Superintendent-School Board Relations That Work

School Administrator, August, 1994 by Elizabeth Donohoe Steinberger

"There were so many administrators," recalls Helfrich, "that we had to put desks out in the hall at the central office." Today, he points out, the district has four central-level administrators and their jobs have changed from telling people what to do to facilitating building-level teams in decentralized management and decision-making.

One of Helfrich's first jobs was to close four buildings, according to veteran board member and current president June Kearly. The trauma of lost jobs and reassignment that accompanies school shutdowns was not new in Ken-Ton. Helfrich was the third superintendent in five years to close school doors.

The superintendent who initiated downsizing had been born and raised in the area and enjoyed a long tenure in Ken-Ton before retiring. The second superintendent survived a year or two of more school closings before accepting another job downstate.

Accompanying severe reductions in administrative staff was a 50 percent cut in teaching staff. Helfrich admits that during downsizing, morale was low. At the school level, in particular, some administrators balked as they saw their power eroding. Out in the community, laid-off employees-joined residents in the battle to save schools and protect long-established attendance area boundaries.

Ken-Ton School District during this time was hardly a peaceful, nurturing environment where smooth, positive relationships among board members and the superintendent were likely to root.

According to Kearly, Helfrich approached the unpleasant task of layoffs and school closures differently. "He went out into the schools and the community and built support for the school district. He informed people about the need to close schools. --- Parents saw the issues and realized that we had to do this," she says.

"By the time we had closed 16 buildings and enrollment had dropped from 22,000 to about 7,500 students, we had the process down perfect," she adds.

Over the years, the composition of the school board has changed, as have the issues. Not one of the board members who appointed Helfrich currently sits on the board. Enrollment is increasing about 200 to 500 students a year, so the board and superintendent now must decide whether to add temporary classroom units to existing schools or reopen one of the 16 facilities they kept in inventory and thus face redrawing attendance areas again.

Funding Struggles

Facility use has been one of the most explosive issues to challenge superintendent-board relationships in KenTon, but it was not the only one. Each year the district must take the school budget to voters for approval. As in many areas of the country, state purse strings have tightened. Currently the state provides about 24 percent of Ken-Ton's school dollars, leaving the bulk of educational funding to local taxpayers.

When more than 70 percent of residents have no children in the schools and higher school taxes are eroding the fixed incomes of many senior citizens, opposition can be strong. Barbara Johnson, a parent in the district, remembers one year when athletics, field trips, bus service, and library materials were cut until citizens petitioned for a budget revote.