Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, January 20, 1992 TAG: 9201200140
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: NEAL THOMPSON EDUCATION WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
PRIORITIES COULD MARK TOTA'S ERA
FRANK TOTA ponders his future while Roanokers ponder his 10 years of accomplishments and shortfalls.It used to be that a school superintendent had a lifetime job.
Times change.
Now, you're only as good as the next school board or PTA group says you are.
The public also expects more of a superintendent; he is now responsible for parenting and policing students in many cases. Most are lucky to last more than a few years in the hot seat.
Frank Tota passed the 10-year mark last summer - an eon for an urban superintendent.
But even Tota doubts there will be 10 more.
Maybe he'll retire in two years at age 55 and reap the rewards of his generous retirement package. Maybe he'll follow other former superintendents into the high-paying consulting field. Maybe he has one more superintendency at a larger school system.
But with a son at college and another just finished, and feeling good about his accomplishments in Roanoke, maybe Tota will opt to pull up the roots of his South Roanoke home and Smith Mountain Lake vacation house.
"I've thought about retiring. We've all had days when we've thought about that," Tota says.
Tota also knows the national exposure he got last spring as one of three contenders for the Boston superintendency will yield many options.
When his contract ends next year, Tota will have been here 12 years: "Twelve years . . . is a long time and I'm a big advocate of change."
As Tota ponders his future, some Roanokers ponder his accomplishments - and his shortfalls - and look back on a 10-year roller coaster.
In doing that, a major theme emerges: drugs, violence, poverty and white flight are getting most of the attention while the interest of the mediocre majority of students is neglected.
Sure, the city has airplanes, magnet schools and renovated buildings, says Wendy O'Neil, a new School Board member and former school employee. But, she adds, "Where's the academic accountability?"
Sophisticated programs have not translated into better test scores. Yet, those programs are more appealing to Tota than helping average kids learn the basics, O'Neil says.
It's a common theme that has followed Tota: He caters to rich, smart white kids and poor, not-so-smart kids, but ignores those in between.
"I think we have extremely good educational opportunities for some kids and extremely bad for others. We're not meeting all the community's needs," says William White, a city councilman and former School Board member.
But in the 10 years Tota has been in Roanoke, academics have had to compete with other societal ills that have become the school's responsibility.
One survey shows the average tenure of an urban superintendent dropped from five years in 1980 to 2 1/2 years. That's partly because problems at home are being neglected and becoming the responsibility of the Frank Totas.
More than half of Roanoke's school-age children live in poverty. Nearly 60 percent come from one-parent homes. And the city's teen pregnancy rate is one of Virginia's highest.
Tota has responded with extended-day programs at some elementary schools, preschool programs for 4-year-olds, business partnerships that supply tutors, the School for Pregnant Teens and the Alternative Education program, which teaches potential dropouts and students with discipline problems.
Tota also promoted college-preparation programs for minorities. Project Discovery helps pay for minority students to go to college if they come back to teach in Roanoke.
\ fought 'white flight'\ Meanwhile, he has drastically altered the make-up of a school system once run by middle-aged white males.
Most of his administrators are black, women or both. Half the school principals are women, including women at both of the city's high schools.
While he has tried to address the concerns of minorities and the poor, he also has had to address the needs of middle-class white families to keep them from sending their kids elsewhere.
That "white flight" is one of the reasons Roanoke has lost 5,000 students since the late 1970s.
Enrollment dropped each year in Tota's decade until this year, when it was up by 200 students.
Part of that turnaround could be attributed to programs designed to meet the needs of middle-class white families - programs such as the downtown CITY School for gifted high schoolers, the PLATO program for gifted elementary school students, and the Governor's School for Science and Technology.
And last week, Tota proposed a plan to add full-day kindergarten to the four city schools still without it. That culminated an ongoing effort to compete with all-day programs in Roanoke County.
If Tota hasn't pleased everyone in Roanoke with those and other programs, he has at least accomplished enough to gain himself - and Roanoke - quite a reputation.
Six Roanoke schools have been nationally recognized. In 1990, Parents Magazine named Roanoke one of the 10 best cities for raising kids, in part because of Tota's "revamping the school system from top to bottom."
\ Criticism called inevitable\ Last summer, Boston chose Tota as one of three finalists for its superintendent's job.
"I think he's one of the finest superintendents we have in the commonwealth and probably in the country," says Joseph Spagnolo, state superintendent for public instruction.
Maybe Roanoke doesn't realize how lucky it is to have a Frank Tota, Spagnolo suggests.
Then again, O'Neil offers, maybe he's effectively promoted the good things and kept the bad things quiet.
"We need to stop pretending all is well," she says.
But School Board member James Turner points to nearly 13,000 kids and around 20,000 parents and says: "In anything that big, you're not going to be able to make everybody happy."
At least not all the time.
Take Louise Myers.
Myers works a part-time job at Thalhimers, in addition to her day job with Norfolk Southern, so she can afford to send her daughter to Roanoke Catholic School. She didn't think city schools were giving her daughter the attention she needed.
"They're either geared toward the gifted or the LD [learning disabled] kids. The middle kids fall through the cracks," Myers said.
Take Pam Hultquist.
Hultquist has children in second and fourth grade at Garden City Elementary School. She likes the school, the principal and Frank Tota.
Her kids used to like school.
Her second-grader now often comes home complaining: "I hate tests; I hate tests."
Her fourth-grader pulls the stomachache scam some mornings so she won't have to go to school.
Now Hultquist isn't so sure the Tota-backed emphasis on standardized testing is healthy - for the kids or the teachers.
"My biggest gripe is, I think these kids are tested to death," she says. "Less testing and more basics! Give the teachers a chance to do their jobs."
Teachers say the same thing. Paperwork and other requirements interrupt their teaching.
Tota says he is proud of the evaluation process for teachers he implemented. But teachers say it's a burden.
Westside Elementary School teacher Linda Wyatt thinks the evaluations waste time and shouldn't be done annually.
"I need time not to go through hoops right now, but to deal with my children," Wyatt said at a recent School Board meeting.
\ Retirement plans unknown\ Tota says it's been difficult to survive some of the changes he's made in Roanoke. Change scares people, but it's necessary.
And though a decision is still 1 1/2 years away, Tota says a change in leadership might some day be needed to avoid the complacency he dislikes.
"I don't want to get the point where I'm more status quo," Tota says.
Turner is convinced Tota won't stay more than a few more years. He thinks rising poverty and tensions with City Council over money to pay for that problem are wearing him down.
At least three people close to Tota say they believe retirement won't be an option for someone so dedicated to and experienced in education:
Mike Robinson, a vice principal under Tota in Rochester, N.Y., and now its budget director, says Tota could make big bucks as a consultant. "He could sell himself all over the country."
Michelle Williams, a consultant who tracked Tota down for Boston's School Committee during its search, says: "He should be looking to other things and not looking to retire, because he has too much to offer to education."
Former Roanoke Deputy Superintendent Henry Williams, who now heads Syracuse, N.Y., schools, thinks Tota has another big school system ahead.
"I think Frank Tota's accomplishments there hold up anywhere in the nation. . . . He's the kind of guy who could lead any school district."
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