Six months after members of the Akron Board of Education voted to buy out the superintendent, Michael Robinson, and appoint a new superintendent, Mary Outley, school board candidates’ opinions about those decisions produced the sharpest disagreements at a Wednesday forum for the eight people running to fill four seats.
On one side were those candidates who thought Robinson should have been sidelined earlier, or who claimed they wouldn’t have hired him at all. Those candidates also said while they thought Outley might be the right person to lead the school district, the school board’s decision to appoint her to the role without following proper procedures was a poor choice.
On the other side were candidates who said the school board appropriately handled accusations that Robinson created a toxic work environment and did the right thing by hiring Outley for the role.
Gregory Harrison, a current appointed member of the board, said he thought Robinson should have been put on leave last December, when accusations against him first came to the board’s attention. Instead, Robinson was suspended in April, then entered into a separation agreement with the district later that month. The district, Harrison said, still must deal with the fallout from the toxic work environment Robinson’s leadership created.
“Things need to be addressed and addressed expeditiously,” he said.
Harrison also said while it’s possible that Outley is the best person for the job, he thinks it was a mistake to exclude taxpayers from the decision-making process that led to hiring her for the role.
Diana Autry, the former school board president who is seeking a second full term on the board, said since Robinson was continuing to collect a salary from the district, “he was going to do his job as long as I was involved.” Regarding Outley’s appointment, Autry said she was concerned about the cost of another search and the continued uncertainty of having an interim leader. Autry made the motion, shortly before midnight on the day Robinson’s exit was approved, to name Outley as the new superintendent.
“It seemed like a circus to me, and I didn’t think it was healthy for the district,” Autry said. “I made that decision, and I stand by that decision.”
Current school board president Carla Jackson agreed with Autry, saying she thought anonymous accusers should have put their names to their concerns about Robinson’s conduct. She said she believed in due process. Regarding Outley’s appointment, Jackson said she stood by it and agreed with it. Outley rose through the ranks of Akron Public Schools, served as interim superintendent and did well, Jackson said.
Karmaya Kelly, who works in mental health advocacy with Red Oak Behavioral Health and Urban Ounce of Prevention, said she thought the school district’s zero tolerance for bullies practices should apply to adults as well. While she said some of the situation regarding Robinson could have possibly been prevented, she wants the board and the community to move past the issue.
Regarding Outley’s appointment, Kelly said she thought the board made the wrong choice. While Kelly called Outley highly celebrated, she said she disagreed with the way she got the job.
Nathan Jarosz, who runs the nonprofit Leadership Influencing Teen Empowerment, said he thought employees should have been treated with dignity and respect. He said that it was easy to Monday-morning quarterback the situation with Robinson but that he thought it was important for district leaders to act with transparency and accountability.
Outley’s appointment, Jarosz said, was a failure of procedure and policy.
“It’s absolutely disrespectful to you,” Jarosz told attendees at the Akron Press Club as they watched the forum. “These decisions matter and should not be taken lightly.”
Some candidates say Robinson should have never been hired
Phil Montgomery, the director of Finance and Budget for Summit County, said Robinson should have never been hired — as did Gwen Bryant, a national education consultant who taught in Akron Public Schools for 30 years.
Montgomery said the board did the district a disservice by not immediately putting Robinson on administrative leave when the accusations came to light. He also said he thought the former superintendent should have been fired for cause.
And, Montgomery said, the board did Outley a disservice by putting her in the role shortly before midnight without getting any community buy-in. He said she might be the right person, at the right time, for the right reasons, “but it was not done properly.”
“Why repeat the same mistakes?” he asked. “Why not take a breath?”
Bryant said her concerns about Robinson had to do with his background — that he came from a smaller school district and that he didn’t have experience dealing with powerful unions, since he came from the South, where they are less prevalent.
But Outley, she said, had already been vetted as a candidate — she served as interim superintendent when Robinson’s predecessor was relieved of her duties and had interviewed for the full-time job. She didn’t think the school district needed to spend any more money on a superintendent search.
“Right now, you have the best person for this moment,” Bryant said.
And Cynthia Blake, whose background includes helping prospective homeowners secure loans, said she would support Outley’s appointment “absolutely, 10 toes down.”
“Mary knows this district,” Blake said. “She had the qualifications, no doubt.”
Blake also accused existing board members of helping to create a hostile environment behind the scenes that led to Robinson’s ouster. While she said the situation could have “most definitely” been handled better, she questioned why the school district improved on its statewide report card this year if Robinson was a bad superintendent.
Improving academic outcomes, managing financial performance
In addition to talking about decisions the school board made in the past, the candidates also looked to the future. They talked about how they might manage the district’s precarious financial situation going forward and what their plans are for improving academic outcomes.
Blake said she’s concerned that “the math isn’t mathing” for two school construction projects that are already in the works. Regarding academics, she said she would continue to advocate for tutoring programs, including one that school board members rescinded a contract for last year following legal action from the teachers’ union.
Montgomery, who manages Summit County’s $700 million budget in his day job, said he had experience thinking creatively about budgets to find solutions about how best to spend limited tax dollars. When the county lost $5 million in 2019 due to a change in Medicaid payments, he reduced the number of expected layoffs from 52 to 16 — then found those 16 people other jobs in county government.
Montgomery said he would help the district’s construction projects stay on time and on task by encouraging regular meetings. And he said out-of-school-time providers can help improve student performance.
As the head of a nonprofit, Jarosz said he’s used to doing more with less. He said vouchers and other state decisions are hostile to public education and he’s cognizant that the district can’t spend more than it takes in.
Jarosz said that academically, he believes teachers are best suited to help students improve. His job as a board member will be to provide resources and ensure they’re able to do their jobs. Additionally, he said, there are a number of partners the school district works with that could help with students’ achievement.
School finance is a huge learning curve, said Autry, who said she wasn’t elected for her financial expertise. But Autry, a registered nurse, said that even as a new board member, she understood the district would need to ask voters to pass a levy, which they did last year. She said the district should celebrate all its wins, including its improvement on the school report card that made it the urban district with the best graduation rate in the state. And, Autry said, she supports literacy initiatives and the expansion of full-day pre-K.
Jackson said she’s managed more than $1 million in grants and knows how to look over budgets from her day job as the head of the middle school and director of entrepreneurship at Emmanuel Christian Academy, along with work at her church and with her sorority. She also said the board is regularly getting information about construction projects, so members can inform the public.
Improving access for students can help improve academics, she said, and a multi-tiered system of supports can help provide a framework to reach more people. Better community relationships and tutoring options can also help students.
While Bryant said she isn’t an expert in finance, she does understand how it affects systems of education. She can help the board make strategic decisions, she said, and understands that delays push construction costs up.
She said, too, that to improve academics, she wants to help teachers give students the opportunity to learn to use their cognition to answer questions.
Harrison, a member of the school board’s budget committee, said the district has to look at ways it can save money. As construction costs rise, he said, he knows that time is not on the district’s side.
Regarding educational improvements, Harrison said the district and the community have to do more to get kids ready to come to school. He also wants the board to help establish a curriculum that teachers are comfortable with.
And Kelly said she thinks the district needs to stop giving away money by paying off superintendents and losing staff. She said the construction projects are a great opportunity to bring the board into the community.
She said, too, that environmental factors play a role in student success. Helping improve support for parents and guardians can help improve results for students, too.
Editor’s note: The forum was co-sponsored by Signal Akron, the Akron Press Club, Akron Beacon Journal and Ideastream Public Media. The archived video livestream is courtesy of Ideastream Public Media, which will air the debate on WKSU 89.7-FM at 9 p.m. Oct. 9.