JEFFERSONVILLE — Our nation’s public education system is in freefall. We are short on money and low on test scores. Programs are being eliminated. Good teachers receive less than their fair share of compensation. And bad teachers keep receiving a paycheck.  

My local school district, New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated School Corp., is suffering its own setbacks. We are in the red. A number of jobs and programs have been cut. Since my daughter started kindergarten in the school system just less than three years ago, four of the elementary schools have been closed.

Many difficult decisions had to be made to make the most out of the budgetary cuts. No community wants to see its school doors close or art and music programs eliminated; but, when there is no money, there is no money.

Since the cuts have taken affect, there have been a number of improvements. Standardized test scores and graduation rates have increased. In the midst of hard economic times for public education, our schools — the teachers and administration — are making things happen.

And yet, we continue to focus on the wrong things.

The latest upheaval in my district is a salary increase for our superintendent, Bruce Hibbard, that was recently approved by the school board. This is not a new conversation. At the end of 2010, after budget cuts were first mandated, certain school board members fought to get our superintendent more money. Parents whose children no longer had as many resources as before the cuts, and teachers who no longer had as many colleagues rallied to protest the raise. In the end, the superintendent refused the money.

But, since then, he has shopped around for a new position in different districts.

On Monday night, just over a year since the initial proposed salary increase, the school board voted again on the superintendent’s salary. This time, the superintendent did not refuse the raise that five of the seven board members agreed to give him.

“What’s different this time around is that this is my third year here,” said the superintendent, “I think by my third year I would have shown the community that I am worth keeping.”

I don’t disagree that he has made improvements; but, I question the cost of keeping someone around who doesn’t want to be here. (His price tag was a $28,500 salary increase with a $10,000 bonus come mid-year.) Our superintendent’s pay raise and bonus doesn’t make him the most competitively paid superintendent in the state; nor does it make him the least paid.

What it does do is raise the bar for the next school district that wants him badly enough. And that — as a school district and a community — is where we are.

Still reeling from the affects of our school funding being drained, our teachers continue to deliver under the stress of scoring applied at a state level without regard to individual school challenges. All the while, our school board chooses to devote much time and effort on one person’s pay raise because there is a chance he could leave us high and dry.

I don’t have any answers here, just more questions. Questions like, what if $28,500 isn’t enough next year? (More money doesn’t usually make someone more happy in the end.) Should a community pay whatever costs necessary to keep a public office filled by someone who continues to have his eye on the next opportunity?

This is only his third year. In what some would consider an extremely short tenure, our superintendent has received a 20 percent increase in salary. Not bad in today’s job market.

What if he needs more money next year to finish what he started?

He — and the school board — has closed four schools, reassigned fifth graders to middle school and eliminated a number of elementary programs. I can’t say whether or not these were bad decisions. Yes, they were unpopular; but, again, when there’s no money, what do you do? All of these cuts were part of a grand vision he put in motion to make the most out of current financial conditions.

The real question centers on the level of integrity expected from public figures like superintendents. I question the integrity of any education leader who agrees to such financial gains when his very own schools, employees and students have suffered financial setbacks.

One of the school board members who voted in favor of the pay raise released a public statement, arguing that the superintendent’s leadership “… should be rewarded.”

Wouldn’t the real reward — having the integrity and a steadfast commitment to see your grand vision through until the end — be more satisfying than another $2,300 on your more than $11,000 monthly paycheck?

Maybe, that’s just the going rate for keeping someone around — or the cost of integrity. I can’t figure out which.

— Amy Gesenhues is a freelance writer and syndicated columnist for CNHI. You can read her daily commentaries at www.AmyWroteIt.com or email her at amy@amywroteit.com.