Copyright Charleston Post and Courier
The Charleston County School Board continues to surprise and delight its critics with all these wise decisions. The most recent example, of course, being its “exemplary” rating of Anita Huggins in her first performance review as superintendent. Of course, given the overwhelmingly positive improvements in Charleston County schools of late, board members must've recognized anything else would’ve have looked, well, dumb. Or just plain political. As The Post and Courier’s Valerie Nava reports, Huggins received 30.89 out of 33 possible points in the board’s rating of her in three key areas: educational leadership, district management and board and community relations. The only question is why it wasn’t higher, because local public schools are showing some of their greatest gains in district history. Charleston County now pays teachers better than any other district in the state, its innovative weighted student funding formula is channeling more resources directly to the students who need them most, and Huggins received the highest rating a superintendent has ever gotten in the most recent teacher survey. And then there’s the student achievement scoreboard … er, report cards. The recently released South Carolina schools report cards show that nearly two-dozen Charleston County schools have improved by one or more rating level during Huggins’ tenure. In all, 57 district schools were rated “good” or “excellent” — the top two categories — up from 38 just before the pandemic, during which many schools statewide backslid. Now, 60 percent of Charleston schools rank in the top two categories, 11 percentage points higher than the state average for districts. There's great potential for continued improvement, too. Seven other schools — including chronically underperforming, high-poverty schools such as St. John's High, Chicora Elementary, Northwoods Middle and James Simons Montessori — are within 1.5 points of advancing to “average” or “good" ratings. Huggins could've bragged about all that during her State of the Schools event a few weeks ago. And she did brag … on her kids, staff, teachers and principals. She highlighted several schools making great gains, including Sanders-Clyde Elementary, which Principal Janice Hamilton Malone has moved up two spots from “below average” to its first “good” state report card ranking. Take a bow, Principal Malone. Huggins also honored the great work at Johns Island Elementary, St. James-Santee Elementary/Middle School, Camp Road Middle School and West Ashley High — which earned its first “excellent” rating. The superintendent delivered this news with her folksy, self-deprecating charm — which is disarming because, make no mistake, she’s also smart, savvy and a master diplomat. She commanded that room like she does this entire community. During her talk, the big three mayors — William Cogswell, Reggie Burgess and Will Haynie — dutifully sat up front, alongside many of the 135 or more partners the district has recruited, from individual volunteers to institutions such as MUSC, College of Charleston, Charleston Southern and Trident Technical College. These aren’t in-name-only supporters; they're actively pitching in. For instance, the local nonprofit Advanced Technological International was so alarmed by the needs at A.C. Corcoran Elementary that it recently donated $10,000 to buy students food, toiletries and clothing supplies for the coming year. All this makes a huge difference in the lives of students — and teachers. In another instance, ACI Logistics' help with uniforms at Stono Park Elementary helped decrease absenteeism. If a politician had such good news, the self-promotion might’ve been unbearable. But, near the end of her State of the Schools remarks, Huggins offered this sober assessment: More must be done to help poor students. “We’re not serving kids as well as we should — but we’re going to,” Huggins said. That's exactly what an education leader says. The School Board can rightfully take some credit here, because it voted to raise teacher pay, adopt the weighted student funding formula and hire Huggins in the first place. It’s a fine story, but beneath the surface, not everyone is singing Kumbaya. A few board members quietly chafe at Huggins’ leadership, listen to outsiders critical of the superintendent ... and grouse they don’t have more power to micromanage district operations. Which isn't their job. They’re smarter than to say so publicly, in light of recent gains, because they’d be laughed out of office. As if Huggins’ critics, a bunch of education neophytes — still quietly lobbying board support for control of the district — could produce even a fraction of these results. It’s all political baloney and, for now, going nowhere. In fact, the board is expected to offer Huggins a contract extension this week. The board — and community — will be fortunate if she accepts. Keeping Huggins around would continue to make this board look like it knows exactly what it’s doing. And anything else would be, well, dumb.
