Education Week - March 8, 2017 - 8

After a Feud, Hard for Schools Chiefs and Boards to Make Up
Legal battles mar
relationships
By Francisco Vara-Orta
When a rocky relationship between
a superintendent and school board
winds up in court, it can lead to the
awkwardness of divorce-akin to a
feuding couple living together, with
their children stuck in the middle.
As the relationship breaks down, it's
pretty common for superintendents to
hit the escape hatches in their contracts, through resignation or retirement, or for members to get voted on
or off school boards as tensions air out.
What's more uncommon, though,
are sitting superintendents who sue
the school board members who can
hire, and in most cases, fire them.
Conversely, it's rare for a sitting
member, or an entire board, to sue a
superintendent.
When it does happen, it usually
doesn't end well, according to a review by Education Week of such legal
cases over the past decade.
The most recent case is unfolding
in the Howard County, Md., district,
where Superintendent Renee Foose
has sued the board in a dispute that
is both professional and personal.
The suit, filed in January in Howard County Circuit Court, alleges
that school board members passed

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a series of resolutions that aimed to
"strip the superintendent of her lawful authority" since the newly elected
board was sworn in December. The
conflict has extended to Foose's personal life, as she also claims in the
suit that she has faced discrimination because she is gay.
Cynthia Vaillancourt, the president
of the Howard County board, said in
an email that the board has turned
legal matters over to its lawyers and
will continue to work with Foose. But
Vaillancourt acknowledged that the
suit has fostered a "challenging" working situation, and she characterized
Foose as trying to usurp the board's
governance abilities.

Point of No Return
Dan Domenech, the executive director of AASA, the School Superintendents Association, and a former
superintendent of the Fairfax County
district in Virginia, said that generally,
it's a bad idea for superintendents to
go public with concerns about the
board, which employs them.
"When that happens, relations are
undoubtedly at the point where the
superintendent will be making an
exit soon," said Domenech, who was
not referring to any specific case.
For now, Foose and Howard County's board have to constantly come
back to the table to work-an indefinite situation thanks to the superin-

tendent's contract and stipulations
rarely seen in state education law but
enshrined in Maryland. Foose is in the
first year of a new four-year contract,
after already serving in the post for
the past four years when she had a
majority of support on the board.
In an interview, Foose said she
has no plans to back down from
her position.
In Maryland, contracts for superintendents must be four years at a
time, according to Bill Reinhard, a
spokesman for the state education
department. Many states allow board
members to simply tack on another
year or two if they are satisfied with
the superintendent.
While most states give local boards
authority to fire superintendents,
Maryland law mandates that only
the state superintendent can terminate them. The state chief has five
grounds for doing so: immorality, misconduct in office, insubordination, incompetency, and/or willful neglect of
duty. Maryland law does allow boards
to negotiate separation agreements.
Reinhard said it's unclear when
that law went into effect for the state,
which has 24 school systems.
Even if a state allows its school
boards more liberty to get rid of a
superintendent, involving the courts
can certainly protract the separation process. Education Week found a
handful of such cases in recent years
as reported by local media.

In 2013 in Ohio, Randy Stepp, the
superintendent of the Medina City
district, sued the board for allegedly
defaming him. Board members then
moved to fire Stepp, which prompted
the then-suspended superintendent to
file a second suit to halt his dismissal.
Stepp eventually submitted his resignation nearly a year later in the aftermath of a state auditor's report that
found he had misspent school funds,
the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported.
In South Carolina in 2014, Vashti
Washington, the superintendent
of the Jasper County district, sued
school board member Randy Horton for defamation. While the court
battle largely played out in the press,
Washington and Horton had to work
together for nearly a year and a half
until the suit was settled and the superintendent resigned.

'Marriage Counseling'
Leadership experts say discord between superintendents and boards
can hijack the district's political climate, and that can have a chilling
effect as employees may feel pressure to choose sides.
In the absence of "marriage counseling," Domenech of the AASA
quipped, there are intermediaries
who can help mediate disputes, such
as lawyers and school board and superintendent associations.
The National School Boards Associ-

ation offers a guidebook for members
to help navigate the process of building and maintaining relationships
with schools' chiefs.
Thomas Gentzel, the executive
director and CEO of the National
School Boards Association, said board
members must carefully weigh their
First Amendment rights and speaking out on behalf of their communities against the superintendent,
especially in public. Board members
should always confer with their district's legal counsel while in sensitive
conflicts with the superintendent in
order to safeguard their behavior
from putting the school system at
risk of further litigation, he said.
That's not to say that board members and superintendents who are
always in harmony is ideal either,
Gentzel said.
The best board-superintendent relationships are those in which people
can respectfully disagree and debate
issues. What's vital when there is disagreement, he said, is for board members and superintendents to monitor
how serious a rift is before allowing
it to turn into an unbridgeable gulf.
"You're not dysfunctional if you
disagree. You're dysfunctional if you
can't make a decision," Gentzel said.
"Disagreement can be healthy if it's
done in the right environment."
Library Intern Briana BrockettRichmond contributed to this report.

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Education Week - March 8, 2017

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