fiscal year.