BRYANT - Arkansas Education Commissioner Tom Kimbrell is leaving that role to become superintendent of the Bryant School District.
He will be the first high-profile Cabinet member to leave Gov. Mike Beebe’s administration. Beebe’s final term ends in January.
Kimbrell, 52, who will start July 1, edged out five other applicants for the Bryant position after School Board members extended him an interview Monday. He was the only one to be offered an interview, district spokesman Devin Sherrill said.
The Bryant School Board voted to hire Kimbrell in public after meeting in executive session for 10 minutes Thursday.
“These jobs are really intense jobs,” Kimbrell said of the education commissioner’s spot Thursday. “It’s a job of reaction - reacting to problems and issues every day. It’s something that wears on you.”
The education commissioner said he had talked to the leading gubernatorial candidates and both asked him to stay, but he thought it was time for the Education Department to “get new ideas and go in a new direction.”
On Monday, the Bryant School Board interviewed Kimbrell for nearly 3½ hours in an executive session until about 11:30 p.m. but did not take any public action, either to offer him a position or hire him then.
“It was a fast three hours,” Kimbrell said Monday after the interview, adding that School Board members asked him “student-centered” questions, along with some about leadership.
On Wednesday, the Bryant School Board met and went into an executive session. The board did not vote in public after the executive session, Sherrill said.
On Thursday, the board called for a meeting at 5:15 p.m. Kimbrell said the board made the offer shortly after 5:30 p.m., though he said the parties had had conversations since the interview about a possible salary and other negotiations.
Board President Rhonda Sanders said in a statement she was thrilled to have Kimbrell join the district.
“His strengths in school finance, curriculum and instruction will be especially beneficial,” she said in the statement.
Kimbrell will replace Randy Rutherford, 52, whom the School Board suspended March 10 after recommending his termination that same night. Rutherford didn’t appeal the suspension, but instead reached a separation agreement with the board April 3.
The board won’t disclose the reason Rutherford parted with the district, calling it a “personnel matter.” It has denied numerous requests under the state’s Freedom of Information Act for documents detailing those reasons.
Retired administrator Fred Dawson is serving as Bryant’s interim superintendent.
Rutherford, who agreed to immediately submit his resignation to be dated June 30, made $155,000 as superintendent. Kimbrell is paid $228,887.98 as state education commissioner. Bryant district officials said Thursday a contract is in the works. Kimbrell said the two parties have agreed on a salary of $200,000.
As superintendent, Kimbrell will take on a few of the district’s pressing tasks.
The 8,862-student district is looking for ways to complete upgrades to its facilities as enrollment grows. In February, residents voted against a proposed millage increase that would have helped finance building expansion and construction.
The district is also facing an Arkansas State Police criminal investigation into its finances. The investigation follows a state audit that found irregularities in the district’s financial reports, including unauthorized spending.
“Because of the recent issues, there’s a need for strong leadership,” Kimbrell said Monday. “Opportunities are about timing. You want to go where you can be sure and make a difference.”
Kimbrell applied for the superintendent position after he said several community members, including Sanders, approached him.
The Cabot resident will leave the commissioner’s position June 30 after holding the job since September 2009.
His tenure at the department has in large part centered on accountability measures for students, faculty members and schools in the state’s 238 school districts and in the growing number of independently operated public charter schools and charter-school systems. Arkansas’ public schools serve 475,000 students and employ about 40,000 teachers.
Kimbrell is leaving the state agency as it and Arkansas school districts prepare for next year’s new, very different state-mandated, online student-testing system that will replace the Benchmark and End of Course exams. The new Partnership for Assessment of College and Career Readiness exams are being developed by a coalition of more than a dozen states. The exams are based on the Common Core State Standards that were phased in over three years in Arkansas.
He also will leave to a new commissioner the direct oversight of a record-high five school districts that are operating under state control and without locally elected school boards. The districts were taken over by Kimbrell and/ or the state Board of Education over the past three years because of fiscal or academic distress or violation of state accreditation standards. Kimbrell acts as the policymaker for those districts in lieu of their school boards.
As commissioner, Kimbrell led efforts to obtain from the U.S. Education Department a waiver from a key provision of the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2002. That federal law calls for all students to be proficient on state math and literacy tests by this current 2013-14 school year, regardless of their language, disability and poverty barriers.
Arkansas received federal approval in June 2012 for an alternative accountability plan to the No Child Left Behind Act that customizes achievement goals for each school. The alternative plan requires schools to reduce by half - by 2017 - the gap between the percentage of students who scored at proficient levels on state exams in 2011 and 100 percent proficiency.
A new teacher-evaluation system that will apply to about 35,000 teachers in the state was developed during Kimbrell’s administration. The system, which will go into full effect next school year, is based on a combination of classroom observations, student test scores and other indicators.The evaluation system was a prerequisite to the state’s attainment of the federal waiver from the No Child Left Behind Act.
Kimbrell has made a “tremendous contribution” to education in Arkansas because of his dedication to children and his “rich experience” in educational leadership, said Brenda Gullett, chairman of the state Education board.
“He is a strong advocate for the Common Core State Standards and helping Arkansas achieve all that is possible for our students,” she said. “We have developed a wonderful friendship and I wish him all the best in whatever path his career may take.”
Kimbrell was the executive director of the Arkansas Association of Educational Administrators when tapped by Beebe to head the Education Department. Before his work with the association, he was superintendent of the North Little Rock School District in 2004-05 and in Paragould from 1995 to 2004.
While he is proud of his accomplishments at the Education Department, Kimbrell said he chose to move on. He had applied for the superintendent’s job for the Fayetteville School District, but later rescinded the application.
There, he said, the schools would always be competing with the University of Arkansas for pride and resources. That wouldn’t be the case in Bryant, he said.
Kimbrell drove to West Memphis on Wednesday night to watch his son play in baseball games and got a chance to talk to a friend, who told Kimbrell that Bryant schools really are the center of the city.
“There’s no industry there, no college there,” Kimbrell said. “There’s nothing to draw people there except the schools. This is the kind of community where you get full support.”
Front Section, Pages 1 on 04/25/2014