BIDDEFORD — Katie Labbe will never forget the day she was headed home from Biddeford High School, pushed hard on a door in the main entrance and clunk!

"One of the hinges from the door fell on my head," Labbe recalled. "I was like, 'Awesome.' "

Dan Huy remembers the day in film history class when, just as a screening ended and the teacher turned on the lights, a ceiling light crashed to the floor between him and another student.

Meaning the fluorescent bulb came loose?

"No," Huy replied. "The whole entire thing fell."

For Ryan Fecteau, it's not the falling metal that bugs him most about the structural nightmare that is his high school.

"It's the smells," Fecteau said. "We have a front wall where the water leaks in whenever it rains. It creates a very distinct smell in a lot of the classrooms that's not attractive at all."

They're all seniors, meaning they'll be long gone if and when improvements ever come to their crumbling school.

They're all 17, meaning they're still too young to vote in the Nov. 3 referendum that could bring a long overdue, $34-million overhaul to the half-century-old building on Maplewood Avenue.

But if the 25-year bond issue passes a week from Tuesday, future students here will owe their good fortune in no small part to these three kids – and dozens like them – who understand that to change something big, you have to do more than just complain about it.

Go to Google and punch in "Supporting BHS Renovation" and you'll find a Facebook page created by Fecteau that provides a virtual campaign headquarters for supporters of the project.

By late last week, Fecteau said, the group had 618 members – the "vast majority" of whom are adults throughout the community who think it's about time the community brought the school, built back in 1961, into the 21st century.

Go to www.biddschools.org, click on "BHS Renovation" and you'll see a 30-minute video, shot by graduating seniors last spring.

Edited this fall by Labbe, the video shows the windows leaking whenever it rains, the cracked cinder block walls, the mold-infested nooks and crannies, the water-stained ceiling panels just inches from light fixtures, even the large window that came loose last May and landed on the hood of a teacher's parked car.

"It was an awakening moment," Labbe said, recalling the first time she sat down to view the raw video. "I realized I needed to do my part."

Go to any Biddeford High School event these days, from the ongoing student-run tours of the school to the heavily attended football games, and you'll be handed an information sheet and a "Vote Yes for BHS" button – compliments of the Student Council and Huy, its president.

"We're the last generation of the old schools," said Huy, noting that the $22-million, state-of-the-art Biddeford Middle School opened just after he and his classmates moved on to high school in 2005. The classes after his, Huy said, "should have a new beginning, new traditions, new everything. Start over."

The new middle school was built with state funds, hence the $34 million for the high school must all be raised locally. And therein lies the challenge for these students-turned-political operatives: While virtually everyone in Biddeford agrees the high school is falling apart at the seams, many worry that the price tag is simply too high.

The kids understand that. But they also note that when it's all said and done, the project will tack $15.50 per month onto the average tax bill for a home valued at $200,000.

"That's one cup of coffee a day," said Labbe.

At the same time, they warn that the longer the city allows its school to crumble, the more "Tiger Pride" – a rallying cry for generations in this one-time mill town – rings as empty as the mammoth brick...