Long Creek Youth Development Center in South Portland, Maine’s only juvenile correctional facility, will be offering its high school-aged incarcerated youth an elective course in playing instruments and reading music.

The musical instruction is funded by an $18,240 grant from the Maine Department of Corrections (Maine DOC) to the Portland-based Maine Academy of Modern Music, which previously taught music classes at Long Creek prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The music classes will be offered as an additional elective class during the 2024-2025 school year at Long Creek’s Arthur R. Gould School, the youth correctional facility’s accredited diploma-granting high school. The school also offers vocational courses in culinary arts, welding, agriculture, and other career exploration programming.

In a form justifying the grant, the Maine DOC stated that the music classes will involve students learning how to play musical instruments, such as the guitar, keyboard and drums, as well as how to read and compose music.

Students enrolled in the music courses will be earning high school credits towards their diplomas.

The Maine DOC says the classes will help Long Creek students “utilize music as a means of creative outlet by writing lyrics, singing, and playing musical instruments.”

“[S]tudents will develop prosocial skills and strengths that will enhance their confidence in learning other subjects and building positive relationships while at Long Creek and in their communities,” Maine DOC wrote regarding the musical instruction.

In July, two Maine teens incarcerated at Long Creek escaped and fled in a stolen car, resulting in a days-long multistate manhunt.

Earlier this year, Portland Police announced that they had uncovered a large and sophisticated drug trafficking network run by teenagers aged 16 to 19 years old, operating out of homes in southern Maine.

As a result of their investigation into the juvenile drug trafficking ring — which Portland Police Interim Assistant Chief Bob Martin described as “Grand Theft Auto, for real” — police arrested three 17-year-old males, seized multiple handguns, a shotgun, nearly half a kilogram of cocaine and more than $45,000.

During a March press conference regarding the arrests, Martin hinted at the fact that the 17-year-olds arrested as part of their investigation would only be detained at the Long Creek for a short time, saying “I’m thankful that these kids were taken off the street, but being juveniles, it’s probably going to be short term — you know, for them.”

Beyond Portland, police, city officials and prosecutors in Lewiston have been grappling with a recent surge in youth-involved shooting incidents — a total of 27 shots fired incidents have occurred in Lewiston over the past eight months, including a July shooting at a public housing complex that resulted in the death of a 17-year-old male.