Calloway is ready to lead
Schools chief: Criticism nothing personal
March 10, 2007
Connie Calloway, the next superintendent of Detroit Public Schools, said Friday she was not intimidated by the heated debates that cropped up this week around her candidacy.
"I am looking forward to putting together a team of stakeholders so that we can create a plan tailored to -- as the mayor calls it -- 'renew' the Detroit schools," Calloway said a day after the Detroit school board voted 7-3 to name her superintendent.
She said she was honored by the decision.
Calloway, 56, is currently superintendent of the 5,700-student Normandy, Mo., school district outside St. Louis.
The board also voted Thursday to immediately remove Superintendent William F. Coleman III and replace him with chief labor relations officer Lamont Satchel, who will be the interim superintendent through June 30.
Assistant Superintendent Oscar Abbott was named deputy superintendent. He will help Satchel -- former chief operating officer and general counsel for the district -- in managing academic operations, said board member Carla Scott, chairwoman of the superintendent search committee.
Scott said Coleman was being removed because the board needed "someone with a vested interest" to lead in the crucial coming weeks as officials decide on closing up to 52 schools.
Calloway becomes superintendent effective July 1. School board attorneys must still settle the terms of her contract. She now earns $165,000 a year; Coleman earns about $225,000 and his contract was set to expire June 30.
Calloway is expected to visit Detroit before July, but no date is set, said school board President Jimmy Womack.
Womack, who had favored opening a new search, did not vote Thursday on Calloway.
"I abstained because the decision had already been made," Womack said Friday. "I will wholeheartedly support the new superintendent."
Calloway beat out Coleman and Doris Hope-Jackson, board vice president in the 1,300-student district in Harvey, Ill.
Search committee members who visited Normandy said Calloway is seen as someone who would not tolerate mediocrity. They backed her even though her district is provisionally accredited and none of the schools met federal annual yearly progress standards last year.
Scott said Thursday that while Normandy schools continue to struggle, Calloway had helped them gain provisional accreditation in a year -- "and their ACT scores are three points better than ours."
Public debates over whether the Harvard-educated Calloway is experienced enough to run Detroit's 119,000-student district ramped up this week. A group called the Coalition for Better Detroit Public Schools held a rally to call for a new search and sent letters to Calloway and Hope-Jackson, saying they wouldn't be met warmly in Detroit.
At Thursday's school board meeting, some cheered Calloway while others said the district must be desperate to hire a candidate from such a small district.
Calloway said it's typical for stakeholders to be split over keeping a superintendent or hiring a new one.
"That's a situation that certainly I cannot take personally," she said.
She said she expects it will take a year to get to know the district. It will help, she said, "for people to speak positively about Detroit, to not be so negative about your own district."
Agnes Hitchcock, leader of the Call 'Em Out Coalition, a local grassroots group known for harsh criticisms of politicians, called the board's selection of Calloway "wonderful."
"She was left standing," Hitchcock said. "Give her a year or two."
Contact CHASTITY PRATT at 313-223-4537 or cpratt@freepress.com.
Copyright © 2007 Detroit Free Press Inc.
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