The Pine Bluff School District has endured several changes and is facing several more, just one year into annexation of the Dollarway School District. As the PBSD seeks to regain local control and the start of the 2022-23 school year is fast approaching, it faces a number of questions regarding its operation. This week, district leaders including Superintendent Barbara Warren shed light into how they plan to forge ahead and what students and parents can expect.
This, the first part of a series on the district, introduces the public to two new members of Warren's leadership team:
The Pine Bluff School District gave Kelvin Gragg his first role into district-level administration following a five-year run as principal of Pine Bluff High School.
After a short stint as superintendent in Dermott and the past eight years leading Dumas schools, Gragg finds himself back in Pine Bluff as one of two new assistant superintendents to Barbara Warren.
"Little do people know my first job in administration was as an assistant principal in 2000 at Jack Robey [Junior High]," Gragg said. "So, I've kind of gone full circle and have kind of gotten a vast array of experiences in the positions I have held, and I just felt like having received my start here, I wanted to come back and try to help the school district as much as I could. Of course, this is my last stop. I'm 38 years' experienced, so I felt like in the last few years I can get back to where I originally started."
Gragg, along with former Little Rock elementary principal Phillip Carlock, round out Warren's leadership team for the 2022-23 school year. Gragg will oversee secondary schools and auxiliary services (transportation, maintenance, etc.), while Carlock will supervise primary schools. The men officially began their roles July 1.
Melvin Bryant had served as interim assistant superintendent during the spring semester after Wanda Van Dyke left the PBSD.
"I think it's a blessing to have the type of hands that we have," Warren said. "We have a wealth of knowledge and experience with both of these gentlemen."
Gragg was Pine Bluff High's principal from 2006-2011. He then was the PBSD director of federal programs before moving onto Dermott in 2012.
"Being a superintendent, you're pulled away from a lot of different things in terms of educating kids. That gets pushed back with all the demands you have. Having done that for 10 years, I was ready to regress back to a position where I could work where the rubber meets the road and work with staff and students to increase student achievement."
Warren said she and Gragg have collaborated as superintendents, while Carlock will be counted on as the district's contact point for the community.
Carlock, who earned a bachelor's degree in business administration, worked the past 23 years in the Little Rock School District, starting as a paraprofessional. Most of his teaching years were spent with third-graders.
"I believe it's an opportunity afforded to me," he said. "I went to school to get my superintendent's license, and I want to put it to use, but looking at Pine Bluff as my neighbor and loving my neighbor, I think it's a mission here similar to the mission nationwide to make sure our children are achieving at high levels academically and especially in environments that are underprivileged and underserved. I do feel like I have the skill set to offer some things to the Pine Bluff School District and Pine Bluff community to move things in a better direction."
While a principal at Little Rock's Stephens Elementary, Carlock instituted a financial literacy program. A local bank established an actual branch at the school, and children would receive incentives for making deposits. Some students – fourth and fifth graders – would also undergo interviews for positions at the branch and be trained by tellers.
"The students were well-groomed and had their references ready, and they were able to give an interview better than a lot of adults I had seen about the life skills they're learning," Carlock said. "They're not only learning reading and writing, but they're also learning some things that are relevant just going out into the real world. On top of that, we also had an economy system where kids had debit cards and they had coins. They would earn coins for good behavior and academics and load them onto their cards."
In Stephens' economic system was a barber shop, beauty/nail salon, arcade, arcade and theater, Carlock said. The community came to the school serving the community.
"I'm looking forward to bringing some of those experiences and opportunities here to Pine Bluff School District," Carlock said.
The unorthodox method of encouraging good deportment speaks to Carlock's passion for community development.
Gragg will help Warren try to pull the PBSD out of Level 5 supervision over fiscal and academic matters from the Arkansas Department of Education. The district has been under state control since September 2018.
Gragg was successful leading Dermott schools out of state control and fiscal distress nearly a decade ago. But the "Level 5" term, used to describe the most intensive support the ADE gives a school district, is misleading in Pine Bluff's case, he stressed.
"Let's stay you have a school district that is Level 1 support," Gragg said. "Basically, what that does is [the ADE comes] in and makes recommendations, where it's still predominantly under local control. It's a watch list. For example, you could have a school district that makes progress and, let's say, their growth [target] was 9%. Let's say they make 8%. They did not meet growth. So, now, it goes onto the next level. The only way you stop is if you make the projected growth the state tells you.
"Pine Bluff is not different from most school districts in southeast Arkansas. You have most school districts that are making progress, but they don't make the measurable progress to stop from extending to that next level."
Level 5 supervision doesn't necessarily mean a state takeover, district officials say. But under state law, the ADE has five years from the time of takeover to determine whether to restore the district to full local control, annex it with another district, consolidate it to create a new district or reconstitute it. Warren says a limited-authority board could be instated by sometime between this fall and early spring.
Sunday: How a limited-authority school board could shape high school construction.