A look at Southern NH superintendent pay

From the Eagle Tribune;

November 28, 2010
A look at Southern NH superintendent pay

By John Toole jtoole@eagletribune.com The Eagle Tribune Sun Nov 28, 2010, 12:41 AM EST

Londonderry School District's Nathan J. Greenberg is New Hampshire's superintendent of the year. But he's not the highest paid superintendent in Southern New Hampshire.

That honor goes to Timberlane Regional School District's Richard A. La Salle, whose $135,960 salary is tops among six superintendents in the region, according to figures released last month by the state Department of Education.

But Greenberg, whose pay for 2010-2011 is $131,325, has something La Salle can't claim this year: a raise. Greenberg's School Board gave him a $2,575 increase over last year's salary.

There is only about a $20,000 difference between Southern New Hampshire's highest and lowest paid superintendents. Their contracts are typical for New Hampshire superintendents, falling in the range of $120,000s to $130,000s. The state's highest paid superintendent is Manchester's Thomas Brennan at $160,471.

Superintendents work an average of 70 hours a week, getting up to check on road conditions before dawn and meeting late at night with school boards, according to Mark Joyce, a former superintendent who is executive director of the New Hampshire School Administrators Association.

"Being a CEO, you are 24/7/365," Joyce said.

The job has great challenges and great rewards, he said.

"You cannot operate in the role to make friends," Joyce said. "You have hard decisions to make on the part of children."

Is Londonderry's Greenberg worth the money? His School Board thinks so.

"Nate every day is like a page out of a how-to-grow-your-business-successfully book," Londonderry School Board member Steve Young said. "He's always in the schools, with management and with the employees. He knows everyone."

Greenberg has coped with reduced personnel, but "not reduced the delivery of the product, which is the education of the student in the classroom," Young said.

The Londonderry superintendent also has been in the thick of the state school funding fight, helping to start a coalition to look out for the interest of school districts.

"It was very important to him that we not make this a fight for us, but make it for every child in New Hampshire," Young recalled.

By the numbers

A superintendent, like a ballplayer, also can be measured by statistics.

Look at key numbers compiled for the state Department of Education and Greenberg comes to the head of the class.

His dropout rate? One of the best in New Hampshire at 2.8 percent. His student attendance? Beats the state average at 95.9 percent.

Salem's Michael Delahanty ranks fifth in pay among the region's six superintendents at $120,500.

Salem School Board member Bernard Campbell said Salem's superintendent should rank first or second in the region for pay.

"Mr. Delahanty's salary has been dropping (in comparison to other superintendents) for some time and that concerns me," Campbell said. "He has a sincere desire to see students succeed. He does not rest, literally and figuratively, to achieve that goal."

Joyce said pay for New Hampshire's school superintendents is typical for northern New England, but much lower than Massachusetts.

Andover, Mass., earlier this year advertised a superintendent's post with a salary range of $180,000 to $200,000.

Parents should evaluate superintendents on the experience of their children in schools, on the superintendent's communication from school to home, Joyce said. Taxpayers, who may not be parents, should look at their superintendent's stewardship of public resources and skills in management, he said.

Some say pay is too high

George Lovejoy, chairman of the New Hampshire Advantage Coalition, which has campaigned for local government tax and spending caps, said school administrators are costing taxpayers "way too much money."

It's not just in the top salaries, but the growth in the administration: more assistant superintendents, more business managers and finance officers, Lovejoy said.

"They get pay increases when the general worker, the taxpayer, is out of work or not receiving pay increases," he said.

They also get benefit packages and retirement plans, Lovejoy said.

The number of administrators has grown even as the number of students enrolled has declined in recent years, he said.

"There's something wrong with that," he said.

Lovejoy advocates a state study of school administrative units. He wonders if New Hampshire would be better with fewer of them through consolidations.

"Do we need a district in every other town?" he asked. "I think we can do a better job than we are now doing."

If teachers aren't doing the job in the classroom, they should be replaced. The same goes for superintendents, in Lovejoy's mind.

"Do we have progress in performance in the subject areas in the classroom?" Lovejoy asked.

Rick Trombly, director of public affairs for the National Education Association-New Hampshire, which represents 16,000 unionized teachers and support staff, said some of his members will tell you their superintendents are paid appropriately, while others will have a less rosy view.

That's because of the natural tension between labor and management, he said. Their opinions, he said, vary district by district, almost member to member.

Parents, in evaluating whether their superintendent is paid appropriately, should look at a variety of factors, in Trombly's view. How does the superintendent get along with the school board? The faculty? Does he understand the laws that govern education?

"Is the superintendent able to inspire not only the school community, but the local community" in support of education, Trombly asks.

"Can you say the superintendent has the interests of the students at heart when he makes a decision?" he said.

But Trombly admits the job of a superintendent isn't easy.

"Sometimes these people are running a school community that is larger than some of the towns in this state," Trombly said.


All about superintendents

Superintendent Pay 2010-2011

Richard A. La Salle, Timberlane, $135,960

Nathan J. Greenberg, Londonderry, $131,325

Frank Bass, Pelham-Windham, $121,411

Brian J. Blake, Sanborn Regional, $120,750

Michael W. Delahanty, Salem, $120,500

Mary Ellen Hannon, Derry, $117,749