GLEN LAKE, SUTTONS BAY
Superintendent will split time for year
District also
will share a finance director
By
Record-Eagle staff writer
SUTTONS BAY - Tom Harwood made the first of what will be many trips between Suttons Bay and Glen Lake this week as he takes on the role of dual superintendent.
Harwood will serve as superintendent at Suttons Bay and Glen Lake under a one-year cooperative agreement ratified Monday by both districts' boards.
"There are some unknowns, but I think the time and investment will help find those answers," Harwood said of the administrative merger.
The districts also will share a finance director, Joan Groening, who already heads business operations in Glen Lake.
Harwood started the job Tuesday and said he's confident he can work with both districts to meet their needs. He will have an office in each district and be at each on alternating days, as well as provide support as needed.
That time split was among public concerns during talks that began when former Glen Lake superintendent John Scholten took a job as superintendent at Petoskey Public Schools.
But Joan Hawley, Glen Lake's school board president, said she's confident that issue has been addressed and the districts will continue to evaluate the sharing arrangement throughout the next year.
"I think it's going to be very obvious whether his time is well spent," she said.
Each district will pay half of Harwood's $132,000 annual salary and half of his benefit costs. Harwood made $118,000 in the Suttons Bay position.
Groening will earn $70,000 annually, with Suttons Bay paying 20 percent of the cost of her salary and benefits to compensate for the one day per week she'd work in that district. Glen Lake board members appointed Groening to serve as interim superintendent since Scholten left June 30.
Although the superintendent and finance director positions have merged, the endeavor does not involve consolidation of either district. Glen Lake schools counts 930 students and Suttons Bay has 1,054 students.
Manistee County's Bear Lake and Kaleva Norman Dickson school districts have the only superintendent sharing arrangement in Michigan, started in the 1990s.
