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Youngstown school board ‘killed’ Hathorn’s spirit
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
Outgoing city schools Superintendent Connie Hathorn says micromanagement from school board members stymied his efforts to run the school district and complicated his job.
The board that hired him in 2010 – Anthony Catale, Lock P. Beachum Sr., June Drennen, Rachel Hanni, Richard Atkinson, Michael Murphy and Andrea Mahone – did so, telling him he would be allowed to run the school district.
That began to change as the composition of the board changed starting in 2011.
Of the board that hired him, only Murphy and Atkinson remain in office.
One board member, who he declined to identify, told Hathorn that when he first came to town he was a “ball of fire,” Hathorn said.
“I said, ‘You put the fire out in me,’” he said.
Hathorn specifically cited micromanagement as something that complicated his role.
“I spent more time defending the work I was doing instead of what I wanted to do,” Hathorn said. “I feel like I’m questioned to death. It frustrates me, and it frustrates my team. It kills my spirit.”
Murphy agreed that there’s more micromanagement from certain board members who weren’t on the board that hired Hathorn.
Before, the board allowed Hathorn to make personnel decisions and then held him accountable, Murphy said.
“Now they want to pick and choose who gets hired and fired,” he said.
Hathorn resigned, effective June 30, to become superintendent of Watson Chapel Schools in Pine Bluff, Ark. With accumulated vacation time, his last day in the office was Friday.
The micromanagement doesn’t come from the whole board but a faction, Hathorn said, declining to identify the individuals. It isn’t the majority, Hathorn said.
Board President Brenda Kimble doesn’t think micromanagement was an issue and believes Hathorn is leaving because he wants to leave and is using that as an excuse.
“I started on the board in 2012 and six months into my term he had already applied for positions many places,” she said.
In early 2013, Hathorn was a finalist for the superintendent job in Little Rock, Ark., but wasn’t selected.
Hathorn also got frustrated by school board meetings.
“Board meetings were three to four hours, and I didn’t see anything being accomplished,” he said. “We were just spinning our wheels.”
Micromanagement extended to the point that some board members wanted to look at candidate resumes before he interviewed anyone for certain positions.
Hiring staff is something Hathorn says he knows how to do, and he believes he should be allowed to pick his team.
“I had three classes in personnel for my master’s,” Hathorn said. “I had three classes in personnel for my Ph.D.”
Some members of the board didn’t trust him and his 42 years as an educator.
“I’ve always said, ‘Let me do my job and hold me accountable,’” Hathorn said.
Kimble said Hathorn had problems with the number of reports requested from board members as well as from the academic distress commission. Most of the reports requested by the board though involved information that should have been easily accessible, she said.
“That wasn’t micromanagement,” Kimble said. “We have a right to vote yay or nay, and there were very few things that we voted no on. Every single thing he requested to move the district forward, we voted for.”
The board has the right to ask questions, she said.
“He seems to have a problem with certain board members, but they were not part of the board when he started applying for other jobs,” Kimble said.
She said Hathorn told her he wanted to relocate to a warmer climate for his wife’s health, and if he waited, he’ll be 65 next March and may not be able to find another job then.
Hathorn lived in an apartment in Youngstown, she points out. He maintained a home near Akron.
“If he honestly had plans of staying here he would have been looking into buying something more permanent,” Kimble said.
She believes Youngstown was just a steppingstone for him.
“That’s OK, but don’t use the board, don’t use the community as an excuse to say we drove you away,” Kimble said, noting he didn’t leave sooner because he wasn’t chosen for another job.
“For him to say that shows a total lack of respect for our community.”
Hathorn said he wasn’t looking for a job last January, when the president of the Youngstown Chapter of the NAACP said that he should be replaced.
“That made national news,” he said.
Search firms hired by school systems looking for superintendents called him about those jobs, including the superintendent post at Watson Chapel Schools in Pine Bluff, Ark., where Hathorn worked as a teacher after graduating from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. He said he was asked to apply.
“I applied, and I got it,” he said.
He begins the new job July 1.
Members of community groups criticized Hathorn when he said the district needs more parental involvement, accusing him of “parent bashing.”
“I was just saying what I observed,” Hathorn said.
Students are in school only about 15 percent of the time, he said.
“If a kindergartner comes to school and doesn’t know his name, you can’t blame me,” he said.
He said the NAACP never talked to him about a plan to help. The district has an academic improvement plan approved by the state. Where groups like the NAACP could have helped was with a plan to help students and families, he said.
Despite the difficulties, Hathorn believes he had the support of administrators, teachers, staff and the community during his tenure. He’s written a letter to the community on the school district’s website at http://www.youngstown.k12.oh.us/SuperintendentsOffice.aspx.
The district has improved since his arrival, he said, even if it’s been incremental. The academic improvement plan will take time to generate dramatic results. He’s proud of the improvement in elementary reading scores as evidenced by a “C” on the state report card in the kindergarten through third-grade literacy measure.
“I know I’m leaving this district better than I found it,” Hathorn said.