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MOUNT ULLA — West Rowan High School parents voiced concerns this week about how the system’s central office is replacing three of the high school’s top officials.
Principal Henry Kluttz and and assistant principals Pam Beaver and Benjamin Robins are leaving in June.
Kluttz announced his retirement this September, and he and Assistant Principals Pam Beaver and Benjamin Robins are working on contract through the school year.
At Monday’s Board of Education meeting, parent Julie Gainer noted that in just a few months, only Assistant Principal John Williams will remain from the current administration.
Gainer has three children, one a graduate of West Rowan, one who attends the high school and one at Southeast Middle School.
Gainer encouraged the board to advertise aggressively and to fill the position in a timely manner, ideally before the other officials leave.
In coming months, she noted, the board will be asking the community for a considerable amount of money — a $103-million school bond. She said they would need good leaders at each school to help raise community support.
Larry Crowell told the board he has three daughters who have had the privilege of attending West Rowan. Two daughters have graduated, and one is a sophomore.
Crowell said he has always been impressed with the high degree of parental support at the school.
He encouraged a slow and deliberate process in selecting the new principal and assistants. “The last thing West parents want is a hasty decision.”
Crowell noted that the school is up for re-accreditation in the fall and having the new administrators in place by this summer is important.
Gainer and Crowell cited the board’s hiring policy, which calls for input from affected parties.
They both asked that the board solicit input from faculty and parents.
But Crowell said school officials have not contacted him and the other “active” parents at West he knows. He questioned how school officials plan to gather advice.
School officials have already received several applications for Kluttz’s job and more are coming in, according to Dr. Becky Greer, human resources director for the Rowan-Salisbury Schools.
Greer said Superintendent Dr. Wiley Doby will first hold a meeting where teachers and parents can share input on what they are looking for in a principal. The date for this meeting has not yet been set.
Following the meeting Doby will review the applications and select candidates to be interviewed by the selection committee.
Greer said their goal is to have a principal hired prior the school letting out for the year. “We really are committed to having a principal in place before teachers leave.”
Greer said Doby has not discussed with her the plans for replacing the two assistant principals.
Kluttz is running for the Rowan County Board of Commissioners.
Beaver has spent 32 years with the Rowan-Salisbury Schools, four of them at West Rowan High. She said she hasn’t had time to think about what she will do or all the things she will miss about the school.
“I’m just planning to retire,” she said.
Robins had retired four years ago and came out of retirement last summer to replace Assistant Principal Sandy
Fogg, who resigned last July.
But Robins only returned for a year. He was a coach and teacher at West Rowan in the early ’70s and worked for the system 30 years.
Granite Quarry Elementary Principal Carolyn Hartung also plans to retire at the end of this year. She has been with the system since 1983. Hartung has been at the elementary school for five years.
Contact Jillian McCartney at 704-797-4253 or jmccartney@salisburypost.com
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