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Improve on good job, Wilcox told
Pinellas County School Board members praise the superintendent in his annual evaluation but say there are areas he needs to improve in.
By THOMAS C. TOBIN
Published June 14, 2006
LARGO - A solid majority of Pinellas School Board members give superintendent Clayton Wilcox favorable marks in his annual job evaluation, but even his biggest fans say he needs to improve. The board sent Wilcox a clear message to work hard this year to raise sagging teacher morale, remove the bite from his often-candid public statements about district employees and take a stronger role in laying out a broad, strategic direction for the district. In his second year as superintendent, Wilcox also drew praise from most board members for stepping up urgency on student achievement and steering the district through a crisis last year that gripped the school bus system. They also credited him with setting Pinellas schools on a better financial course through this spring's budget cuts. Wilcox's evaluation, discussed by the board at a workshop Tuesday, comes at an important juncture in a tenure that has brought marked, if uncomfortable, change to the district. About one-third of Pinellas teachers and principals said in a recent district survey that Wilcox provides "quality leadership" - down from 55 percent the year before. In a recent St. PetersburgTimes poll, 22 percent of Pinellas teachers described Wilcox's job performance as poor while 46 percent said it was only fair. More than 60 percent said morale at their school had declined over the past two years, though many of them blamed Gov. Jeb Bush and the Legislature in addition to their local education leaders. Wilcox has said that he views the September School Board election as a pivotal moment in his tenure. Four of the board's seven seats are up for grabs, giving voters an indirect voice on whether they like the course the superintendent has charted the past 19 months. "I think the majority of the board thinks that I'm doing a pretty good job under real trying circumstances,'' Wilcox said Tuesday after the workshop. "The one thing that came through to me is they're concerned about how I'm getting the job done.'' Board members graded Wilcox on a scale of 1 to 5, from "highly ineffective'' to "highly effective.'' Their average score was a 3.67, the rough equivalent of a B-minus. At its regular meeting Tuesday, the board will formalize the evaluation and discuss the possibility of adding a year to Wilcox's contract, as it did last year. The contract, which expires in 2009, has language that triggers the possibility of an extension when the board agrees in his annual evaluation that he "meets or exceeds'' expectations. The contract includes an automatic increase in his roughly $180,000 annual salary, tied to teacher pay raises. This year's superintendent evaluation underscores the deep division that continues to mark the board's work. Board members Nancy Bostock and Jane Gallucci gave Wilcox composite scores of just under 5. Board members Mary Brown, Carol Cook and Linda Lerner gave him marks that hovered at or around the 4 mark. But board member Janet Clark rated his performance with a composite score of 2.51, and Mary Russell gave him a 1.94, pulling down the overall score. Each board member wrote a narrative summary of their evaluation. While six of them kept it to a page or less, Russell's was 10 pages. She said Wilcox has not been proactive enough in recommending policy changes, has not set a "clear vision and measurable goals for major initiatives'' and did not use enough data when making recommendations. She described his leadership as "immature'' and criticized some of his public statements, saying, "his sarcasm and biting comments become demoralizing as they spread throughout the school system.'' Wilcox has drawn both praise and scorn for his candor. In some of his public remarks, he has stated or implied that district employees are not working as effectively as they might be. He has said that he is trying to create a sense of urgency in the district, but some have called his remarks unnecessarily harsh. "Lead by hope, not fear,'' Lerner exhorted in her narrative, which also praised Wilcox as an analytical thinker who is intelligent, hard-working and "committed to improving achievement for all our students.'' Mary Brown, one of Wilcox's biggest supporters on the board, also complained of his "sarcasm and quick retorts'' in public, but her assessment was otherwise glowing. "Ninety five percent of your evaluation is really very, very good,'' Brown told Wilcox Tuesday. "I'm glad you're our superintendent.'' Wilcox said of the board: "They listen to a lot of constituents who say maybe I'm too aggressive in some areas or the push is too hard. And that clearly is something that I'm trying to take into consideration, and will.'' As part of his evaluation, Wilcox met individually with each board member and said his sit-down with Russell was by far the most candid. He said it was difficult to read her 10-page narrative and get a sense for what was most important to her. He also described their relationship as strained. But he said their meeting was good. "She has very high expectations for me and I have high expectations for myself, but they're not necessarily the same. And that's something that I've got to work on,'' he said. "I'm not going to discount any one of the board members' thoughts,'' he added. "Absolutely every one of them said stuff to me that's meaningful. I'm going to work my hardest to please every one of them ... But I'm also paid to do what I think is the right thing for kids. And I'm going to keep balancing their interests and the interests of the community against that.''
[Last modified June 18, 2006, 11:19:28]
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