David A. Volrath, the executive director of high school performance for Harford County Public Schools, will retire from the school system at the end of the 2010-11 school year, sources have told The Dagger.
Volrath informed Superintendent Robert Tomback of his plans to retire earlier this week, the sources said. Volrath, who oversees high school principals and assistant principals, could not be immediately reached for comment.
Volrath’s retirement from HCPS comes on the heels of news late last month that two high school principals, Tom Szerensits and Macon Tucker of Aberdeen and Joppatowne high schools respectively, were demoted by Tomback and reassigned for next year. Tomback’s move sparked protests from students and parents in Aberdeen, where Volrath was also once a principal.
A source familiar with his trajectory within HCPS said that Volrath began teaching at Edgewood High School in 1974, but spent most of his teaching career at Fallston High School where he was a physical education teacher and a coach. After becoming an assistant principal, the source said Volrath was promoted to principal of Aberdeen High School and was elevated in 2002 to a central office position as executive director of secondary schools, overseeing both middle and high schools. That position was later renamed and narrowed to oversight of high schools only, in a management reorganization implemented last year by Superintendent Tomback.
Best wishes to Mr. Volrath and his family… and thank you for your many years of service to HCPS, but especially to our children.
Really? There are people who “dislike” well wishes to a man and his family on his retirement. Come on, folks! What ever happened to the Golden Rule? Our world is only as good as we are, and I for one, intend to WALK my TALK.
Enjoy your retirement, Mr. Volrath. Thank you for your years of service. I mean that sincerely!
To bad the four period day isn’t leaving with him!
This is GREAT NEWS!!! and you are right Lee….too bad the four period day is not leaving with him. However, I see that changing as well very soon.
We will go to whatever schedule Baltimore County uses. It will be one more step in Dr. Tomback’s efforts to turn HCPS into BCPS before he leaves.
When the block schedule was being “discussed”, teachers consistently spoke about how their opinions were not being considered, and that they knew that Mr. Volrath had already decided to implement the plan before he gathered any information from the people directly affected. It stands as yet one more example of how HCPS leadership consistently makes decisions regarding teachers and students, both instructionally and administratively, without their input and then hands them to the schools as if they were carved on stone tablets.
Mr. Volrath may have been a fine teacher, and perhaps even a good principal. I will not miss him in his most recent role as secondary school supervisor. I do wish him well in his retirement.
Recent changes to the BOE may put a stop to any effort at making HCPS more like BCPS.
In concern to what you were saying about Mr. Volrath being a good educator, Principal, but not Supervisor, I agree. While I am not that familiar with what Mr. Volrath has done for HCPS, something I’ve noticed is that the higher up administrators get, the farther out of touch they become with what’s going on in the schools. It’s really a shame because some Central Office Supervisors who were once great Teachers and Assistant Principals, Principals, etc. are now just typical bureaucrats. They forget what it is like to be a classroom teacher.
There should really be some sort of system set up where Central Office Administrators are required several times a school year to leave their ivory towers and teach in the schools. Perhaps teaching a half-day at a school or even substitute teaching. That way, they don’t get too out of touch.
The four period day isn’t going anywhere for financial reasons. As it stands now, they get one teacher to teach 6 sections over a 2-day rotation. Going back to the “old” method, a teacher taught only 5 sections. Going back means hiring at least one teacher per department, per school. With the current budget mess, that isn’t happening.
Moving away from the four period day would require some additional staff but not to the degree you suggest. Nor does it mean returning to a seven period day. Other scheduling variations exist which would better serve HCPS students. There is certainly enough excess in administrative positions to cover the cost of any additional classroom teachers positions.
What was the “old way” The old way was different at every school. If we went to an 8 period day for example it would require no extra staffing as every teacher could still teach 6 sections with a lunch and planning. a kid would take 7 classes unless they opted out of lunch and then they could take 8
A great article in the SUN paper the other day by Marta Mossburg detailing the failed legacy of Nancy Grasmick’s MSPAP and HSA testing disasters she foisted upon MD school children. The same can be said about Bush’s No Child Left Behind fiasco. Add to that list CSSRP (the four period day better known as Block scheduling for all Harford Co. high schools) for which Mr. Volrath will most be remembered.
Another recent article in the SUN exposed the all too common practice of “course inflation” (changing the names of high school courses to make them sound more difficult than they really are) for the purpose of making your school or a school system look good. The same can true about this rush to increase the number of AP course offerings (Harford Co. included) and pushing students into those classes that do not have the academic talent or work ethic to do the work or pass the end of course exam.
The result is all too obvious – a generation of kids taught to take a test at the expense of being able to think. The evidence also speaks for itself – the extremely high rates of students needing to take remedial English and math classes when they get to college.
And before anyone starts to blame teachers for these results remember that they do not make these decisions. All of this starts with our politicians, State Board of Education, local school boards (all or most have little or no actual experience in a classroom but think they know everything about teaching), and superintendents who frequently drink the cool aid and spout the virtues of the latest education fad in order to make themselves look good. They all think think they know better than the people who actually make the biggest difference but have the least amount of control in our schools – the classroom teacher.
Of course none of this makes any difference if voters and parents continue to keep their heads buried in the sand and allow themselves to be spoon-fed the same steady diet of repackaged education nonsense wrapped in some new name like NCLB, MSPAP, HSA, AP, or CSSRP.
About time,they need to clean out the whole lot of them,theres alot of waste in the school system!!
Just finished watching a program on CNN titled “Education in American: Don’t Fail Me.” An interesting admission by the Governor of Tennessee was that his state lied to the federal government about test scores mandated under NCLB to keep the feds off their back by claiming over 80% student proficiency when the real figures were closer to 20%.
The show produced a diagram showing that MD was one of 30 states that claimed higher scores under testing of their own creation (MSA’s and HSA’s) than was demonstrated under standardized testing using national standards. Makes you wonder what the true figures are in MD.
This is just another example of the MD State Board of Education led by Nancy Grasmick playing fast and loose with the facts about the true state of education in MD.
The people in NJ have already recognized this fraud and that is a major factor in why the much ballyhooed rush of BRAC people to Harford Co. has not materialized.
Those of us who do the day to day work in classrooms have always known the testing frenzy Grasmick forced on everyone was a sham. Everyone should be glad she is gone and now it is time to start weeding out her co-conspirators in Harford Co. and around the rest of the state.
Good riddance. This is a step in the right direction. Hopefully the position will not be re-filled. This can eliminate a useless position with six figures. Put that money back into the schools.
While newsworthy, was this really headline worthy, and “Breaking News” material?
Perhaps while they are weeding out some of the ineffective “leaders” at HCPS, they can look at the administration at Edgewood High School and get rid of them! Worthless!
I am concerned about the state of our school system as well.
OMG – Just heard the news. Nice to see one of the last “No Gray Hair” policy advocates finally leaving. Shame to all those educated, highly experienced and effective individuals passed up for promotion in place of those minimally experienced individuals with no gray hair. Maybe now we can see some what of a change back to the fantastic schools which once existed.
Good riddance. Maybe his sheep will follow him out. Get rid of the rest of the closed minded ones. Molter take note.