Cooper: Outside needed to review schools

The Public Education Town Hall panel listens to proceedings about the Chattanooga 2.0 movement Tuesday at Woodland Park Baptist Church.
The Public Education Town Hall panel listens to proceedings about the Chattanooga 2.0 movement Tuesday at Woodland Park Baptist Church.

At perhaps the most crucial juncture for the Hamilton County Schools since the merged system was formed in 1997, the Hamilton County Board of Education should not decide to march in place.

Today, that board will interview three candidates it has selected for interim superintendent. If it so chooses, it could turn around and make that interim superintendent the new superintendent.

That was done four years ago when school board members decided longtime administrator and then-recently named interim superintendent Rick Smith was their man.

Two of the candidates for interim superintendent, co-acting superintendent Dr. Kirk Kelly and Normal Park Museum Magnet Principal Jill Levine, are entrenched parts of the current system the public has said is broken.

Kelly, who was assistant superintendent for accountability and testing, was a part of Smith's leadership team. When Smith needed to present numbers, the story goes, Kelly could find the numbers. And although he served as a principal at Alton Park Elementary School, where a teacher won a six-figure settlement against him for mistreatment in the late 1990s, he has not shown bold public leadership since moving into the central office.

Levine, who came into the Hamilton County system from Louisiana some years ago, has found success at Normal Park with a tailored school zone. She has previous experience as an assistant principal and as a teacher locally. Both she and Normal Park have won awards during her tenure there. Her innovative leadership style is said to have both its supporters and detractors.

The third candidate is Shaun Sadler, a Hixson High School graduate who is a recently retired Marine Corps colonel with a personal interest in education as the son and husband of educators. As commanding officer of the Marine Aircraft Group 39, he oversaw all operations of the largest aircraft group in the Corps, dealing with more than 4,800 people and a $490 million operating budget.

We believe Sadler would be the best choice for interim superintendent because he would be able to give the entire system an unbiased review, determine areas of overlap and duplication, learn how the system could make better use of its state dollars and create a strategy to give a new superintendent a way forward.

Both audience members and panel members at a Chattanooga 2.0 Public Education Town Hall Tuesday night at Woodland Park Baptist Church outlined challenges for the school system (and for an interim superintendent), challenges they seemed to believe current leadership is either uninterested or unwilling to meet.

Ken Meyer, a panel member who is a former state representative and now employed by an online education firm, may have best summed up what most people want in the Hamilton County Schools. He said the system should have "bold leadership," a willingness "to think outside the box," the temerity to "challenge the status quo," innovative technology and training on that technology, the ability to set "high expectations" and the understanding that moving forward is not necessarily "about spending more money."

An interim superintendent not currently in the system would have the best ability to move ahead on those desires. We hope the board heeds that call.

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