Interim superintendent takes job

Priorities include discipline, enrollment, school finances

Thomas McCraley, originally hired in May by the Williams Unified School District Governing Board as the district's interim superintendent, revealed to the News last week that he's in it now for the long haul.

"Initially, this was supposed to be an interim position," McCraley said. "But it's not interim anymore ‹ I'm the guy."

McCraley comes to the district with 30 years experience as a superintendent, both in and out of state, with institutions in Bullhead City, Yuma, Cottonwood and the Mingus district, a Florida county district and, most recently, Ganado on the Navajo Reservation.

His background is marked with accomplishments and awards, including being selected as Arizona's Superintendent of the Year in 1995. The new administrator has great plans for the local schools, such as making Williams an example to other educational systems.

"My vision for our district is that I want Williams to be the lighthouse school that schools in America can look at and say, 'This who we need to emulate,'" McCraley explained.

Priorities on the to-do list for the new super include addressing communication complaints, the district's financial distress ‹ which ties in with enrollment ‹ and discipline issues at the Williams Elementary-Middle School.

In terms of communication, McCraley says he plans to make himself visible and readily available not only to district staff and board members, but also to the community. He plans to be walking the halls of the schools and attending sporting events as well as other school functions with the school's new principals.

While addressing the district's financial problems may be difficult for any administrator, McCraley has the advantage of insight as he faced a very similar situation while superintendent of the Mingus district in Cottonwood, and bills the issue as one of his strong points.

"Part of my strengths as an administrator would be in school finance and school law. I've been doing that for years ‹ I've taught those courses at NAU, in Bullhead City, and in Yuma," McCraley said, adding that the task starts with bringing more students back into the system.

In regards to discipline issues at WEMS, McCraley is confident that the board's newly hired principal, Donny Bridges, has a handle on the situation. He says that, according to Bridges, the school and the district needs to take its Character Counts program to the next level and adds that a turn-around will be apparent.

"I think you're going to see a major change in discipline," McCraley predicted, citing that solving the issue will probably have a positive effect on enrollment. "Once they (parents) see that we're going to provide a safe net for kids, I think they'll start bringing them back."

McCraley currently lives in the Prescott area where his wife is a high school principal, but says that if he had the freedom to do so, he'd buy property in town right away. He did, however, bring up the future possibility of living in Williams during the week and commuting on the weekends.

Another bright point to McCraley's acceptance of the job is the fact that his wife is working and he already has certain benefits through his past years with the Arizona educational system. For those reasons, the new superintendent was able to voluntarily strike certain portions of the pay and benefit package he was offered. Doing so allows his total compensation package to be about $10,000 less than the previous superintendent's.

McCraley has an open-door policy at his district office and invites community members to drop in and say hello at any time.