KALAMAZOO, MI – After more than 70 years of collaborative service to the Kalamazoo community, two school principals packed up their offices and said goodbye last month.
Gary Start and Cindy Green, two longtime assistant principals at Kalamazoo Public Schools, retired in late June after each serving for more than three decades and serving under five principals.
Start, the former deputy economic and finance director who also served as interim director, started working for the district at the age of 27.
“It’s been a much more rewarding, much more interesting, and much longer career than I ever thought possible,” said Start, now 65, in an interview with MLive.
Green, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning services, has held several roles during her 36-year career at KPS, she said.
“I really appreciate the opportunity to serve the children in this community,” said Green, 63. “I love the children in this community and love making sure that every single child has a chance to learn.”
Green started out as an adult education teacher before working as a special education and general education teacher. She later moved to administrative positions, serving as head of special schools, head of special schools, deputy head of student services and, most recently, deputy head of teaching and learning services.
In her final role, Green oversaw curriculum, instruction, assessments, professional development, school principals, and academic support for children and staff.
“The energy bunny has nothing to do with Cindy,” said CEO Patti Sholler-Barber. “Your energy and enthusiasm are remarkable. She sets the bar so high. “
Green’s heart for the job came from her early days as a special education teacher, said Sholler-Barber.
“She has never lost sight of what is important in the classroom and what is important for children,” she said. “She has an incredible passion and belief in children and their abilities. No matter what role, she really approached everyone with the same dedication and hard work. “
The long-time school council president said that Start was “rightly” known for its fairness, thoroughness and integrative approach to its work. The financial stability of the school district can also be attributed to him, she said.
Green knew it was time to retire to spend time with her parents and adult children. After working overtime week after week, she was ready to travel for freedom to see her children and attend her mother’s tap dance concerts, she said.
Green enjoys doing genealogy research and plans to take her own dance classes, play pickleball, and maybe write a book or two, she said.
Start looks forward to spending more time with its four grandchildren. His boat, which docks on Lake Michigan, will be used more and his granddaughters will enjoy more riding lessons on Start’s horse.
He might even try to sleep in later. This could be tough, he said, as his 11-year-old dog got used to a deputy commissioner’s morning schedule.
The district is losing two major assets with the retirement of Green and Start, Sholler-Barber said.
“These gaps are huge,” she said. “These institutional and experiential knowledge and insights are critical to a stable district.
“It is so commendable that they not only have given their successful careers, but both serve children and students out of real love and heart,” said Sholler-Barber. “It was never something that was just a job; It was a career they were very proud of.
“They are friends of the district, not just employees or managers, but very big friends.”
Start had plans to retire a decade ago but “kept forgetting to retire,” as he put it. The manager has postponed the time for him for several years in a row to clean up his office. Only last year did he really feel ready to ride off into the sunset, so to speak.
He agreed to serve as interim superintendent in June 2019 after Michael Rice left the district to serve as Michigan’s state superintendent. Initially, Start wanted to stay to help the next superintendent settle in her role and instead led the district through the COVID-19 pandemic.
He remained the chief administrator of the district until the arrival of the newly hired Superintendent Rita Raichoudhuri in June 2020.
After Start returned to his role as assistant superintendent after Raichoudhuri joined the district, Start directed the district budget through a virtual school year as schools across the state feared the worst for their checkbooks.
However, tight budgets were nothing new for Start. Until the launch of The Kalamazoo Promise, the district faced budget cuts year after year.
A state funding model based on enrollments and falling student numbers at KPS and other boroughs is a bad combination for the local district’s budget, he said. Budget cuts, forcing schools to close and programs to end, only dragged families further away, and the cycle continued.
Being the bearer of bad household news year after year is a “bad job,” said Start.
“I’ve worked with good people, but too often I’ve had to do things that aren’t good for good people,” he said.
On November 10, 2005 everything changed.
“I always felt that I had two careers: before the promise and after the promise,” said Start.
The promise of free college for local students through the Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship has changed for the district. In the first year after the first college scholarship program of its kind was announced, the district grew by 1,000 students, Start said.
Both he and Green remember the day more than 15 years ago when then-superintendent Janice Brown announced that all graduates would receive free study grants through a gift from anonymous donors.
“We haven’t had a lot of students who believed they could get into post-secondary education, so they didn’t try too hard,” said Green. “There is a huge difference in culture when you enter our high schools now.”
After more than a dozen years of increasing enrollments and increasing graduation rates, the experienced school administrators may have faced their greatest challenge to date.
“I was an old, temporary interim superintendent when we suddenly had to close due to COVID,” said Start. “I’ve never been to a Zoom meeting.”
Start and Green, both on the verge of retirement, were forced to switch to a virtual school and, like many others, learn a new way of life and work.
But Green sees a silver lining.
The district distributed laptops to all students and integrated new software and programs. Today the virtual world is more accessible for all students, said Green.
In addition to making plans to teach their students apparently overnight, Start said the district is also tasked with feeding the students. Meal programs conducted during the pandemic offered free food to those who needed them.
“Within a few days of the closure, we fed the students at 23 locations,” said Start. “Probably one of the most rewarding chores I’ve done in the school district is handing out food.”
Green said the meal distribution was also a chance to get in touch with the students so they knew there were staff to take care of it.
When he took up the position of interim superintendent, Start had never imagined a pandemic. He said his team of senior executives helped guide and advise him.
His leadership role in the district made him tougher in the face of criticism, Start said.
While overseeing the district’s transportation division, Start was tasked with driving the snowy streets of Kalamazoo at 3:30 a.m. to decide whether to close buildings for a snowy day. Doing this winter after winter taught Start to make difficult decisions, knowing that they would upset some of the parents and students.
Today both he and Green know that they serve a diverse community and that no response to the COVID-19 pandemic would please everyone.
Green heard from families who were frustrated that the school was virtual while others expressed their fear of returning to face-to-face classes after losing family members to the virus.
“That’s the hard part of work because you never really please everyone, but we always focus on what’s best for kids,” said Green.
The outgoing administrators admitted that the work at KPS is not over yet.
Green said she believed that more extracurricular support for students to continue the learning process would help make KPS a better school for all students.
“Teachers do a great job during the day,” said Green. “I think if every child could get support after school – if there were special needs like tutoring or special programming – we could individualize that.
“Not every child needs the same thing, so we have to be able to adapt to the needs of the children individually.”
After creating dozens of school budgets during his tenure, Start knows the ins and outs of public school funding – and, more importantly, the lack of funding the state is making available to counties, he said.
“The only disappointment I have is that there are still too many legislators who fail to understand that different students have different needs,” Start said, pointing to the additional resources available for English learners, special education teachers and those living in poverty Children are needed.
“Different needs require different funding, and Michigan is terrible,” he said.
Both outgoing directors say they knew they left the district in the best possible position. Green sees forward momentum for the district and greater success for students through deeper integration of career exploration in Kalamazoo.
Start said the district is in the best financial shape it has ever had during its three decades at the helm.
“What a great finish,” said Green.
Also on MLive:
The Superintendent of Kalamazoo was rated as very effective after the “challenging” first year at the helm
A Christmas parade must be held for “downtown Kalamazoo to survive,” business owners say
Local nonprofits work with Paw Paw schools to educate students about job opportunities in the area
source https://collegeeducationnewsllc.com/longtime-kalamazoo-school-leaders-reflect-on-struggles-successes-over-combined-70-years-of-service/
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