LeMahieu calls
review helpful

The school superintendent
described the evaluation with
board members as 'helping a
guy get it right'

By Mary Adamski
Star-Bulletin

The state Board of Education spent more than two hours in closed session questioning and evaluating school Superintendent Paul LeMahieu in a process that he described as "helping a guy get it right."

The personnel review, which comes halfway through LeMahieu's first year on the job, was established by the board to head off a showdown at report card time.

The board declined to give the previous superintendent, Herman Aizawa, a multiyear contract after his last annual evaluation, leading him to resign.

"It was a good time to clear the air," said board Chairman Mitsugi Nakashima after the late executive session last night.

Earlier, the board met with state Librarian Virginia Lowell. It was a much shorter session because "it is a much less complex department," the chairman said.

He said the midterm review process "is a way to take stock with the idea of seeing where we need to go for the rest of the way."

He and other board members declined to discuss specific questions about the superintendent. Asked if there were criticisms or negative comments about Le-Mahieu's performance, Naka- shima said: "It was not so much negative; it was to find out if certain perceptions are valid.

"We don't work with him on a day-to-day basis. It was a chance for part-time board members to tell him, 'We've heard this' or,'What is that about.' A lot of it is perceptions. Where he thought there was some validity, he said so."

Vice Chairman Karen Knudsen said: "It was a very good process, one we should have begun a long time ago."

Member Lex Brodie said it may have been too soon to try to evaluate.

"It is such a complex system. He has to have time to get to know how it works. That is what's happening now."

LeMahieu said, "I asked for it."

He said he and the board agreed to change the way evaluations were being done when he was being interviewed for the job last year. He signed a four-year contract last fall.

He said there are "three strands" to his personnel review. "There is an informal sit-down with each board member during each quarter to discuss things as we go along. This is the point for feedback. This way nobody's surprised when we get down to the evaluation. It's not a "thumbs up-thumbs down' situation."

Nakashima said: "No one has any desire to see him fail. There's no sense in criticism or carping. We need to be supportive in our own ways."