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Super-sized compensation

Very interesting op-ed point/counterpoint in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution over that paper’s recent exposé on superintendent compensation.  From the editorial board:

In other words, before taxpayers can decide for themselves whether Hall and other school superintendents deserve the money they’re being paid, taxpayers first have to know what that compensation actually is.

They have to know something else as well — how well school leaders are performing in the job. But here again, voters are kept in the dark by most school boards.

While school boards evaluate superintendents annually, those evaluations are deemed private documents, and state law allows local boards and superintendents to decide whether to make those evaluations public. Most do not, and those who technically make the documents available to the public often make the process so cumbersome that citizens give up and go home.

A notable and laudable exception is the city of Gainesville, which posts Superintendent Steven Ballowe’s evaluation scores each year on its Web site.

By shrouding evaluations in secrecy and burying the pay perks in the fine print, metro school boards stymie taxpayers interested in learning whether their school superintendents are doing a good job and whether their compensation for that job is legitimate or larcenous.

Herb Garrett, executive director of the Georgia School Superintendent’s Association, fires back.  While it was almost certainly unintentional on his part, some of Garrett’s comments are awfully revealing:

Virtually without exception, superintendents oversee one of the largest enterprises in any community. It is not unusual for a local school system to have the largest "taxi fleet," the largest "restaurant operation," and the biggest payroll of any "business" in a community. Viewed through this lens, the salaries and benefits listed in the recent article hardly seem out of line.

This very accurate statement is also extremely disturbing.  The biggest endeavor in many, if not most, communities is the public school system–bigger than any company or business in town.  Is it any wonder that many school reformers are aghast at the level of girth and bureaucracy American school districts have achieved? 

Setting fringe benefits over and above base salaries is a common practice across the country and in Georgia. It is common in the business world. And if a superintendent is to have CEO-type responsibilities, such additional benefits seem appropriate. I agree that a superintendent’s total compensation package should be open to public scrutiny so as to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.

I take issue, however, with the editorial board’s position that all superintendents’ evaluations should be made public. Unfortunately, the superintendent evaluation process can often be quite perfunctory in nature, and it is one that is not guaranteed to yield a significant amount of useful information.

Perfunctory: characterized by routine or superficiality, or lacking in interest or enthusiasm.  And even this simple evaluation should be withheld? 

However, if a local board and its superintendent can, as part of negotiating the superintendent’s contract, agree on a limited number of understandable and measurable objectives upon which the superintendent’s performance can be accurately evaluated, then I don’t see why that information could not be as public as the rest of the contract.

A "limited number" of objectives.  Ladies and gentlemen, behold the face of today’s hidebound, self-serving educrat.