Document text
Butte Falls superintendent is happy to get out of school By VICKI GUARINO BUTTE FALLS -- The way Harvey Boyle sees it, retirement is going to be even better than being a 9-year-old on summer vacation. "It's like getting out of school," he says. "There are all these opportunities without the concern of having a paycheck coming in. And no parents." No wonder the 57-year-old superintendent of Butte Falls schools is choosing to retire at the end of the school year. The Butte Falls School Board has picked a 13-member committee to review applicants and recommend Boyle's successor. The application period closes Dec. 10, and board members want to have a new superintendent for the 235-student district by March or April. Boyle says he has been thinking seriously about retiring for a year. By June, he will have been in education for 30 years and will become eligible for state public employee retirement benefits. Beyond not being superintendent anymore, Boyle says he hasn't made firm plans for retirement. "It could be anything from being a teacher in a private school to driving a big truck," he says. He'll remain in the area -- Boyle lives in Grants Pass -- because his wife, Hanby Middle School Principal Mary Barker, isn't ready to retire. He came to Butte Falls as superintendent in 1988. At the time, he recalls, he figured on staying two to three years, then moving on to head a larger district. "After a couple of years here, I decided I really liked it," he says. What he has enjoyed most are the students and the strong community support for the district. "They might not always be supportive of me, but they always are supportive of their kids," he says. In Butte Falls, the support goes farther than attending PTA meetings or going to home games. The community has worked to build school programs. Almost 10 years ago, a couple told Boyle that they wanted to give kids a constructive activity. Those were the days of the "Just Say No" anti-drug campaign. This couple said they wanted to give kids something to say "yes" to. They wound up offering swimming lessons to the entire third grade. The next year they offered cross-country skiing lessons to the fourth grade. The year after they added downhill skiing lessons for fifth- and sixth-graders. The couple continues to fund lessons in all three sports for all four grades. Another donor spent some $90,000 to refurbish the school gym. Then he created a foundation to pay for more projects. And just this fall, when the gym scoreboard broke, a woman walked in and wrote out a $4,000 check for a new one. Some $2,500 in additional donations will pay for installation and perhaps some athletic gear. "You see, that's the kind of community this is," Boyle says. Boyle has taught English at Scenic Middle School, and was principal at Hanby Middle School. He moved on to be curriculum director for Eagle Point schools, but came to feel too distant from students. "There was my job that was supposed to effect kids the most and I never saw the kids," he says. So he took the superintendent's job to be closer to students. "As superintendent, this is the place where you effect the kids directly." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA