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The Valley Breeze |
11/20/2009 |
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Foster hiring for merged superintendent, principal postnews@breezeobserver.com FOSTER - The Foster School Committee has decided to hire one person to serve as both the principal of the Capt. Isaac Paine School and as school superintendent, replacing what used to be two positions held by Gary Moore and Robert Wallace, respectively. The committee's decision to merge the jobs came after a subcommittee of Foster residents examined the administrative options available to the small school district and concluded that combining the positions was the best way to move forward, Ron Cervasio, School Committee chairman said this week. The School Committee adopted the subcommittee's recommendation at a meeting in late June. Since then, the new position has been advertised, 20 applications have been received and another subcommittee is in the process of interviewing candidates, Cervasio said. As a group, the applicants have impressive credentials, and he is confident a qualified, talented person will be hired in the coming weeks, Cervasio said. Already, the subcommittee has narrowed the field to seven candidates, he said. "Most of the people who have applied have Ph.D.s and are from out of state," said Cervasio. Neither Moore nor Wallace applied for the new position, he said. Until the job is filled, James Halley will continue to work on a temporary basis as superintendent because Foster is required by state law to have one, Cervasio said. Halley, formerly superintendent of schools in North Kingstown, was hired after the forced resignation of Wallace earlier this year. He has been paid $500 a day. The goal is to have a new principal/superintendent hired before school starts in the fall, Cervasio said. The hiring of a new principal/superintendent may put to rest a controversy that erupted in March of this year, when the three-member School Committee voted 2 to 1 to not renew Moore's contract and to request the resignation of Wallace. At the time, Cervasio said his goal was to save the taxpayers money, noting that the Paine school has only about 250 students and Wallace was paid $46,000 a year to oversee this one school. Cervasio had the support of committee member Cynthia Bernard; the committee's third member, Dennis Chretien, opposed the action. But the cost-saving move was not popular with the parents of students at the Paine School or the school's teaching staff. In a series of packed meetings, they demanded that Moore and Wallace be kept on, saying they were both doing an excellent job. The Foster Teachers Union took a vote of no confidence in Cervasio and Bernard and there were calls for the two committee members to resign. Moore initially fought to keep his job, filing an appeal with the state Board of Education. But just before a hearing was scheduled on his case, he withdrew his appeal without explanation. Back in March, after Wallace resigned, Cervasio asked Moore to temporarily take on the superintendent's duties on top of his own until a new merged position could be created and advertised. Moore refused. This left the district in the position of having no superintendent, a violation of state law that necessitated the hiring of Halley on a per diem basis. The parents and teachers of the Paine school complained that a merged position had been tried before and didn't work well. They also objected to the way the School Committee had gone about effecting the administrative change, criticizing Cervasio and Bernard for unilaterally imposing its will on the community. In light of these complaints, the School Committee agreed to form a subcommittee to study the district's administrative alternatives before posting a new position. This committee, led by Foster resident Patty Fountain, met several times before concluding that a merged position was the way to go, essentially agreeing with the thinking of Cervasio and Bernard. Fountain could not be reached to discuss the subcommittee's recommendation.
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