FINDING A SUPERINTENDENT   BY MARY MCGARR:

Finding A Superintendent

By Mary McGarr  (First posted on the Katy Citizen Watchdog$ Website)

April 29, 2006 (modified and rearranged May 15, 2014)

In 1995, the Katy ISD School Board found itself in the position of needing a new superintendent. The previous one had been sent on his way, and the Board
initiated a process for finding a suitable replacement. In that effort, the Board solicited input from all sorts of places, hoping to find consensus among the members of the public who cared about the selection. Although lists of suggested requirements were tallied by the headhunter, the newspapers, and the Board, none of those lists seemed as comprehensive as the one I assimilated from my personal contacts, listening to the public, reading the newspapers, and tapping my own list.

Here is what, I believe, our school district wanted in a superintendent in 1995:

I thought the Board received a clear message that the public wanted a man who was to be our superintendent to have these characteristics or qualities:

*To be a man who was younger than 45

*To be someone who was from Texas

*To be someone who could exhibit some original thinking about improving the quality of our schools (we weren't looking for someone to come in and recreate what he had done elsewhere)

*To be someone who could accept blame when he was wrong

*To be someone who could maintain his objectivity in all situations

*To be someone who could become a true educational leader

* To be someone who had an outgoing personality

* To be someone who was well-spoken and a good speaker

*To be someone who had a family with school aged children

*To be someone with some business background

*To be someone with some college course work outside the field of education

*To be someone who had an acceptable college transcript that all Board members could see

*To be someone with a clear medical history

* To be someone with the ability to take direction from the Board

*To be someone with the ability to take criticism from the Board and the community without becoming defensive

*To be someone with a  philosophy of education in tune with the Katy community

*To be someone with the  ability to get along with women without feeling threatened

*To be someone with  the ability to work with current employees and not have to bring all his cohorts with him from his previous places of employment

*To be someone with a grasp of financial issues

*To be someone with an understanding of curriculum and methodology

*To be someone with an interest in educational issues beyond those that only serve superintendents

*To be someone with a willingness to live in the school district and become a part of the community

*To be someone with a willingness to start with a two year contract at $100,000

*To be someone with the ability to provide financial direction that would maintain KISD's average tax rate and its modest building program

*To be someone with the ability to accept smaller minimal pay increases for the administrative staff

*To be someone who harbored a belief in the importance of an elected School Board being in charge of the local public schools

*To be someone with a willingness to thwart Outcome Based Education (OBE) in KISD schools even if it meant a loss of grant money and other perks

*To be someone with a successful work history and documented leadership ability as a superintendent for at least five years in a school district of comparable size and demographic composition

*To be someone with a real liking for children (and not just his own)

*To be someone with a respect for and an understanding of the issues facing teachers in KISD

*To be someone with the ability to write and speak well

*To be someone with a clean cut appearance

*To be someone with a respect for patrons who might be critical of him and/or the school district

*To be someone with a grasp of what it means to achieve academic excellence

*To be someone with a clear understanding of the needs of special populations including special education, minorities, gifted students, and vocational students

In retrospect, the Board did not do a very good job of listening to the public. I knew that they hadn’t ten years ago, and when it came time to vote for Leonard Merrell as superintendent, I voted “NO.” It took me from March 1995 until August 1995 to get my remarks that accompanied my NO vote placed in the Board minutes.

Some of the media stories of Merrell’s selection did not state my opposition. I take no comfort in having been correct in my assessment of Leonard Merrell. He is, after all, a person with a family. But he has done the children of the Katy schools no favors. His lack of educational leadership, his inability to follow the dictates at the time of his hiring, his constant effort to control who his bosses on the Board are, his spreading of the bond money wealth among non-Katy businesses and dumping the businesses that had served this school district so well for many years, his apparent involvement in setting up the Xpediant front company and allowing those employees to soak this school district, his closing of the KISD print shop, his bringing in of “outsiders” for administrative positions when KISD had plenty of qualified employees who could have been promoted to do that work just as well, his obvious patronizing of those whose wealth could curry favor for him with the public, his endless opportunistic efforts to garner photo-ops for himself, and his placement of a curriculum in our midst that fails children on every front is inexcusable and shameful, in my opinion.