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San Francisco Superintendent Contract Extended Through June 2007
A divided San Francisco Board of Education has quietly extended Superintendent Arlene Ackerman's contract by another year, with one commissioner calling the decision irresponsible and another declaring the schools chief one of the nation's best.
The board voted 4-to-2 on Dec. 9 to extend Ackerman's $223,526 contract through June 2007. Commissioner Sarah Lipson, who often sides with the minority faction that is critical of the superintendent, was absent.
The state's budget crisis prevented any pay raise, board members said. But they agreed to give Ackerman a $1,200 monthly housing allowance and to abandon their previous plan of buying a residence for her and succeeding superintendents. In addition, Ackerman may now take cash for 15 of her 30 vacation days.
"Arlene Ackerman is among the most sought-after superintendents in the country," said veteran board member Jill Wynns, who favored the contract extension. "Any school district in the country would give their eye teeth to have her."
Wynns credited the superintendent with bringing test scores up "tremendously" among the 60,000 students in the district. She praised Ackerman's school assistance program as "responsive to their individual needs. " She also noted that Ackerman had succeeded in repairing the district's accounting system, which was so bad in 2000 when Ackerman arrived from Washington, D.C., that the district nearly came under state control.
The majority of board members share Wynns' view. Commissioners Dan Kelly and Eddie Chin and board president Emilio Cruz voted to extend Ackerman's contract.
Commissioners Mark Sanchez and board Vice President Eric Mar voted against the extension. Mar said there was little dissent on matters of finance and desegregation. Where the sides diverge is on the seemingly narrow issue of testing.
But at present, when the size of the achievement gap among ethnic groups has come to symbolize a school's success or failure, testing has become huge and the stakes high.
Federal dollars rest on whether scores rise or fall. State money is allotted only if the curriculum is aimed in the same direction as the state's achievement test. And superintendents like Ackerman are evaluated -- it's spelled out in her contract -- by how much they bring up test scores and focus instruction on state and federal achievement goals.
That bothers some people -- including Mar, Sanchez and Lipson -- who believe that classroom success should still be based on whether students learn to love school and become engaged in a curriculum rich with subjects like music and art that can't be found on an exam.
"The superintendent is not as critical of the various fads like high- stakes testing and federal policies as we would like," Mar said. He accused her of undermining the board's effort to explore testing alternatives, a move he labeled as insubordinate on her part. And he said that because the board had not yet established a "work plan" for Ackerman -- an idea supported by the entire board -- extending her contract out to 2007 made no sense.
"It's irresponsible," he said.
But Ackerman says she has no trouble looking far into the future.
She is staying put, the superintendent said, and is proud of "putting our fiscal house in order" so that voters felt confident enough to approve a $295 million bond measure for school facilities in November, and pleased at doubling the number of schools that met state test-score goals.
"My goal is to retire here," she said. "I love this city. I'm invested in it. I have no intention of leaving on my own."
— Nanette Asimov
Split education board extends Ackerman's stay
San Francisco Chronicle
2003-12-16
URL: sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/12/16/BAGNM3NVD11.DTL
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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