When Johnnie Vick stepped into the superintendent’s job at South Pike School District on July 1, it wasn’t a fruit basket or bouquet of flowers on his desk to welcome him.
Only a few days after his arrival in Magnolia, he learned of a scathing report by state auditors detailing a long list of accreditation standards in which the district was deficient. Unless the violations were cleared by early October, South Pike was at risk of losing its state accreditation status.
The report had been delivered in December 2015. Although members of the school board and the former superintendent, Dr. Estes Taplin, said many of the deficiencies had been addressed, as of early July the Mississippi Department of Education had not received notice of the efforts.
Until MDE receives documentation of violations’ resolution, or inspectors sign off after visits to the district, the report remains in effect with the clock ticking.
Vick faced the task with fervor and set about tackling the long list of violations one by one.
They ranged from administrative issues, including record-keeping and adherence to testing standards and curriculum, to bus and facilities safety problems.
All told, South Pike was noncompliant with 20 of the state’s 32 accreditation standards.
In addressing the problems, Vick drew on his experience at the North Bolivar School District in the Delta, where he spent two years as superintendent before moving to southwest Mississippi, where he grew up.
At North Bolivar he also faced a critical state audit but approached it methodically and with openness. He said in July, “The first thing I did was put it in the newspaper. I believe in total, complete transparency.”
At South Pike, as in North Bolivar, Vick assigned each deficiency to the appropriate department head, then stayed in close contact as problems were addressed. In turn, he made his own frequent reports to the school board, updating them of his progress.
Vick’s methods worked in North Bolivar, and they appear to be successful in South Pike.
As of last week, all but five of the subpar accreditation standards had been cleared by MDE.
“We’re clicking at a good pace,” Vick said this morning.
“A lot of people have put in a lot of work, including after hours and on weekends,” he added, giving credit to “staff from the building level all the way to Central Office.”
Vick said he expects the remaining handful of violations to be cleared this week. A building inspector is in the district today and another will visit Wednesday.
Given the early-October deadline, Vick said, “I didn’t want it to come down to the wire.”
He said he told his teachers and administrators that once the report is put to rest, “then we can focus on why we’re really here.”
