Dexter, PCHS to field cooperative baseball team for a second season

GUILFORD — For the second year in a row, due to low numbers for a team of their own, Piscataquis Community High School baseball players will travel down Route 23 to be part of the neighboring Dexter Regional High School Tigers under a cooperative agreement.

The establishment of a cooperative team for varsity baseball in 2026 with Dexter as the host school was approved by the SAD 4 Board of Directors during a Feb. 10 meeting at Piscataquis Community Elementary School. 

Last season’s cooperative team between the two schools reached the Class C North championship despite being the eighth seed, falling 1-0 to Washington Academy of East Machias at Mansfield Stadium in Bangor. The Tigers finished with a record of 13-7.

Heading into the new school year the numbers for baseball looked decent, Piscataquis Community Secondary School Athletic Director Tom Panciera said, based on players potentially coming back and a large grade 8 class on the middle school team in 2025.

“Long story short, a lot of them decided not to play baseball in high school,” he said. Some players are specializing in other sports and some are opting to work after school.

The number was right around the bare minimum of nine players on the field at a time, and this would not have been sustainable over the course of an entire season.

Per Maine Principals’ Association rules, if a team is unable to finish a varsity season then it is ineligible to play at this level for the ensuing two seasons, barring appeal.

“Baseball’s in hot water right now, I’m not going to sugar coat it,” Panciera said as numbers will likely be low in the future too. 

He said a cooperative with Greenville High School was also considered for 2026, but PCHS players would have had to travel a greater distance compared to Dexter.

Panciera also said having eighth graders come up to play on the high school team is not an option, as the school’s male enrollment is above the 60-pupil threshold.

The hope is to have the Dexter/PCHS team play a game or two in Guilford on Dave Gaw Diamond.

“At the very least, we want to give our boys a senior game on their home diamond,” Panciera said. 

When asked he said the current numbers for other PCHS spring teams are 26 for track, 16 for tennis and 16 for softball — the largest in a few years 

In 2024 PCHS had a cooperative agreement with Greenville for softball as the Pirate players were part of the Laker team. The Pirates had their own team in 2025.

The numbers can change. Twenty signed up for middle school wrestling this season but nearly half did not attend the opening practices, Panciera said.

For middle school, which includes fifth graders, the early roster numbers are 15 for track, 16 for baseball and 25 for softball.

For the 2025-26 basketball season, Dexter and PCHS have a cooperative girls basketball team with the Tigers serving as the host school. Pirate athletes have also been able to play football in Dexter.

In other business, Superintendent Kelly MacFadyen said she met with Guilford Town Manager Johanna Turner. 

“She had a lot of ideas for what we could do together, the town and the school,” MacFadyen said. 

The municipality and school district could potentially collaborate on work development and training programs utilizing the vacant mill and building that formerly housed Walgreens. 

MacFadyen and Turner also discussed the proposal from Foxcroft Academy to serve as SAD 4’s secondary school and the application for a regional comprehensive high school with the Dexter-based-SAD 46 through the Maine Department of Education.

“Our commitment is to see the application for the regional high school through, but we are open to all ideas,” MacFadyen said. “We will continue to look at things that might benefit the town and the school.”

The budget committee is set to meet at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, March 2 in the superintendent’s conference room to continue work on the 2026-27 finances, MacFadyen said.

In the spring the full school board will vote on a budget to then be brought to the public for a district meeting/referendum voting process.

This year’s One Book – One School shared family reading program featuring “The Mouse and the Motorcycle” by Beverly Clearly is underway, PCES Principal Anita Wright said. “That is just a hit,” she said.

Each PCES family received a copy of the book as did classrooms to read together.

Trivia questions from the previous night’s reading will be part of the announcements and the first class to call in with the correct answer gets to have a replica mouse for the day. Despite being older, Wright has said the fifth and sixth graders still get very competitive and want to win the mouse.

One Book – One School will culminate in an evening program in the spring with games, crafts and food tying into the novel .

The school had offered a monthly “Guessing Game” at morning meeting with music teacher Matthew Fogg serving as host “Bingo McSprinkle.”

Guessing Game categories were posted in advance to help students prepare for the fun competition to reinforce learning in an enjoyable and engaging way. 

“The purpose of the Guessing Game is things we think the students should know,” Wright said, such as continents/countries and spelling words.