ISD 166 Superintendent Beth Schwarz has a following. In light of looming funding cuts and declining enrollment, the board of Cook County Schools planned to take a vote on reducing the superintendent’s position at its October 18, 2011 meeting, held in Grand Portage, as a way to shave the budget while retaining student programs. People in support of what she has done for the district made impassioned pleas to keep her position, however, and to at least postpone the decision.
Citizens’ pleas
The board spent hours discussing the position at a September 28 special meeting, but former school board member Eric Kemp told the board on October 18 that he believed they were moving too fast. He urged them to get more input from the public, saying not having “public buy-in” on such a decision could lead them down “a pretty rocky road.”
1961 Cook County High School graduate Geraldine Koslowski of Grand Portage said Schwarz was the first superintendent she knew of to acknowledge Grand Portage Indian students and help them feel welcome in Cook County schools. “Why cut the salary down?” she said. “We need a leader. …You need a good leader. Our superintendent has proved that.”
Another former school board member, Brian Sherburne, said he didn’t understand why they would want to reduce the top administrative position. With a business in financial distress, rather than reducing the head person’s job, common practice would be to “lean on them” harder. “It’s a mistake to cut the captain of the ship,” he said.
CCHS grad Rosie Novitsky said this is the first time she’s seen an ISD 166 superintendent try to get the various schools working together.
“I just think it would be a huge mistake to reduce the superintendent position,” said Grand Marais parent Cara Sporn. “I think that we’re headed in the right direction and I want to see us continue to go in that direction.”
The district would lose positive momentum if they reduced Schwarz’s position, said Gunflint Trail parent Sue Prom.
School board opinions
Rather than trying to take Schwarz’s job from her, school board member Deb White said, they were considering restructuring the superintendency. The decision was not about Schwarz’s performance. If it were, she said, they could simply not renew her contract. She pointed out that the board has been discussing reducing administrative staff for some time, deciding to eliminate a part-time dean position but keep a fulltime school counselor. “We brought it to the public many times,” she said. “We have dwindling funds.” Voters graciously voted to institute a levy to help balance the budget, she said. “We are elected to be good guardians of these dollars,” she said, “and to provide every educational opportunity to our students.”
The decision was “money-driven,” she said, “because the voters of Cook County expect us to not squander the money.”
To stave off any rumors regarding why this discussion was taking place when the meeting was held in Grand Portage, White said, “This was not an underhanded thing to have this here.” Holding the meeting in Grand Portage was a way to allow her constituents to attend a school board meeting without having to travel, she said.
School board member Jeanne Anderson said the Minnesota School Board Association had told them to prepare for a $250 per pupil reduction in student aid, a total of $115,000. This didn’t happen, however. In addition to this good news they found out they would be receiving an extra $130,000 in Small Schools Revenue. “We are still not doing well,” Anderson said. “Our fund balance is low. …It’s nothing any of us want …We want to give all that we can to our students. … Funding is an issue.”
“This might look like we’re trying to get rid of the superintendent,” school board member Leonard Sobanja said. “This is not the case, and I say that emphatically. …She has done what we have asked her to do.”
Sobanja said he has not agreed with everything Beth has recommended, such as increased spending on early childhood education. “It isn’t that I’m not for those issues,” he said. “It’s that I saw us getting into a real fiscal bind.”
A priority for him, Sobanja said, is to keep class sizes small “until the money is not there anymore.” He has wondered which position is more important to a district – the superintendent or the principal? Research shows that when schools are doing well, he said, it’s because of things the principal is doing.
School board member Terry Collins read something Beth Schwarz had written and read at his first meeting as a school board member on March 3. The letter favored reducing the superintendent position over losing school programs when push came to shove. A natural reduction in expenditures could occur in upcoming years if senior faculty retire. The board cannot make them do that, however, he said, and they are valuable to the district. While declining enrollment is expected to decrease funding in an amount equal to three teacher salaries, he said, other funding cuts will likely call for reducing nine teacher positions in upcoming years.
Collins said he would be happy to postpone a vote on reducing the superintendent position, but they will have to reduce spending somewhere.
School board member Mary Sanders said she had received numerous letters in support of retaining the superintendent position full-time. “I really would hope for a delay in a decision,” she said.
Superintendent’s thoughts
The district will still have “a serious situation” in the 2016-17 school year, Schwarz said, but it will be half what they thought it would be originally. She recommended that the board keep its goal of reducing the budget by $135,000 but said she thought it could be put off until the fall of 2014. She thought finances might change over the next two years if senior teachers retire or the district’s new philanthropy effort achieves good results.
Many districts pay for a part-time superintendent, Schwarz said, but offer a combined position that involves working part-time doing something else, such as being principal. Trying to decide where to reduce hours would be difficult, especially since full-time work demands more than 40 hours a week.
“I fully get the gravity of our situation,” Schwarz said, but she believed the benefits of keeping a superintendent full-time outweigh the risk of spending the money to keep a superintendent on full-time.
Terry Collins made a motion, seconded by Jeanne Anderson, to delay a decision on reducing the superintendent’s position. The motion passed by four ayes, with Collins abstaining.
The board plans to discuss the issue further at a special meeting on November 11.
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