Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, September 24, 1994 TAG: 9409270025
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Partly, it would seem, that's a result of his own doing. He has a management style that might fairly be described as shoot first and ask (or answer) questions later. That doesn't sit well with some people, including teachers and parents who want more participation and better communication.
Partly it may be that, irrespective of what Bartlett does, some people just don't like the cut of his jib.
Some, grown accustomed to a symbolic game plan - according to which wishful budget-requests were sent to the miserly, myopic county supervisors for ravaging - may have been taken aback by the new superintendent's submission of a scaled-down plan, which the supervisors received more warmly than teachers did.
Whatever the reasons, the superintendent has been a lightning rod for dissent, mostly along the fault line dividing Montgomery between rural and urban factions.
Given that, it's hard to figure why the Montgomery County School Board voted recently to extend Bartlett's three-year contract by a year - two years before it was due for renewal, and a year before the review process would ordinarily have begun.
This isn't to say Bartlett should be booted out - now or when his contract expires. He hasn't been in his post long; he's done some good things. (His interest in a regional electronic education network, for example, is commendable.) And many in the county think he's doing a fine job managing schools.
But many others disagree. They urged - reasonably, we think - that the board at least make no decision until next year, when there will be a longer track record on which to assess the superintendent's performance.
Nearly 300 residents signed petitions this summer asking the board to hold off. This followed a systemwide morale survey in May that showed widespread dissatisfaction with Bartlett among teachers, principals and the schools' administrative staff. PTA organizations rang in with their concerns as well.
Bartlett asked the board to extend his contract now because, he said, he needed a vote of confidence to get on with the task of effectively running the schools. Perhaps, by standing by its man, the School Board will dampen critics' hopes of ousting Bartlett, enough anyway to quiet some of the agitation and afford the superintendent breathing room to do his job.
That's the idea, anyway. But just as likely, the decision will inflame opinion further. Precisely because it wasn't necessary, the board's move amounted to an in-your-face slap at the teachers and parents who had begged members simply to wait and see. The board will have done Bartlett no favor if it has turned up the heat for him, or left him with the impression that his communications and consensus problem is resolved. Resulting tremors could even aggravate the county's Blacksburg vs. rural split, leaving public education at risk of falling in the cracks.
A better vote of confidence would have been to express faith that, even without an extended contractual guarantee, Bartlett will by his performance ease fears and prove detractors wrong.
by CNB