A Passion for North Dakota's Singularities

School Administrator, Nov, 1995 by Jerome Enget

As a lifelong educator in North Dakota's public schools, Jerry Enget regularly sees a side to human nature that few colleagues in more populous places ever encounter on the job.

And no subject, Enget discovered, quite raises the emotional fervor of a debate more than interscholastic athletics in a rural state otherwise dominated by agriculture. "Some things are precious to the heart," he muses. "It's something that brings out the best and worst in everyone."

Enget, in his 22nd year as a district superintendent, spent a sometimes-trying year recently as president of the statewide association governing sports and other student activities in North Dakota. During that time, he pushed what he considered a simple and logical change to the two-class basketball structure to better reflect fluctuating secondary school enrollments across the state. The plan would have moved some schools from Glass A (enrollments greater than 375 students) to Glass B.

Opponents railed against the reclassification, contending it upset too many sacred traditions. The local newspaper editor in Hazen, N.D., where he has been superintendent for the past four years, says Enget found himself in "a civil war." The proposal was roundly buried, though the superintendent suggests that changes in the educational landscape remain inevitable in the near term as enrollment at some high schools across the state drops to 35 or less.

Enget seems to have escaped unsullied from the political wrestling match.

Superintendent colleagues, who subsequently elected him president of the North Dakota Association of School Administrators for 1995-96, say Enget has a knack for civilly working through touchy issues. "He can be stern and firm but that's after a considerable amount of thought," says Greg Haugland, superintendent in Kenmare, N.D. "I've never seen him fly off the handle."

Lauren Donovan, editor of the weekly Hazen Star, points to Enget's willing ear as his greatest attribute. "He's one of the most excellent listeners I've known."

The superintendent says, "A lot of times it's easier to form an opinion before you've heard the whole story, but I've learned you never know the whole story because you're always learning something new."

That quality, along with a penchant for diplomacy, served him well when a neighboring school district dissolved, leaving its property and students to be divvied up between Hazen and another community. Some in Hazen pushed the superintendent and the school board during endless hearings and petitions to aggressively pursue a greater share of both. But Enget resisted such a stance, saying it would be contrary to a cooperative working relationship.

"He had to sooth a relationship and, being the professional he is, put out the truth of the matter," says Hazen school board chair Kal Boyd.

Enget, who turns 49 this fall, came to the 1,000-student Hazen district following successive superintendencies in Turtle Lake, New Leipzig, and Tuttle--districts ranging in size from 130 to 270 students--and a two-year principalship in Flasher. Unlike a number of superintendents who have left low-paying school leadership positions in North Dakota for better opportunities in Minnesota, South Dakota, and Montana, Enget says the state is his home and he finds sufficient advantages to limited size.

"One reason we're doing so well is smallness. We can really track and deal closer with parents and students," he says. According to one national directory, 85 percent of Hazen's graduates e roll in some form of post-secondary education, and the superintendent says daily attendance runs between 97 and 98 percent.

Enget credits long-distance learning technology for giving his students the academic offerings at come naturally in most suburban schools around the country. About 60 high school courses are available, with interactive features, to Hazen students from transmission site in Bismarck, the state capital.

"It doesn't take t place of a teacher in the classroom but it's the next best thing," he says recognizing the limited effectiveness of satellite instruction in, say, a laboratory science class.

Enget personally is taking advantage of the interactive TV offerings. Without leaving school property even to enroll, he has accumulated 12 credit hours and currently is taking another four graduate course hours toward a specialist degree from North Dakota State at Fargo, located 250 miles away.