The Board of Education of the Western Wayne School District will act on the retirement request of our Superintendent, Joseph Adams at the next Public Board meeting. Mr. Adams intends to retire, tentatively, on February 1, 2017.
In the process of hiring Mr. Adams as Superintendent, the Board and Joe identified fourteen (14) specific items that we collectively believed Western Wayne needed to strategically accomplish. These items were:
- Settling all labor contracts/agreements with long term affordability and reasonableness for the community and staff;
- Refinancing the debt to harvest exceptional savings;
- Procuring the smallest tax increase in recent years, yet significantly improving the fiscal position of the District. Right now, the District is in the best financial shape ever recorded;
- Putting a succession and professional development plan in place for administration;
- Completely overhauling the Transportation system;
- Settling all outstanding Grievances and combining these settlements with improvements for professional development, instruction, curriculum and co-curriculars;
- Completing the $10,000,000 Capital project without having to raise taxes, and adding 20 years of useful life to our largest capital items;
- Continuing to have improving academic performance, curriculum upgrades and standardized test score results; 9.
- Promoting positive perceptions and morale within our District, Community, Staff and Students;
- Making substantial capital and operational improvements with our information technology operation, programs and media;
- Continuing to improve our co-curricular and athletic performances and programs and;
- Providing educational opportunities for the Board regarding school finance, accounting, operations, with comparative PDE compiled, statewide school district data;
- Establishing an effective, sustainable, maintenance and custodial program, with succession planning and;
- Providing a future capital projects plan with estimated replacement costs and schedules.
Mr. Adams had significant expertise and experience in these areas and was hired with direction to accomplish these tasks. The Board and Administration’s expectation was that the completion of these items would take three (3) to four (4) years. With the diligence of The Board, Administration, Staff, and Community, the first twelve are completed and in place, and the final two will be done before February 1, 2017 – within a twenty (20) month timeframe.
It was made clear in the hiring process that Mr. Adams committed to remain with the District until all items were accomplished and intended to retire shortly thereafter. The next phase of concentration and focus for Western Wayne are in the areas of improved educational achievement and strategy, curriculum, instruction, professional development, educational programming, and continuing to improve Districtwide communication.
Mr. Adams has delivered on his commitment and contributed to our recent growth and success, but communicated to the Board that the future needs of the District are outside his expertise and experience areas, and it is the appropriate time to transition to a new Superintendent. Joe has further committed, at our request, in assisting us for an extended period of time in this transition.
We all appreciate the efforts and contributions of Mr. Adams to our Western Wayne Community and District and wish him well in his retirement. We believe that Western Wayne has and will continue to make dramatic progress in becoming an exceptional public school and important Community partner. Thank you.
Signed by: Don Olsommer, Jr., Bill Gershey, Jeff Gogolski, Gary Enslin, Bernice Fiorella, Rick Hoch, and Don McDonough
