Q&A: Mount Pleasant superintendent hopes to bridge district, community

Several school districts in Westchester County welcomed new superintendents this summer. Leading into the 2018-19 school year, The Journal News/lohud.com is sitting down with each of them to talk about their new roles.

Kurtis Kotes took over the Mount Pleasant school district July 21.

He replaces Susan Guiney, who retired after 10 years as superintendent last month.

Kotes previously worked in the Goshen, Cornwall and Arlington school districts in nearby Orange and Dutchess counties.

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The following was edited for length and clarity.

Question: What attracted you to Mount Pleasant?

Answer: My career started in a very large school district. I was a teacher in the Arlington school district in Dutchess County with over 10,000 students. As my career progressed — this is now my fourth district — each time my experience was in a slightly smaller district. Having the opportunity to lead, but also having the opportunity to maintain great student connections within a district is what truly attracted me here. You still have the ability to work within a system that has four different school buildings, to see the developmental progression from age to age, and building to building. But there's also that opportunity to get to know students personally, get to know their families personally, and be a part of a community where the school is truly a quote-unquote community school was really what attracted me here.

Q: What do you mean by a true community school?

A: Sometimes you run the risk in larger school districts of having communities within communities, districts within districts, where one elementary, one middle school is slightly different than the other part of the community. Here, with the size, scope and nature of the community, it all focuses around one unified vision where the district wants to see all four schools heading.

Q: What makes you uniquely qualified to oversee this district?

A: It was really the breadth of my experience. Having been a classroom teacher, an assistant principal, principal, and then especially the last position I held, my title seemed to run off the end of my business card. I oversaw curriculum, instruction, personnel and technology — having that cross-section of experience to see every aspect of what leadership looked like to most effectively run a school district prepared me and made me feel like I was ultimately the best candidate to take over leadership here. One of the experiences, too, that I had in my last position was that school-to-community connection. All of those community connections from time to time served the school very well to create opportunities for students. I intend to bring that here as well.

Q: A quick glance at the district’s performance on the grades 3-8 state tests, shows that Mount Pleasant students overall performed better on the math exams (60 percent proficient) than on the English tests (50 percent proficient). What do you make of that? And is that an issue you’ll want to focus on as superintendent?

A: The biggest thing we have to look at is the participation in the assessments. Certainly, the data is telling for those that participated, but when we look at the challenge of building trust with the community, the purpose of assessments, and especially on the 3-8 assessments, that is the greater challenge, not just for Mount Pleasant but for any district. Why do we have students take the assessments? What are we using the data for? And realistically, how do we move forward together to make sure that we encourage participation? No student should be punished, if you will, for any performance, or lack thereof, on an assessment, but more so I think we need to work together to really see the vision of why and what is the purpose.

Q: How do you go about that?

A: You have to have regularly scheduled times where parents feel like it’s a good mechanism for them to come and be informed on the district’s vision and perspective. But you also have to make time for those who want to speak individually, whether that’s the parent or community member walking into your office, whether that means being invited to smaller groups, the PTA's or even to informal coffees in their homes or place of business. The key is information, and making sure that accurate information with a unified vision is put out to the community.