Beaufort County schools superintendent reviewed for COVID-19 leadership. How’d he do?
Clarification: This article has been updated to include more context for a board member’s vote against the superintendent’s evaluation.
Beaufort County schools superintendent Frank Rodriguez has received his second positive review since starting work at the county in July 2019 — but a major piece of the evaluation was missing due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Rodriguez scored as “effective to highly effective” on his 2019-20 school year review, which was developed and carried out by the school board.
He was evaluated in five categories, using 32 questions written by the board’s ad hoc results committee.
The scores for each category of the evaluation ranged from 3.17 to 3.50 on a scale of 1 to 4, with 4 being the best. His overall score was 3.31, up a tenth of a point from his 90-day evaluation last year.
His highest mark was community relations, and his lowest was governance and board relations. His marks on staff relations, business and finance, and instructional leadership fell between the two.
The evaluation also includes concrete measures for teacher recruitment and retention, financial oversight and student achievement. Typically, these concrete measures would make up 55% of Rodriguez’s overall evaluation score, and the board’s evaluation would make up the other 45%.
But all three were excluded from this year’s evaluation due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The board unanimously approved the exclusion at its Sept. 1 meeting, citing state superintendent Molly Spearman’s March decision to waive end-of-year student tests for the spring semester and the board’s June decision to keep a “temporary” budget for 2020-21 that maintained last year’s spending.
“We wanted to use this year to establish a baseline, and we said to Dr. Rodriguez when we negotiated this instrument we didn’t want any slippage (in those three categories),” board member Richard Geier said in September.
“We could not establish this year as a baseline. So, therefore, we’re hoping this coming year will be able to give us some data.”
A letter summarizing Rodriguez’s evaluation was approved 8-2-1 by the board. John Dowling and William Smith voted no; JoAnn Orischak abstained.
Dowling said he voted no because the evaluation didn’t include suggestions for improvement, which Orischak also cited as her reason to abstain.
Smith said he voted no because teachers in the district were still subject to evaluations that included metrics. According to district officials and S.C. Department of Education forms, no test scores or concrete measures are included in teacher evaluations.
Rodriguez signed on for a four-year contract with Beaufort County School District in July 2019, replacing interim superintendent Herbert Berg.
The contract includes a base annual salary of $210,200 and the following benefits:
A $2,000 monthly stipend for temporary housing that could be used for up to six months after July 2019 as his family moved. He was expected to relocate his family within the district by Oct. 31 and keep a residence in the district for the duration of his contract.
$800 per day for visits to the district prior to the start of his contract on July 1.
$1,250 annually for life insurance.
Reimbursement for moving expenses.
An annuity contribution to the retirement plan of his choice equaling 10 percent of his base salary.The board can increase that amount based on the results of Rodriguez’s annual evaluation, but no such increases were announced Tuesday night.
A laptop or tablet and a smartphone.
20 days of annual leave per year, with the ability to carry up to 25 unused days into the next school year.
Up to five days of time out-of-office for professional development per quarter.
The same insurance protection and benefits given to other administrative employees of the district.
Due to the school board’s policy to leave operational decisions up to district staff, Rodriguez has been the final word on COVID-19 decisions, including the Oct. 5 start of hybrid classes and the graduation plan for the class of 2020.
The board referenced those decisions in its evaluation summary letter, congratulating Rodriguez on his high performance “despite significant challenges, many of which were COVID-19 related.”
This story was originally published November 11, 2020 at 3:29 PM.