Seattle Superintendent Search

A week ago the Seattle school board announced four finalists for the superintendent post. The public reaction to the candidates is not very enthusiastic, or is it?

An ad hoc advisory committee appointed by the school board voted not to recommend any of the four candidates. The Seattle Times describes the advisory committee as "A diverse committee of community leaders", but it's not very diverse. The committee's membership is overwhelmingly drawn from city and school district employees, unions and minority activists. (The only member with a business background is Ken Alhadeff, who also advocates the extremely silly not to mention unconstitutional proposal that "The collective voice of America must rise as one and demand a completely publicly funded election system"). So the advisory committee has no serious business representative and nobody representing ordinary taxpayers and parents, except for the minority of the community who happen to be minorities.

The best superintendent candidate is Dr. Steven Adamowski, who was superintendent in Cincinnati for several years. The only serious objections to Adamowski are being raised by the teachers' union. Adamowski raised academic achievement in the mostly black Cincinnati schools, partly by introducing charter schools and performance pay for teachers. Naturally, unions hate any form of competition or meritocracy, especially if it works. The mayor has climbed aboard the pro-union/anti-child bandwagon and called on the school board to reject all the candidates. The reliably predictable Seattle Post-Intelligencer also sides with the union both in its reporting and on its editorial page. The P-I even goes so far as to lavish extra praise on the puerile Evelyn Castro.

One expects better from the Seattle Times. Today's paper has profiles of the three surviving candidates (one withdrew her name). Of the three, only Adamowski appears to have solid community backing:

Several Seattle community leaders say Adamowski would be a good fit for Seattle.

Phyllis Beaumonte, a retired teacher who represents the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People on the committee, also said Adamowski was the best of the four finalists.

She said it's because of his range of experience with collective bargaining, working with business leaders and building strong rapport with Cincinnati's African-American community.

Unfortunately, the editorial page calls on the board to reject all of the candidates:

Steven Adamowski, former superintendent of Cincinnati Public Schools, is an experienced educator committed to improving achievement through innovative education reform. But his matter-of-fact demeanor, top-down style and impatience with process would be a mismatch for Seattle. His clashes with the teachers' union were public and bitter.

Above the editorial is a cartoon from Eric Devericks:

Devericks is right. There are so many interest groups, that not all of them will be happy. But what is more important, kowtowing to the union bosses and helping them maintain their monopoly and job security for underperforming employees? Or giving more kids a shot at a decent education? If Adamowski has "impatience with process", good for him. The current process is responsible for leaving 93% of the black tenth graders incapable of meeting state math standards and 80% unable to read at grade level. It's time for the existing process to change.

On Friday I e-mailed a letter to the Times in support of Adamowski, where I said:

Let’s keep [the union's] objection in perspective. The union exists to protect economic interests and job security for all teachers. Those goals are not always consistent with the school district’s mission to best educate our children – which requires the superintendent to demand top performance from all employees. Adamowski’s introduction of performance pay and charter schools enabled Cincinnati to serve its children better. Seattle could benefit from similar results. Dramatic improvements in academic achievement will require some changes to the schools’ current practices. If the cost of academic success is that some union members fret about competition and being held accountable for improving their performance – who can seriously say that is not an acceptable price to pay for giving our children a better education?

I e-mailed the letter to all seven members of the school board. Four of the board members wrote back to thank me for my support. The Times hasn't published the letter yet, nor have they published any other letters about the superintendent candidates. One wonders how many other pro-Adamowski letters they're sitting on.

The school board says that they will vote on a superintendent on Tuesday evening, though they won't necessarily hire any of the existing candidates. If they don't, one wonders who else they can find -- the Times also tells us that "several national education experts said Seattle brought in some of the best prospects the profession has to offer" -- and how long the Seattle schools would remain without a superintendent.

If you live in Seattle and care about our schools, please drop a line to the school board and encourage them to hire Dr. Adamowski.

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at October 05, 2003 05:26 PM