EMBDEN -- In 2001, the Embden Elementary School hit rock bottom.

Annual test scores for fourth graders in this rural community in Somerset County showed just eight percent of students met or exceeded state standards in math and reading.

"We were put on a priority list as a failing school," Embden principal Jean Butler recalled.

A year later, scores spiked to 69 percent in reading against the Maine Education Assessment target of 34 percent. In math the numbers were good, too, with 38 percent of students meeting or exceeding the target of 12 percent.

By school year 2004-05, 100 percent of students met the standard for reading -- tops in the state -- and 64 percent met the standard in math.

In March of this year, test results, now done for grades three, four and five, remained high across the board -- 100 percent of fourth graders met the standard in reading and 80 percent of fifth graders met the standard in math.

Then came the letter last Friday from the U.S. Department of Education.

Tiny Embden Elementary School, with an enrollment of 43 students and on the short list of schools that could be closed to save money, was selected as a No Child Left Behind Blue Ribbon School, a national award.

Only two other schools in Maine -- Mt. Desert Elementary School and Falmouth Middle School -- were so honored.

"Your school is a national model of excellence from which others can take inspiration," U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings wrote in her congratulatory letter to Butler.

Butler and third/fourth-grade teacher Agnes Dodd will travel to Washington, D.C., next month to receive the award.

The school, which had been nominated for the award by the state Department of Education, achieved success in the "dramatic improvement" category, meaning that, with at least 40 percent of students being from disadvantaged backgrounds, the school had shown "high levels" of success in math and reading.

"We were put on the priority list, which was devastating, certainly, for us," Butler said of the 2001 test scores. "The staff got together and said 'We know our kids can do better. We need to better prepare them for the test.'

"You can see the jump the next year and we've been able to maintain that."

Scores have remained high ever since, Butler said.

"I think getting to know more about the test has helped," Butler said. "And having strategies to help prepare kids, working together, looking at instruction methods, making it high stakes, making the kids excited about it and understanding about doing their best."

Butler said classroom preparation for the annual tests meant teaching students how to better explain their thought processes by writing more essays and learning how to answers questions. A new math program in the district also helped. Butler and Dodd said a dedicated school staff, hard work by the students and the support of parents and the community went a long way to bolstering hope when things seemed to be at their worst.

They are now a Blue Ribbon School -- nationally recognized -- Dodd said.

"I think the entire staff started to realize that we needed to shake up our literacy, to think more about the MEA and the thing we and the parents could do to prepare for it," Dodd said. "The MEA is a good measure of what children can achieve. There's a lot of writing in it. I think it's a very good measure.

"It shows you one way or the other whether you're being effective in what you're teaching."

Doug Harlow -- 474-9534, Ext. 342

dharlow@centralmaine.com