According to the Express-Times (read it here), the Nazareth Area School Board met on Saturday for the purpose of hiring a Director of Curriculum, Isabele Resende.
Resende will earn $98,000 according to the article.
I did not see this meeting included in the district web site calendar, nor was it included in the last board agenda that includes upcoming meetings.
While names of positions may change, it is hard to tell if this is a new position or not.
Michael Roth previously held a position titled very similar to this, took the same in Quakertown last year, and this year returned to Nazareth as Assistant to the Superintendent.
Judy Swigart's position, Asst. Superintendent for Education Support Services, remains open, or at least listed on the Admin page of the web site.
Resende's position is not currently listed on the web site under administration, so it could be new.
The job postings on the district web site lists an "Assistant Superintendent or an Assistant to the Superintendent for human resources and educational programs".
The position now posted would appear to be very similar to the one held by Diane Dautrich, who is rumored to be retiring.
From an organizational standpoint, I believe our structure looks like this or close to it:
1 Superintendent
1.1 Asst. Super for Ed Programs
1.1.1 Director of Pupil Services
1.1.2 Director of Special Education
1.1.3 Director of Curriculum
1.2 Asst. Super for Ed Support Programs
1.2.1 Supervisor for Facilities and Operations
1.2.1.1 Asst. Supervisor for Facilities and Operations
1.2.2 Coordinator of Transportation
1.2.3 Applications Specialist
1.2.4 Director of Food Services
1.2.5 Network Administrator
1.2.5.1 Asst Director of Educational Technology
1.3 Asst. to the Super
1.4 Business Administrator (the one position on this level that is not a former teacher)
1.4.1 Asst. Business Administrator
I understand some of the need to have people responsible for these core areas, but it seems if a Director, 3rd level (Super, Asst. Super, then director) is near or at the $100,000 range then we do have more than a few six figure administrators and I'm not sure if the position's value should be decidedly more than those in the classroom.
It would seem if we want our best teachers in the classroom we shouldn't incentivize them to leave the classroom and enter administration.
Teacher's pay is based on years experience and education level, but administrators seem to be based on getting a bit more than where you came from. If we are going to have this much administration, then maybe it is time we looked at a system more akin to the teachers and put an emphasis on classroom years, followed by administrative experience, and education. And then tie it to the teacher's pay scale. Say for instance for a like admin position you couldn't exceed 110% of teachers pay.
Just a thought, but it does seem we are going to have to deal with this as our budgets get that much tougher to balance each year. And I respect we couldn't do it retroactively, but we could implement for new hires moving forward and that shouldn't pose too much of a problem because the turnover rate seems to be pretty significant.
What do you think?
7 comments:
Well if this isn't sneaky, then I don't know what is! A Saturday School Board meeting??? WHY? What was sooo URGENT that they needed to meet? Was this position soooo critical to the education of our children that it necessitated this apparent covert operation?
I would really like any School Board member, who has enough guts, to stand up and explain why/how this occurred and explain IF it is a replacement position (I doubt it!), and while they're at it tell us all, why our district is so top heavy yet the teachers who impact our kids (and the almighty PSSA reults) have to fight so hard to get what they deserve.
I'd also like to know when someone on the school board is going to evaluate the need for all of these admin positions and start cutting some of the duplication of efforts or combining jobs that used to be one but are now filled by two people.
TIMES ARE TOUGH! Let's get real, School Board. STOP THE SPENDING!
Just to note it was announced at the school board meeting on 9/22 and in the Express Times 1 week before the meeting that the board was going to hold this special meeting and that we were going to hire administrative postions.
Limiting administration pay may help the budget, but it may limit the quality of administrators we have. I know someone on a school board in Berks county and when they hired a super they had very few choices. Salaries are based on supply and demand. The article you posted on Swigart said she received a substantial pay raise at her new job. When you posted the comparison page for Pa supers, Nazareth was near the middle. I don't think , by comparison, that we are overpaying administration. We should look at getting more out of fewer administration.
Jacob - glad you go to meetings and saw that they made the announcement in the E-T. Feel free to forward any notes - I'd be more than happy to post them, anonymously if you'd prefer.
Of course they could have also sent a note here and I've been happy to alert people of the meeting. Seems a case of being minimally compliant, instead of reaching out and being inclusive.
Justc - I think to an extent you get what you pay for, but that is much more the case in the open market than in the school system.
We are encouraging people to leave teaching, based on pay, for administrative positions and they are jumping in far too early.
I can't speak for Resende's background, but if you are to be administrating and you have less than 10 years in the classroom you'll be spending less than one third of your career in the classroom and over 2/3 telling others what they should be doing there.
That doesn't resonate with me.
Typically, you get paid more for having more reports and a bigger budget.
Comparing our superintendent's pay to other superintendents should put us near the middle because of the size of our school (I won't get into school test score performance;-)
You also can't extend super pay to director, which is two steps down, based on the reporting structure we seem to have.
I don't disagree with getting more out of less and I think it will be our only option down the road.
Two examples - transportation and central registration.
We sub-contract busing and that needs to have oversight, but we don't need a part time admin position to do so. Similarly, central registration is new. We used to do this on the building level and shifted the responsibility.
Probably time to shift back.
Point is, nothing will change unless change takes place on the board. If you are interested in running and want to learn what you need to do and how to do it - get in touch with me and I'll be happy to forward the information.
Have a great night!
With the school board making all these lovely dicissions kind of on the sly, I find it interesting. NOw that we are now paying another high priced administrator, and we have all these other items that the school board thinks we need to buy. I guess we tax payers can not seem to be kept up to date appropriatly on what is going on with our school district. I think the school board and Dr. Lesky need to remember who the tax payers are. I can not figure out why or who though of the brilliant idea that we need to start making our different sport groups, extra curricular groups, and also the band pay for the use of school areas. Good example, when the basketball teams or soccer teams have fundraisers using the cafeteria, they have to pay to use the cafeteria, so does the band and I found out they also have to pay to have a cafeteria worker there and a maintenance worker. If I am not mistaken this amount for the middle school cafeteria comes out to $700, then the best one yet is that we charge our own groups to use the stadium at a whoping $1500. Now if I am not mistaken, the school does not pay a whole lot for the band, the band parents do. I do know they have paid for the uniforms, the maintenance on the uniforms, instruments, some bussing, along with the band banquet at the end of the year. I do not see any reason why we need to cut any extra curriculars, but I certainly do not know why we need all the administration positions. These people can't multi-task?
spectator said...
I think the school board and Dr. Lesky need to remember who the tax payers are.
With all due respect, they know who we are. That's why they do anything they want, Monday nights, Saturdays, whenever.
Regarding the pay per administrator and attracting quality administrators. I think we sometimes sell ourselves short. It isn't always about money. We are not a large district with all the problems they have, we have an excellent quality of life in this community, provide plenty of resources for professional development.
This community and school district was here a long time before the current not-so-desirable
administrators, and it will be here long after they are gone. So, don't fall for that "We will lose a good person if we don't pay" nonsense that the teacher's union also uses. There are plenty of good people out there just waiting for an opportunity to prove themselves.
So, we should offer what we know to be competitive, reasonable and responsible. And if the grass is greener somewhere else, let them go. I believe that this community is strong enough to survive and find replacements at least as good as those who would go. It's not like we've got the best the field has to offer in the first place.
"spectator" hit a good point about usage fees suddenly becoming an issue
recently all the district PTA's were hit with usage fees for the school facilities due to a rewrite of the policy over the summer
case in point---Shafer PTA was charged for its blood drives that were being held for the benefit of two students diagnosed with leukemia over the summer---charges were for maintenance although the custodians are there until 9 pm and the blood drive is over at 8---all the Shafer PTA events were being charged---
of course Lesky has promised to try to rescind the fees but only with the threat of the PTA taking it to the board and the public becoming aware of such nefarious attempts to gather capital to fund even more bloated projects &/or positions---
Admin and board were looking for extra $ to pay off the colonial facades on the new school with its mexican rivera blue tile in the natatorium and its extra cushioned seats in the auditorium---so lets gouge our PTA's with fees that they have never paid before and hope they just pay and don't ? ---sneaky, underhanded, and downright unacceptable
my question is who wants to inherit this mess--rational people don't want to run for the board only to incur the headaches from the position that the current board and admin has gotten our school district into
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