No Encores for Zeke
Have you ever wondered about Zeke Smith’s qualifications to be PPS Chief of Staff and the lead on the high school redesign?
The Chief of Staff job description describes a very high level of job responsibilities but doesn’t list ANY minimum job qualifications.
Would you expect the lead of a major education system redesign to have a background in education? Well, Zeke doesn’t.
Zeke’s college background is in theater and international studies.
District Administrators are required to be licensed but Zeke doesn’t hold any kind of license through Teacher Standards and Practices Commission. The Oregon Administrative Rules provide the following definition of administrator:
OAR 584-005-0005 (1) “Administrators:” Superintendents, assistant superintendents, principals, vice principals, and such other personnel, regardless of title, whose positions require them to evaluate other licensed personnel.
The PPS 08/09 budget states “Additionally, staff now working in Research and Evaluation, Compliance, Grants, and Project Management will be brought together as a new System Planning and Performance group in the Office of the Superintendent, reporting to the Chief of Staff.”
Both Carolyn Leonard (Compliance) and Susan Kosmala (Title I) are licensed staff and according to the budget, reporting to Zeke. That would make him an “administrator”.
Including PPS, Zeke has worked at three different places in the last 5 years. He left his previous position with the Portland Schools Foundation making less than $50,000 per year. His current salary as Chief of Staff is $115,000. The Chief of Staff salary listed in the 2009/10 budget is $124,067 and proposed to be $129,030.
Zeke’s background in theater is certainly paying off.
6 comments
where is the link to who reports to whom?
The quote in the post came from http://www.pps.k12.or.us/files/budget/200809fiscal.pdf (p.16).
There was no such position as “Chief of Staff” until Vicki Phillips got here. As I recall, our current Superintendent was the very first to hold that position. She came in with some relevant qualifications; why did she not look for someone else who had these when it was her turn to hire?
There is no doubt the CHIEF OF STAFF job description was created with the intention to hire Zeke. There was no hiring procedure. Carole appointed him. Zeke claimed to be Asian, too. His father might be Indonesian. He also claimed to be Native American but had a hard time to prove this heritage. Carole liked the fact that Zeke could be both. She liked the fact that Kurt was Asian but Kurt turned out to be a different Asian than what she had assumed: “A model minority”. Now the fact of the matter is that many of Carole’s senior management staff do not have either an educational background nor an administrative license to supervise licensed staff. Robb Cowie does not have a licence. His major in college was Environmental Studies. Yet, Pat Thompson, POSA, reports to him. Judy Brennan does not have a license. Her college major was in Cultural Anthropology???(which is very doubtful considering how she acts and behaves toward her minority staff). Lolenzo Poe does not have an educational background nor a license. He is getting paid just as much as his boss, Robb Cowie. Carolyn Leonard has been with the district for more than 35 years but both Lolenzo and Robb make more money than she does. BTW, Carolyn saved the district from losing thousands of federal dollars by her efforts to create an OCR plan that was not worth the paper it was written on. The district 10-year out of compliance from 1994 to 2004 with ESL was finally settled due to Carolyn Leonard’s ideas and hard work. She deserves to be with the district until she is ready to retire. At least, she had the creativity and knowledge to be able to resolve the OCR mess than the folks currently in charge.
I forgot Sara Allen who does not have an administrative license nor an educational background, but she is currently supervising Harriet Adair who used to be Principal, Area Director and now overseeing K-8. In addition, Harriet Adair has a Ph. D in Education. It is all messed up. It is about Who You Know and how good of a kiss up you are.
I believe Zeke is really very detrimental to PPS. He doesn’t have a clue about education, process, supervision….I believe there should be some type of disclaimer about him saying don’t go to him for anything he is just window dressing getting paid a lot of money.
Leave a Comment