ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 22, 1996 TAG: 9609230071
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
JANICE BARCLAY says her time spent with Roanoke School Superintendent Wayne Harris has prompted her to search for a job in a Roanoke-size city.
When Janice Barclay was growing up in Boston, she wanted to be a missionary for her church. Her guidance counselor told her the pay for missionaries was low and advised her to consider a backup profession that she could use in her mission work.
So Barclay became a schoolteacher and principal. Now she's in training to become a school superintendent.
But she said she still feels like a Pentecostal missionary. Her mission is education, and she tries to make a difference in the lives of her students.
Barclay has worked for more than two decades in schools in the Chicago suburbs, where many children from low-income families have emotional and behavioral problems.
"Some children bring excessive baggage to school. We have to help them unpack the baggage," she said. "We have to try to reach them academically as we try to deal with the other problems."
Barclay, 44, is a doctoral student in the Graduate Education School at Harvard University. She has completed her course work and now is spending six months in Roanoke on an internship that is the second phase in the three-part Urban Superintendent's Program.
The Harvard program is designed to train a new cadre of superintendents to lead America's schools in the next century. Only a handful of people are admitted each year. It is intensive, with the customary three-year doctoral course compressed into one year. Students also are required to complete the internship and write a dissertation.
Paul McKendrick resigned as principal of Addison Middle School in Roanoke last summer to enter the program.
In Roanoke, Barclay is working directly with Superintendent Wayne Harris, studying the role and responsibilities of a superintendent. He is a graduate of the seven-year-old program and serves on its national advisory panel.
As an intern, Barclay spends much of her day with Harris, shadowing him and learning what it's like to be a superintendent. She attends meetings with him, visits schools and sits in on conferences.
She got to know Harris when he came to Harvard to speak at a conference and attend meetings of the advisory panel, but she didn't expect to be assigned to Roanoke for her internship.
She is also working with Richard Kelley, assistant superintendent for operations, and Rita Bishop, assistant superintendent for instruction, learning about all aspects of the superintendent's office.
Barclay didn't know much about Roanoke before she arrived this summer, but she was familiar with Virginia. Her father lived in Richmond before he moved to Boston, and she has a daughter who is a student at Hampton University.
In recent weeks, she has visited most of Roanoke's schools and has been impressed with what she has seen.
"I see more community support for schools here than in the Chicago area," she said. "We didn't have the technology you have here. I come from a school district where a school bond referendum was defeated twice. You have more resources here."
Barclay said she has observed that most schools in Roanoke seem to have comparable instructional equipment and technology.
Unlike school systems in some urban areas where schools in poorer neighborhoods have less equipment and older facilities, she said, "here the commitment and technology seems to be about equal everywhere."
Before entering the Harvard program, Barclay was principal of an elementary school in the Dolton School District, a Chicago suburb, for six years. She also was personnel director of the district. Prior to that, she was an assistant principal for two years at an elementary school in Calumet City, Ill. She taught elementary school for 14 years before going into administrative work.
She has decided that she would like to become superintendent in a relatively small school district such as Roanoke instead of in a large urban area.
"I have to say that a school district with about 13,000 students [Roanoke's enrollment] would be a good size," she said. "I don't have any desire to be the chancellor of a district with 1million students."
School superintendents in big cities now have little job security. Many get fired or resign because of turmoil in the schools. The average tenure for a superintendent in large urban districts is less than three years.
"Superintendents are expected to be able to walk on water," she said. When they don't solve all the problems, she said, they are forced out.
But Barclay hopes the Harvard program will equip her with the skills to survive the demands and pressures put on a school chief.
She said she thinks some of the criticism of public schools nationwide in recent years is unfair and off the mark because it tends to be a broad-brush condemnation. She said she believes there is too much focus on test scores without adequate consideration of other factors that affect academic achievement.
"If the children have made a significant improvement, you can't say the school has failed," she said. "I value the individual child more than just a test score."
Roanoke and the state of Virginia are ahead of schools in the Chicago area in reducing the size of classes, particularly in the early elementary grades, Barclay said.
Classes in several Roanoke elementary schools have 15 or fewer children this year, as part of a statewide program to provide incentives for smaller classes. Barclay said she had classes with 26 or 27 students in her school district.
Barclay said she's opposed to vouchers and the use of public funds to pay part of the cost for students to attend private or parochial schools.
"I'm pro-public schools. My three children went through the public schools in Chicago, and I support them," she said. "When you take money away from public schools and give it to private schools, you hurt them."
Barclay is on leave from her school district and could return there if she doesn't have a superintendent's job when she completes the Harvard program. But she's not sure she's going back.
"I like the South. I'm a little tired of the windy weather in the Midwest," she said.
She feels comfortable with Roanoke's small-town atmosphere and thinks she might like to be the school chief in a similar city. "I don't feel alone here. The community is small enough that you feel a part of it."
Barclay said she senses an enthusiasm about education in Roanoke.
"When I go to Lincoln Terrace [Elementary], and I see teachers and principals who are enthusiastic and a principal who is proud of his school, I feel good," she said. "When I see that kind of pride, it is impressive."
LENGTH: Long : 119 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Janice Barclay\Doesn't miss the big city. color.by CNB