The Bibb County Board of Education met in a special called work session and meeting on Wednesday, December 19, to take care of routine matters as well as setting the salary of the Superintendent of Education.
State law mandates any elected superintendent must have their salary set by the Board by January 1, following the election. Excepting possible legislative raises and cost of living adjustments, whatever salary is set remains such for the entire elected term, or four years.
Sally Salter, of the Alabama Association of School Boards, held a webinar on updated rules and regulations regarding Superintendent salaries which helped guide the board in their actions.
The salary for the Bibb County superintendent had been $109,000 over the past eight years. Assistant Superintendent Alesa Judd researched salaries by county and city, and separated them by elected versus appointed superintendents. According to her findings, the average salary for a superintendent in a county of Bibb County’s size and student population is $117,000 per year.
The superintendent is the chief executive officer for what is typically the largest employer in most counties. The Bibb County system consists of over 3,300 students, two high schools, two middle schools, four elementary, two pre-k facilities, and employs over 420 full-time staff members. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in private sector businesses throughout the United States “the median annual wage for chief executives was $183,270 in May 2017.” (https://www.bls.gov/ooh/management/top-executives.htm)
The Bibb County Board of Education meeting on December 11, 2018After hearing from an expert from the state, research done by Dr. Judd, and discussion by board members, the salary of the Bibb County Superintendent was set at $115,000, plus any legislative raises and a cost of living adjustment (COLA) increase in any certain year that the COLA goes up or down.
The newly set salary would rank the Bibb County Superintendent as 103rd highest paid in the state, out of 137 school systems in all, according to a memo by the State Department of Education concerning Superintendent salaries for fiscal year 2018. (https://www.alsde.edu/sites/memos/Memoranda/FY18-3005.pdf) That, after the raise, is still among the lowest paid 25% of all superintendents statewide.
Perhaps ironically, the ranking of 103 is also what Bibb holds when it comes to local – versus state or federal – funding per student, according to a report by the Alabama Association of School Boards.
Already sworn in for his new term, Bibb County Superintendent Duane McGee sat down with the Bibb Voice before the school board meeting on December 11, to discuss new developments with Lawson State, the school system’s relationship with Cahaba Medical Care, new facilities and other improvements planned for his upcoming term. Watch the video attached to this article to find out what he had to say.
[Contributing authors: Mike Oakley and Jeremy Crowson]
