Central Support Services

According to an article in last Sunday’s (Aug. 15^th) Statesville Record & Landmark, the I-SS Central Office is now going to be called ‘Central Support Services.’ The article states that the change is meant to dispel any “us vs. them” mentality and to reiterate that administrators are there to work with the schools’ staff. The article also states that Mr. Johnson said that he doesn’t want staff to look at administrators as roadblocks, but instead as resourceful tools they can use in order to accomplish the goal of educating children.

Later in the article it cites Mr. Johnson as saying that with the district moving from a district of “progress” to one of “distinction” with an 80.7% performance composite for 2009-10 under ABC results, the goal moving forward is to get to 100%. Then the article quotes Mr. Johnson as saying, “You hear people talk about No Child Left Behind, but we’re serious about that.” However, there was no mention of the low AYP scores.

Of course Mr. Johnson also did not mention that one of the I-SS primary goals has been that the district was to have 97% expected ABC growth by 2010 and that another goal was that the district was to meet 96% of the AYP targets in 2010. Remember that the AYP scores are a measure of the success of the ‘No Child Left Behind’ program.

If Mr. Johnson is serious about ‘No Child Left Behind’ then he has to admit that the I-SS AYP scores dramatically decreased this past year and discuss what the district is truly going to change in order to improve both the ABC and AYP goals. I don’t think that rebranding the Central Office as Central Support Services is going to bring much real change in the way that the I-SS administration does things.

Buddy Hemric's Letter to the Editor

The following is Buddy Hemric's 'Letter to the Editor' that was published in Saturday's Record and Landmark. Buddy has given me permission to post the letter. The wording is a little different from that which was printed in the paper. This is the version that Buddy provided to me and I assume it is what he provided to the newspaper. The Record and Landmark reserves the right to edit submitted letters and in my experience they exercise that right quite liberally.

This past year the ISS school system lost 50 teachers due to retirement or teachers leaving the system. Because of budget cuts at the state & local levels of government these teachers were not replaced. This has caused an increase in class size to 31 pupils per class. There are 35 teachers in the system that do not teach in a classroom. They are called IF Models. I.F. stands for "Instructional Facilitators". What is wrong with this picture?

Of the 35 IFs I found salaries for 26 of them ranging from $36,670 to $63,453. I must note this is an old list and may not be exact. The total cost of these "non-teachers" on this scale is $1,275,475.00. That will average out to $49,056.73 per "non-teacher". With 35 on the payroll at this average these "non-teachers" cost the taxpayers $1,724,086 dollars per year with no return for our kids, and 50 teacher positions left empty.

Buddy Hemric

Administrative Raises

In previous posts I told of the announced shift in personnel at the I-SS Central Office. The shifts were triggered as Mr. Johnson assumed the role of Interim Superintendent. Mr. Johnson had informed me that administrators moving into new positions would receive raises corresponding to their new responsibilities. Mr. Johnson has now provided the amounts of those raises. The change in position and salary for each administrator is given below.

Brady Johnson was Deputy Superintendent of Operations and is now Interim Superintendent. His previous salary was $129,900.00 and is now $175,100.00, which is a 34.8% raise.

Ron Hargrave was Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Education/Student Services and is now Interim Associate Superintendent of Operations. His previous salary was $118,000.00 and is now $125,000.00, which is a 5.9% raise.

Dale Ellis was Associate Superintendent of Human Resources and is now Interim Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Education/Student Services. His previous salary was $110,970.00 and is now $117,000.00, which is a 5.4% raise.

Dr. Melanie Taylor was Chief Academic Officer and is now Interim Associate Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction. Her previous salary was $120,000.00 and is now $125,000.00, which is a 4.2% raise.

Bill Long was Director of Recruitment & Retention and is now Interim Associate Superintendent of Human Resources. His previous salary was $81,900.00 and is now $92,000.00, which is a 12.3% raise.

Mr. Johnson stated that all of these salaries are subject to the 2% reduction/furlough and that each of these individuals will revert back to his or her previous position/salary after the new superintendent is hired.

In my opinion, under normal economic conditions these raises would not be out of line. But, with the drastic cuts in the overall school budget, these raises do seem to be unwarranted. It was recently reported in the Statesville Record & Landmark that there would be a 5.8% reduction in More at Four Funding; the elimination of funding for literacy coaches, staff development, and improving student accountability; a 13.1% cut in funding for teacher mentoring; and an estimated $420,000 cut in transportation spending. Many students who previously were able to ride a school bus are now required to walk to school. Yet these administrators were given raises. As I mentioned before, the justification given is that these individuals will be taking on new responsibilities.

The Record & Landmark also reported that the cap on class size for 4^th through 12^th grades will increase to 31 students. Each of the teachers in these grades will have to take on new responsibilities for each additional student. Are these teachers going to be given raises because they have to take on these new responsibilities? No! Are other school employees going to be given raises because they have to take on new responsibilities due to cuts in the budget? No! This was emphasized in the Record & Landmark article. It was reported that there would be no salary increases. I guess no one bothered to inform Ms. Broadnax, R & L reporter, of the raises for the administrators mentioned above. Why is it that the School Board sees no disparity in giving raises to administrators who take on additional duties but continues to ask other employees to do more and more for the same pay?

Click on the link below to view the online version of the article in the Record and Landmark that was referenced in this post.

Budget for I-SS coming into focus