By KENNETH LIPP/YachatsNews
The Lincoln County School District board voted 4-1 Tuesday to skip a search or application process and instead to negotiate with a senior administrator to become the district’s next superintendent.
After discussing its choices in a closed, executive session in December and another Tuesday night, the board voted to offer the superintendent’s job to Majalise Tolan, the district’s director of secondary education. Tolan would replace Karen Gray, who is retiring June 30 after five years as superintendent.
Board members deliberated between three options during an executive session Tuesday, but those discussions were not public and board members did not explain their decision during its open session later Tuesday night.
Board chair Liz Martin simply said the board had three choices – hire a consultant to conduct a national search, take internal applications, or negotiate with Tolan.
During the board’s regular meeting at Oceanlake Elementary in Lincoln City, Martin said the process to find a new superintendent “is the board’s decision” before reading three options the board gave itself. After the 4-1 vote, Martin said she was “very confident” in the board’s decision to negotiate with Tolan.
“While we might not agree 100 percent, we are in unison that we are all here for kids,” Martin said.
No other board members said anything about their process, the decision or about Tolan. Board member Senitila McKinley of Waldport cast the lone no vote — but without explanation.
The board’s vote was to enter into an initial agreement with Tolan that would be finalized with a decision to offer her a contract at its February meeting. In the meantime, Tolan will submit a resume and cover letter, as well as participate in four community forums.
When Gray announced her retirement during a board meeting Dec. 8 she said then she believed her successor was in the room. Tolan was one of several administrators and other district employees at the meeting. That comment followed an executive session in which Gray and board members discussed Gray’s retirement and how to fill the position.
On Wednesday, Gray told YachatsNews she “could not have been more delighted” with the board’s decision Tuesday, calling Tolan a visionary leader committed to education in Lincoln County.
“A while back, I developed a list with 30 different reasons I felt that Majalise would be the best person on the planet to run our school district upon my retirement,” Gray said in a written statement to YachatsNews. “Summing them up, she has the K-12 experience, broad knowledge and skills in curriculum, instruction and assessment systems, experience at both the state and national levels of education, and she has the personal and interpersonal communication skills that are the top in the district, bar none. Her intense energy, never failing optimism and ability to think completely outside any box when finding solutions to difficult challenges makes her the best person to lead LCSD into the future.”
Who is Tolan?
Tolan has worked in education for two decades. She currently oversees the district’s secondary and alternative education programs and was previously school improvement and secondary curriculum administrator, a position she accepted in 2018 after five years as principal at Taft 7-12 School in Lincoln City. Before that, she was principal at Newport Middle and the now-closed Isaac Newton Magnet schools from 2009 to 2013. She got her start at the district with a one-year stint as Taft’s assistant principal 2008-2009.
Prior to moving to Lincoln City for an administrator role, Tolan taught high school English and coached multiple sports in Milton-Freewater from 2005 until 2008. She taught English and coached varsity softball in La Grande 2003-2005 after graduating from Eastern Oregon University with a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s in teaching in 2002 and 2003, respectively.
Tolan holds an Oregon professional administrator license, qualifying her to serve as a superintendent.
She’s currently a doctoral candidate in educational leadership at Concordia University in Chicago, with a research focus on hiring, support, and retention of female athletic directors.
Tolan is also an educational consultant and co-authored a book published last January called “She Leads: A Women’s Guide to a Career in Educational Leadership.”
“I believe in education, teachers, students, families and the role the entire community plays in the development of our youth,” Tolan told YachatsNews in an email Thursday. “The position of the superintendent has a direct responsibility to all of these parties to serve them, listen to them, and find the connections needed to support them in their work and on their educational path.”
Tolan said she counted yearly graduations among major milestones in her career.
“I will say that serving as the Oregon Association of Secondary School Principals and on the Coalition of Oregon School Administrators board during the pandemic was a major milestone for me because I was able to be in key conversations with Oregon Department of Education and statewide administrators at all levels,” Tolan wrote.
She said she would have applied to be superintendent if the school board opened the position to internal applicants. After she published her book on educational leadership, individual board members asked if she would ever be interested in the job, she said.
“There was a time my answer would have been ‘No’,” Tolan said. “Watching the importance of the role of the superintendent during the research for that book and during the pandemic changed my mind to an absolute ‘Yes’.”
Tolan said the biggest issues facing the district as it transitions between top administrators are declining enrollment following the pandemic, an educator shortage, and “the need to keep pace with meeting the diverse needs of our students and community.”
Union criticism
In addition to McKinley’s opposition, Peter Lohonyay, a career-tech teacher in Toledo and the teachers union president, said it was a mistake to move forward with a decision to hire someone without public input.
“I’ve talked to my union and said I can’t support this,” Lohonyay said, adding that not every member’s position aligns with his own.
Public forums with Tolan are scheduled for Jan. 30 at Toledo Jr/Sr High, Jan. 31 at Taft 7-12, Feb. 1 at Newport High and Feb. 2 at Waldport High. All forums will run from 6-7 p.m. and take place in the schools’ libraries.
Lohonyay said he believed it was a joke to schedule one hour for public comment four days in a row and said the fact that the board gave just a 30-day window for its decision showed the hire was a foregone conclusion.
- Kenneth Lipp is YachatsNews’ full-time reporter and can be reached at KenLipp@YachatsNews.com