Ellsworth school official to step down

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Ellsworth’s superintendent of schools announced that he is stepping down to take the same position at a town in Massachusetts, admitting that Maine’s polarizing school district consolidation issue played a role in his decision.

“Obviously, when the state began talking about consolidation, my wife and I started thinking about other options,” Frank Hackett said Tuesday about his decision to accept a job offer from the school committee in Pembroke, Mass. “I haven’t really talked with other superintendents, but the reality is that many of them will lose their jobs.”

Hackett’s move poses a serious statewide question: Will more Maine school administrators begin polishing their resumes and follow his lead in looking for greener pastures?

State officials said they don’t think that will happen. At least not yet.

“I know there are some superintendents pondering what has happened at the state level, but from the conversations I’ve had, people are still trying to digest what the new law means,” said Dale Douglass, executive director of the Maine School Management Association, which represents the state’s superintendents. “But I do think you’ll see more people leave in the future.”

State Board of Education officials are busy hosting public forums across the state to discuss the implications of a new law that would cut the number of Maine school administrative systems from 152 to no more than 80 by 2009.

Maine school districts currently average 734 students, compared to 3,200 nationally. Since 1978, however, the number of students attending Maine public schools has declined by 16 percent while the number of administrators, not including superintendents, has grown by 54 percent.

The consolidation plan is designed to reduce the amount of administrative management in the state’s education system, thereby saving Maine more than $36 million by the end of 2009.

What effects the law will have on the state’s superintendents is unclear.

Susan Gendron, commissioner of the Maine Department of Education, could not be reached for comment Tuesday, but DOE communications director David Connerty-Marin said he doesn’t think the state’s superintendents, as a whole, are on their way out.

“What I’ve heard so far is an awful lot of creative thinking on the part of superintendents in figuring out how to implement this plan,” Connerty-Marin said. “It doesn’t mean they like all aspects, or even any aspects, but they’re doing the work and taking on the challenge with great professionalism.”

Some school districts currently have part-time administrators, but Douglass said there are still 118 full-time superintendents across the state, meaning several could potentially be out of a job.

The exceptions, of course, are those school administrators who have contracts. When the school consolidation plan goes into effect, any active contracts will have to be honored by the new regional school units, Connerty-Marin said.

Those units can then either reassign administrators to different positions, shift their duties or potentially buy out contracts.

Douglass added that the state usually sees anywhere from 20-30 vacancies each year at the superintendent level, many as a result of retirement, so the consolidation may not have the drastic impact predicted by some.

While Hackett conceivably could still have kept his position in Ellsworth, he wasn’t about to take that chance without considering other options.

“We took it seriously,” Hackett said of the consolidation issue, adding that his wife also works as a school administrator. “I think there are people out there who want to try and take control of their own situation rather than wait.”

Ellsworth City Council Chairman Gary Fortier said he’s not surprised that Hackett took another job.

“The atmosphere in the state right now is not what you would call inviting,” he said. “If you’re in that position, you need to take the jobs when they’re available.”

For the last 18 months, Hackett has been instrumental in ushering the city of Ellsworth through the painstaking process associated with a new $35 million elementary school project.

In fact, on the same day he announced his decision to leave, Ellsworth residents prepared to hit the polls and officially vote on that project.

Hackett officially was hired by the Pembroke, Mass., school committee at a meeting last Thursday, according to a story published Friday, June 22, in the Pembroke Mariner & Reporter.

He said he’s still in the process of negotiating a new contract with Pembroke, a community of about 17,000 people located 30 miles southeast of Boston.

“I don’t know much about the Massachusetts education system just yet,” said Hackett, who has never lived outside Maine. “But it seems that they value local control of their schools and that, to me, is important.”

Hackett, 40, originally is from Orono. He was hired in June 2005 as Ellsworth’s superintendent after spending four years as assistant superintendent in Bangor and also has served as superintendent in East Millinocket and Camden.

“I have watched Frank since he started his first superintendent job,” Douglass said. “He’s had a remarkable career for someone who started so young.”

As far as Hackett’s decision to leave, Douglass said, “It’s Maine’s loss and Massachusetts’ gain.”

Fortier, who used those exact same words to describe Hackett, said Ellsworth likely will begin the process of finding an interim superintendent.

As for whether Hackett’s decision will be the first of many moves throughout Maine’s community of superintendents, only time will tell.

“Obviously, we have had people inquire about looking elsewhere,” Douglass said. “People have families; they have other responsibilities. But I don’t see a groundswell just yet.”

Connerty-Marin was more optimistic.

“I think most people who want to are going to find positions within the new structure,” he said.