Outgoing schools chief Rulffes proud about not laying off teachers

As superintendent of a school district that has been rocked by $385.5 million in funding reductions over three years, Walt Rulffes said his proudest achievement was never laying off a teacher.

Because "we recruited so many people to come to Las Vegas, I was desperately concerned about not having to lay anybody off," Rulffes said. "We lost a lot of positions, but we absorbed our existing employees into other positions that were vacant."

Rulffes, 69, will officially retire Tuesday after nearly six years in charge of the Clark County School District, the nation's fifth-largest school district with about 310,000 students.

Former Clark County School Board President Terri Janison, who resigned to become Gov. Brian Sandoval's community relations director, said she was grateful that Rulffes "brought us through a very difficult time financially, always looking out for employees to the best of his ability and keeping the focus on the classroom."

The effects of a national recession that deflated revenues for public entities created high drama in the district, and unlike teachers, support staff employees were not spared from layoffs.

Before the 2009-10 school year began, support staff picketed School Board meetings to protest the elimination of 592 jobs.

Many of the employees who were affected have since been rehired for other positions, Rulffes said.

Hard times also prompted members of the Clark County Association of School Administrators and Professional-technical Employees to criticize what it perceived as unfair perks for Rulffes' executive team "during a time of shared sacrifice."

They openly questioned whether board members even knew what Rulffes was doing.

In a policy shift, School Board members decided in March to have outside attorneys assist with negotiating contracts in the future for school executives who report directly to the superintendent.

Minorities complained about the student achievement gap among ethnic groups.

At Rulffes' last board meeting in December, Frank Hawkins, president of the Las Vegas chapter of the NAACP, criticized empowerment schools, which were among Rulffes' signature reforms that was supported by millions of dollars of contributions from the business community.

In theory, empowerment schools have more latitude to innovate, but Hawkins questioned whether principals of empowerment schools actually have the authority to hire their own assistant principals.

Despite all the turmoil, Valley High School Student Body President Zhan Okuda-Lim always believed Rulffes was doing his best. Okuda-Lim, 17, is chairman of the district's Student Advisory Committee.

"Dr. Rulffes has faced many trials and tribulations during his term," Okuda-Lim said.

"I think he's done his best to overcome issues. In graduation rates, reducing dropout rates, raising student achievement, I know he has been dedicated. We still have a lot of work to do, but I'm very grateful that Dr. Rulffes has shown so much dedication to the school district."

Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction Keith Rheault praised Rulffes for his attitude.

"He was very even-keeled. If you asked him for something, he always got it done," Rheault said.

"I thought his best part was his willingness to collaborate not only with the department (of education) but all the school districts. In Clark County, he had a lot of staff expertise that a lot of the rural districts didn't have. He was always the first one to say, 'Come on down to Clark.' "

Rheault called Rulffes a team player. "He worked for the betterment of the state," he said.

Rulffes originally was hired as the district's chief financial officer and deputy superintendent in 1998, moving here from the state of Washington, where he had been an associate superintendent of schools in Spokane.

He also was superintendent of a sub­urban school district in Cheney, Wash.

One of his first assignments in Clark County was to design the long-term 1998 bond program. It was intended to produce $3.5 billion to fund new school construction but grew into a $4.9 billion program over 10 years, paying for 101 new schools and 11 replacement schools.

One of Rulffes' regrets is that he did not get to organize a new bond program as a parting "gift" for his successor, Super­intendent Dwight Jones.

The recession made it difficult to go the voters for approval of a new program.

District officials estimate local public schools will have $5 billion in unfunded capital needs, such as school maintenance and technology, over the next 10 years.

Rulffes' original intention to organize a new bond program in 2008 was one of the reasons why he didn't support the state teachers' union, the Nevada State Education Association, in its call for an increase in gaming taxes to fund public education.

Rulffes said he was worried that voters would confuse the gaming tax increase with the bond program if there were two ballot initiatives in support of increased school funding.

Philosophically, Rulffes did not think one industry should bear most of the burden for funding public schools.

The teachers' union has since adopted Rulffes' position by calling for passage of a broad-based business tax in the upcoming legislative session.

Gary Peck, the Nevada State Education Association's new executive director, said he appreciated that Rulffes was "always professional, principled and a person of integrity with whom we could work."

"The community owes him a great deal of gratitude for his many years of public service," Peck said.

Rulffes said one advantage for the new administration is that Southern Nevada's population boom has subsided.

"I think we will have a more stable community," he said. "We're not going to have the migration in and out. Schools can focus on academic issues as opposed to worrying about all this growth, building buildings, adding seats."

Rulffes leaves behind a mixed academic track record.

On his quality assurance report that the School Board uses to review academic progress, Rulffes got an overall positive review by meeting 65.5 percent of the benchmarks. He is proud that district graduates are taking fewer remedial classes in college.

But the superintendent acknowledged his disappointment about the district's low graduation rate. Under his tenure, he stressed the district's goal of producing more high school graduates with a program called "Eyes on the Cap."

In recent years, the graduation rate inched up from 65 percent in 2007-08 to 68 percent in 2008-09, as calculated by officials using the state formula.

But other studies that calculate the graduation rate differently have put the figure much lower, about 50 percent or less.

Rulffes also was not satisfied with student progress in math. In 2008, a district-wide math assessment was introduced to measure how well students were learning material in the district's curriculum.

The second-semester results from 2009-10 showed that only 35.4 percent of eighth-graders passed the pre-algebra assessment and only 12.8 percent of high school students passed the Algebra I test.

"I didn't know there would be quite as much controversy, and I thought (progress) would move faster than it did," Rulffes said.

Recognizing the public's appetite for more choices beyond their neighborhood schools, Rulffes created more magnet school options and introduced "open enrollment," which allows students to go to other schools with available seats.

Rulffes appreciates that his successor is an education reformer who instituted many changes as Colorado education commissioner.

He advised Jones to "immediately build his team quickly because he is facing so many issues with the budget and a new board."

Rulffes does worry that his legacy of never laying off a teacher might be impossible to sustain in the face of the district's anticipated funding shortfall of $150 million in 2011.

"I think there's a great deal of anxiousness among the employees," Rulffes said. "There's talk of cuts that would result in thousands of cuts of positions."

Contact reporter James Haug at jhaug@reviewjournal.com or 702-374-7917.