Keith Mispagel began his new position as superintendent of the Fort Leavenworth School District July 1. Mispagel, formerly the district’s deputy superintendent, has been at the district for 13 years.
What motivates you to continue to work with the military population year after year?
It’s the best opportunity I can provide to serve those that are serving our country by providing the best education we can. If we’re doing our best to educate the dependents and the children of soldiers, that’s the most we can give back since they’re doing their best to defend our country.
What are some of the unique needs of these military children in schools?
One of our biggest challenges is the mobility. On an average year, we could see nearly a 50 percent turnover of all our students, kindergarten through ninth grade, and the new group of students that we have the following year come from all over the country and all over the world from various duty stations. We have, with the No Child Left Behind law and adequate yearly progress, mandates to meet certain target levels for math and reading on assessments. So, our teaching staff has the phenomenal challenge of getting our students ready to meet those target levels by March. Our main focus on day one becomes the individual academic needs of each child.
You’re writing a dissertation on how military children do in education. What is the topic of your dissertation?
Currently the title of my dissertation is “Academic Performance in the Mobile Military Child.” I’m still currently conducting (research) I’m in the process of writing my proposal. With that proposal, it’s doing some historical research on mobile students, mobile military dependents and the transient population and what research shows to the academic performance of that population across the country. My initial research review shows that the mobile military population does not automatically perform less academically, which leads my research of – why? What is it about our mobile military students that allows them to continue to be successful? I project it has a lot to do with the resiliency, parental involvement and community support.
Although Fort Leavenworth schools do receive aid differently than nonmilitary schools through the Department of Defense and federal impact aid, you’re still facing cutbacks in funding from the State of Kansas with a base state aid per pupil reduction to $4,012. Being a small district, how are you making cutbacks?
Moving forward, we have decreased a central office position. Geri Parscale is the new deputy superintendent. Geri, for the last four years, has been the director of instruction and professional development. We will no longer have that director’s position.
Between her new position as deputy and my new position as superintendent, we’ll consolidate our duties from three positions to two.
We did not do an adoption of textbooks last year. In any school district, when we have nearly 2,000 students and adopt a new textbook series, for any given subject, it can be more than $100,000.
We’ve had some retirements of administrators that, at the height of their career had a higher salary, and hiring some new administrators, their salaries were lower.
We cut back on supplies and equipment. Anywhere we could cut back, we did, without affecting the educational programs we’re offering.
Are you concerned about more cuts for the 2010-2011 budget?
They’re saying there won’t be any cuts this year, but only the state finances can determine that. So we’re basing our operating budget at $4,012 per student in hopes that it stays at that and doesn’t decrease.
— Melissa Bower
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Keith Mispagel began his new position as superintendent of the Fort Leavenworth School District July 1. Mispagel, formerly the district’s deputy superintendent, has been at the district for 13 years.
What motivates you to continue to work with the military population year after year?
It’s the best opportunity I can provide to serve those that are serving our country by providing the best education we can. If we’re doing our best to educate the dependents and the children of soldiers, that’s the most we can give back since they’re doing their best to defend our country.
What are some of the unique needs of these military children in schools?
One of our biggest challenges is the mobility. On an average year, we could see nearly a 50 percent turnover of all our students, kindergarten through ninth grade, and the new group of students that we have the following year come from all over the country and all over the world from various duty stations. We have, with the No Child Left Behind law and adequate yearly progress, mandates to meet certain target levels for math and reading on assessments. So, our teaching staff has the phenomenal challenge of getting our students ready to meet those target levels by March. Our main focus on day one becomes the individual academic needs of each child.
You’re writing a dissertation on how military children do in education. What is the topic of your dissertation?
Currently the title of my dissertation is “Academic Performance in the Mobile Military Child.” I’m still currently conducting (research) I’m in the process of writing my proposal. With that proposal, it’s doing some historical research on mobile students, mobile military dependents and the transient population and what research shows to the academic performance of that population across the country. My initial research review shows that the mobile military population does not automatically perform less academically, which leads my research of – why? What is it about our mobile military students that allows them to continue to be successful? I project it has a lot to do with the resiliency, parental involvement and community support.
Although Fort Leavenworth schools do receive aid differently than nonmilitary schools through the Department of Defense and federal impact aid, you’re still facing cutbacks in funding from the State of Kansas with a base state aid per pupil reduction to $4,012. Being a small district, how are you making cutbacks?
Moving forward, we have decreased a central office position. Geri Parscale is the new deputy superintendent. Geri, for the last four years, has been the director of instruction and professional development. We will no longer have that director’s position.
Between her new position as deputy and my new position as superintendent, we’ll consolidate our duties from three positions to two.
We did not do an adoption of textbooks last year. In any school district, when we have nearly 2,000 students and adopt a new textbook series, for any given subject, it can be more than $100,000.
We’ve had some retirements of administrators that, at the height of their career had a higher salary, and hiring some new administrators, their salaries were lower.
We cut back on supplies and equipment. Anywhere we could cut back, we did, without affecting the educational programs we’re offering.
Are you concerned about more cuts for the 2010-2011 budget?
They’re saying there won’t be any cuts this year, but only the state finances can determine that. So we’re basing our operating budget at $4,012 per student in hopes that it stays at that and doesn’t decrease.
— Melissa Bower
