Two farm workers, two kids, eight years of college.

The math is going to be difficult at best for Denise Sica and her husband, Robert Mosher. They’ve been fretting recently over how to send their daughters Sophie Mosher and Elena Mosher to college. The problem is more immediate for Sophie, who will enter her senior year at Northport High School.

So news that there will be at least some scholarship money available through a fledgling program called the Northport Promise aimed at boosting student numbers at Northport Public School could not have come at a better time.

“It’s fantastic,” said Sica, who works for Meadowlark Farm in Lake Leelanau. Robert Mosher works at an orchard in Omena.

Both work hard, given the growing cost of tuition, may not be enough by itself to fulfill one of several college venues being considered by Sophie Mosher. She is looking at attending the University of Michigan.

“We’re just starting to look at college applications, and then on to applying for various scholarships and aid. I’m thrilled to know there is any amount available from the Promise. It’s such a generous and wonderful effort, so it says a lot about the Northport community,” said Sica.

Sica and Mosher represent something that Northport is short on — working families, the type of families that send children to public schools.

Northport’s enrollment has dropped dramatically this decade, peaking at about 350 and sinking to 154 in 2007. Superintendent Ty Wessell has identified just 12 members of the class of 2008 — and a kindergarten class entering school of just 7 or 8 students.

Modeled after a program begun in 2006 in Kalamazoo, the Northport Promise hopes to convince parents to have their children attend Northport Public School in exchange for payment of tuition costs throughout their four-year collegiate career.

“We do need the Promise’s help,” he said. “I’m optimistic in that (the Promise) will help us… There is a lot of excitement around the community. I know the kids are talking about it.”

Talk of the program started last fall with Sally Viskochil, owner of the Tamarack Gallery in Omena and a consummate Northport school supporter. She heard of the success of a similar program in Kalamazoo, and began working to offer the same benefits in Northport.

The Northport Promise is ready to move from discussion to implementation, according to Ruth Steele Walker, who with her husband, Scott, own and operate Due North Marketing and Communications out of their home on the former Matheson Greens Golf Course.

Viskochil and other members of the Northport Promise Steering

Committee laid out the program in a 4-page application and qualifications document released this week — a step required before lining up funding.

“This gives something to present at the corporate and the foundation level,” said Walker. “They want to know what you’re going to do with the endowment donations, and that’s a very reasonable expectation.”

Some provisions were placed in rules governing the program allowing adjustments to be made based on funding levels. Walker expects that an endowment level of $6 million to $7 million will be needed to create a self-funded program — a goal that may take several years to reach.

Consequently, the Promise will likely fund only a portion of tuition costs in its first years. Eventually, she said the goal is to offer to pay all college tuition expenses for up to four years for all Northport graduates.

While the Northport Promise will need large donors to build the endowment fund, Walker expects most Northport graduates to contribute or become involved in some way.

Included are her former classmates, such as Jack Latimore, a custom furniture maker based in the Philadelphia area. His designs are known across the country, but he has not forgotten his Northport roots.

“I had a really good experience living and going to school in Northport,” said Latimore from his office.“I would say that most (Northport grads) would say it was a pretty magical way to live and grow up.”

Attending a small school has other advantages, Latimore added, such as providing a tool to push your own children into getting better grades. “I told them I graduated 14th in my class. Eventually they found out there were only 28 in my class. They know the joke now, so they’re not intimated by that.”

Latimore has given back to Northport before — a custom-built bench was provided by him to the school on behalf of the Class of ’68. It sits outside the school office.

The Northport Promise is closer to making a much larger contribution to future Northport graduates — college degrees.