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Michael Dunne: Almost every school district in Oregon is dealing with budget challenges right now. The formula for receiving state money for districts is based on the number of students attending school, and we're in a time of declining enrollment in our state and in our nation. But locally, the challenges that Springfield Public Schools is facing seem especially difficult. The board recently parted ways with its superintendent. It laid off teachers mid-year, to the consternation of many, and even one of its board members quit, citing fears for herself and her kids. It's been a lot. Today on the show, you'll hear from the person brought in to calm the waters: acting Superintendent Jodi O'Mara. She's done almost every job an educator can, and she'll need every ounce of that experience in Springfield.
Jodi, great to talk to you. Thanks so much for coming on.
Jodi O'Mara: Thanks for having me. This is a great opportunity.
Dunne: Why don't you tell folks where you came from and what your experience is running a district?
O'Mara: I retired about four years ago after 30 years in education. I've been an elementary school teacher, an elementary school administrator, and then for the last 10 years I was the superintendent and elementary principal in Mapleton, which is on the coast on the way to Florence.
Dunne: What was that like? It's a smaller district. What were some of the lessons you learned there that you're bringing to Springfield?
O'Mara: I think one of the best things I learned in Mapleton, because it was so small, was that it was an extremely tight community with diverse needs and diverse political ideas, but everyone was able to come together and agree around the importance of education for kids. That is the focus, and should be the main focus when you are leading a school district. I was the only administrator in the district other than my high school principal, so not only was I superintendent and elementary principal, I was curriculum director, Federal Programs director, nutrition services, facilities. I did have a finance director, thank goodness, but I had my hand in communications as well. I think that experience uniquely prepares me to come in and help support Springfield School District in this transition to an interim and then an official superintendent.
Dunne: As a teacher, were there things you were able to bring from that experience into the administrative role?
O'Mara: Yes. My experience as an elementary teacher included grades one through six at the elementary and middle school levels, so I was able to bring the perspective of knowing the developmental abilities from first grade all the way through sixth grade. Having that lens across multiple grade levels, and across multiple districts, including Rosemary, Siuslaw, Coos Bay, Mapleton, and now Springfield, gives me a diverse view of how things are done that I can bring it all together.
Dunne: You come into a situation that's challenging, to say the least. Give us a general sense of how you plan to lead the district and what guides you in what you want to do in Springfield.
O'Mara: What I want to do is bring everyone to the table with the same vision: looking at what's best for kids. Everybody will have a different opinion about what that is based on their experience, their education, and the role they play in the district or community, but everyone's opinion is important. We take all of that information together and make sure we are truly focused on our kids. I want to calm the waters and help us move forward. We've got some tough decisions to make, and bringing people to the table to help make those decisions, letting people feel heard and communicated with, that's the goal.
Dunne: You used the phrase 'calming the waters' in reference to what happened before you arrived. Talk about the idea of both calming the waters and earning back the trust of all the different constituencies. For a superintendent, that includes staff, parents, students and the community in general.
O'Mara: To build trust, you have to have active engagement and face-to-face conversations. That's why we've held several community budget forums and staff budget forums. We've met with student groups. I've had community conversations over coffee. We've done two of those and are planning a couple more. Just getting out and engaging with people, that's how you build trust. It has to be active, respectful engagement with each other, and so that's where we're focused.
Dunne: We're talking to the acting superintendent at Springfield Public Schools, Jodi O'Mara. Without getting into specifics, can you tell us what those conversations have been like? What's the feedback been from the different constituencies you've met with?
O'Mara: The first thing I would say is everybody is so passionate about kids. They want what's best for kids, not just necessarily for their own children, but for all kids in our community. We have to look at not just our own, but how this program or this positive activity in our schools benefit our kindergarteners all the way up through our high schoolers. We need that wider vision. When we ask what has had the greatest impact on your child's success in school, the conversations are so enlightening and positive. It's wonderful to know that people actually do understand what's going on in the schools, and there are amazing positive things happening that we need to focus on.
Dunne: When you talk to folks, or even among your own staff, we've done shows about what's been called the enrollment cliff. That's not just affecting Springfield. It seems to be affecting almost every school district in Oregon and nationally. Can you talk a little about that? I think some people still don't understand that there's a real challenge in just not having as many kids as there used to be. Drawing on your experience as a superintendent and teacher for so many years, how unique is this challenge?
O'Mara: While it is a unique challenge, I don't think it's unique to the Springfield School District. It's definitely a statewide issue, and there are a lot of factors at play. There's the housing market, whether it's in Springfield, Salem or Florence. As a district, and a lot of districts do this, we track live birth rates through the years so you can see what your expectation is for incoming kindergarteners. We also look at job and housing trends: Are there new housing developments coming in that can help bolster enrollment? There are also many new education options out there for students. A lot of them came out of the COVID years with online schools, and I think that has reduced enrollment in a lot of schools across the state because there are other options for families. COVID really opened that up for families who recognized they had alternatives.
Dunne: Talk about your interaction with the Board of Education, just generally working with them.
O'Mara: Part of working with the school board, specific to Springfield, is understanding the dynamics between the board and the school district and helping guide the two to work together, because they are almost separate entities. You have the school board, whose main role is governance of policies and basically hiring the superintendent, and then you have the superintendent's role, which is managing the school district. It is an interesting dynamic, especially coming in new, not knowing all of the players and just getting to know everyone's personalities and how they work together as a board and how they interact with staff. I get to have a unique perspective on that.
Dunne: They selected you, and I wanted to ask about communication with the board in terms of your contract and what you want to do. Has there been a sense of, OK, we're going to let you do what you need to do and evaluate at the end of the year? Can you talk more about that communication with the board?
O'Mara: My contract runs from March 1 through June 30, so it's a pretty short contract. My interpretation of why I was brought in was to calm the waters, to move the district forward in balancing our budget for next year, to determine staffing, and to ensure, as an acting superintendent, that the district stays in compliance and out of liability. Making sure everything is done as it's supposed to be done, whether it's an ODE report, a transportation report, or getting the budget in on time, and making tough decisions when it comes to budgeting and reductions. That's what I view my role as in the short term.
Dunne: We're going to take a quick break. I'm Michael Dunne, and you're listening to Oregon on the Record. When we come back, more of our discussion with acting Springfield school Superintendent Jodi O'Mara.
Dunne: We're back. I'm Michael Dunne, and you're listening to Oregon on the Record. Let's get back to our conversation with acting Springfield Superintendent Jodi O'Mara. The mid-year layoffs were met with a lot of angst and even anger. How has it been going between you and staff, managing through the fact that you have fewer staff members? And as part of that, how have you been able to deliver the kind of education experience for students that you want, given the limitations of having less staff?
O'Mara: First and foremost, we have amazing staff in the Springfield School District. I've seen it in the schools I've visited, in conversations at coffee and conversation opportunities, in community meetings, and in staff meetings. We have amazing staff who work extremely hard to ensure that the reductions and the loss of staff are not affecting our students as much as possible, and they're really good at that. They recognize that this is an adult problem, an adult situation that really doesn't belong in the classroom. So we still have amazing things happening in our schools, even with the mid-year layoffs. Staff have worked hard to still create great opportunities for our students. We are now looking forward as we recognize that we have a budget deficit coming up, and that will increase the number of reductions in all three employee areas: administrators, certified staff and classified staff. Part of what we're looking at as a district leadership team is feedback from staff, parents, students and community members regarding what we need to keep, and trying to ensure that our cuts have the least impact on students, understanding that some impact is unavoidable.
Dunne: All of this is happening in the shadow of some pretty profound changes in our nation's education system. There is real hostility at the federal level toward even the Department of Education. As someone who has done this for a long time, is this a unique challenge, not just for you but for educators and administrators in general, trying to do what you want to do amid cuts at almost every level imaginable?
O'Mara: No matter what year it's been or how long you've been in education, there are always issues at the state and federal level. I think our job, and my job as a superintendent, is to focus on our district and what we can do to ensure our kids are getting the education that our communities and parents expect. While there is a lot of noise from the federal and state levels, our control and our focus has to be on the kids within our community.
Dunne: When you first got the job, you talked about budget stabilization. Were there particular things you put in place to help stabilize the budget and get Springfield through this year?
O'Mara: I don't know that there are any specific items I've done or can do to help with budget stabilization. I think the best thing we can do is create lines of communication and develop active engagement opportunities for everyone involved with our students: the community, the staff, the parents, the students. A two-way street of communication is one of the best things you can do. Budget stabilization and dealing with declining enrollment, those are things we can examine, but it's really hard to guarantee outcomes, because a lot of those factors are out of our control.
Dunne: One thing I'm sure is on people's minds, not just in your district. At 4J, there's been talk of possible school closures if things don't turn around. Is that a conversation all districts may have to have if the enrollment cliff doesn't reverse?
O'Mara: School closures have come up in our community forums. You can look around and see they are happening in districts of all sizes around us. That is not a short runway. It's a conversation that needs to take place over the course of a school year. While it's not a consideration for balancing our budget for the 2026-27 school year, it is a conversation Springfield School District is going to have to have next year for the following year's budget. I think that is inevitable in a lot of medium to larger school districts.
Dunne: You've been doing this for a long time, and I think this is an important question for parents listening right now. Are there challenges any superintendent faces today that maybe didn't exist 10 or 20 years ago? Social media seems like an obvious one. There have also been efforts at the state level to limit cell phone use in schools. What's more difficult or more challenging today, and what's better, compared to 10 or 20 years ago?
O'Mara: I think you really hit it when you said social media. Social media can be our friend, but it can also be our worst enemy. What's better is that social media gives us an avenue to communicate, but communication goes two ways. When you put information out, you expect people to read it and be informed, rather than sharing what I'll call gossip-informed content. We want the community, parents, students and staff to communicate with us, and we in turn put out communication, and want it to go both ways. Social media is a lot different than it was 10 or 15 years ago, but it can be an asset to school districts if it's used in the right way.
Dunne: My last question is a two-parter. At the end of your contract, would you like to stay on in some capacity with the Springfield School District? And if not, what does success look like to you at the end of your contract when handing off to another person?
O'Mara: Right now, I'm really focused on the work at hand, working with staff, students and community. If I were to say what success would look like when I hand off the district on June 30, it would be that we have a balanced budget, that we have communicated it appropriately with the community, students and staff, and that there is a process in place for the community to continue to be involved and engaged in moving forward, with back-and-forth communication. And to hand the plan off to the new interim superintendent: here's what we completed, here's what we've accomplished, and here's what we're hearing from the community that needs to continue as a conversation.
Dunne: She's the acting superintendent for Springfield Public Schools. Jodi O'Mara, thanks so much for taking the time to talk with us.
O'Mara: Thank you very much.
Dunne: That's the show for today. All episodes of Oregon on the Record are available as a podcast at klcc.org. Tomorrow on the show, you'll hear about how traffic fatalities in Eugene are going down but are still at an alarmingly high level. I'm Michael Dunne, host of Oregon on the Record. Thanks for listening.
