BLOUNTVILLE — Incoming Sullivan County Director of Schools Chuck Carter doesn’t officially start a two-year contract to head the region’s largest school system until July 1.
However, he said he has already been working on bringing more work-based learning opportunities to Sullivan County students like the one three West Ridge seniors are pursuing with Eastman Chemical Co.
Salary is $130,000
The two-year agreement includes a salary of $130,000 and other payments of $12,000 annually for a total of $142,000 plus a one-time payment of $3,500 for moving expenses.
Carter’s pay is to increase when professional employees receive a percentage increase, but not step increases. He also can receive raises as the Board of Education may decide.
In addition to his pay, Carter is to receive a monthly car allowance of $800 and a monthly telecommunications, phone and home office allowance of $200. He also will have use of a school district vehicle available and will be paid mileage for his private vehicle only on trips outside the county.
The BOE also will pay his membership dues for the Tennessee Organization of School Superintendents, American Association of School Administration and two local civic clubs.
CARTER backs WORK-BASED LEARNING
Carter, the head of the Tennessee Department of Education’s career technical education (CTE) programs statewide, said he believes students earning and learning at the same time is a great opportunity that should be expanded.
He said the areas of focus for grant-funded programs include work-based learning in robotics; computer science; and science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM.
The Morristown resident formerly worked for the Hamblen County school system there and was a candidate to head that system before he starting working for the state about a year ago.
Speaking with reporters, he thanked his family, as well as teachers, principals, directors and coaches who have shaped him along the way, both as contemporaries and when he was a student.
FULL-TIME WORK BEFORE JULY 1?
“The board will have to approve the official starting date,” BOE Chairman Randall Jones said near the end of the meeting and its 6-1 vote. Vice Chairman Michael Hughes cast the lone no vote.
“I was very comfortable with that,” Carter said of the 6-1 contract vote.
“I spoke with Mr. Hughes, and we have a good working relationship,” Carter said. I don’t take it lightly. It’s a very big committment.”
The system, the largest in the region, has about 8,500 students among 10 elementary schools, three middle schools and two high schools.
“I look forward to meeting everybody in all these schools,” Carter said.
He got a head start on that process Thursday night, going outside the board room to catch up with West Ridge High School junior Lindsay Chapman. He talked with Chapman after Rafalowski and the board honored her for winning a spot in the U.S. Air Force Flight Academy this summer, when she will have the chance to earn her pilot’s license through a program valued at more than $20,000.
She plans to attend Middle Tennessee State University and major in aviation, serve in the Air Force as a pilot and then possibly go into commercial aviation.
Carter said that kind of career planning is something all students should try to accomplish: a future pathway.
“I wanted to make sure she understood how proud I am of her,” Carter said, adding that an education with no career to follow is a failure for school systems and their students.
Meanwhile, a criminal background check is the final legal step in the hiring process, to be followed by a possible vote on him starting to work full-time with the system before July 1. That will depend on the time of the retirement of interim Director Evelyn Rafalowski, who celebrated a birthday Thursday, after more than 40 years with the system.
FROM 13 TO ONE
Last month, when the board chose between finalists Carter and Josh Davis, principal of West Ridge High School, the vote was 5-2 with Hughes and Jones voting for Davis and the rest for Carter.
The board earlier had narrowed the list of three semifinalists that also included Diedre Pendley, an assistant principal at Tennessee High School in Bristol and head of the Bristol Tennessee City Schools CTE program.
The three were among a field of 13 applicants gathered with the help of the Tennessee School Boards Association.
The two-year clock won’t start ticking on the contract until July 1, but any work Carter does between now and then won’t count toward the two years and would be on a pro-rated basis of his pay level.
COUNTY SCHOOLS A “JACKPOT”
“If you were out mining, you would have hit the jackpot when you found this,” Carter said of the school system in a state he said excels in CTE and other educational efforts.
“Everything that is good going on in education is going on right here,” Carter said. “Strap on your seat belts.”
