Assistant superintendent to leave Lawrence after 25 years.
By: Lea Kahn
Mimeograph machines, slide rules and computer punch cards were the order of the day when Bruce R. McGraw began his 25-year tenure as administrator for curriculum and instruction for the Lawrence Township School District in1979.
Dr. McGraw, who announced his plans Tuesday to retire effective Jan. 1, 2005, recalled that he used to spend hours in those days copying discs to use in the district’s Apple II computers. Equipment from that era that is now an "artifact of history" at the Smithsonian Institute, he said.
Leaning back in a rocking chair in his office Tuesday afternoon, Dr. McGraw said some things have changed, but others have not. While there is still a need to educate children, the most significant change that has occurred in the past 40 years is a philosophical one, he said.
"The most fundamental change has been from ‘some children can learn’ to ‘all children can learn,’" the 61-year-old administrator said. "That’s a huge philosophical shift. We are now responsible for all children and finding ways to motivate them and help them to learn.
"The people who say, ‘I brought the horse to water but I can’t make him drink’ that is no longer acceptable," said Dr. McGraw, who assumed his present title of assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction in 1993. "We must find a way to make all children proficient in math, language arts and science."
While Dr. McGraw is close to completing a 40-year career in education, that field was not his first choice. In fact, Dr. McGraw considered following in his father’s footsteps and becoming a minister.
"I was originally going to go to the seminary, but it was not the right decision for me," he said. "One of my professors (at Bucknell University) suggested teaching. He recommended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill."
Dr. McGraw, who had earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Bucknell University, was accepted into the masters of arts in teaching program at UNC-Chapel Hill. It was designed to attract liberal arts majors into education, he said.
Graduate students in the MAT program took courses during the summer and taught during the school year. They took a few courses during the school year, also. It took 18 months to complete the degree, he said.
Soon after he enrolled, Dr. McGraw said, there was a call for graduate students to volunteer to teach at segregated, inner-city, black schools. He quickly signed up and became an associate teacher in language arts and social studies, teaching eighth-graders at a junior high school in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg County, N.C., school district.
It was an easy choice for Dr. McGraw, who had long been interested in the civil rights movement. As a college student in the early 1960s, he was active in voter registration drives in the South, for example, so it was natural to volunteer to teach in a segregated school, he said.
Upon receiving his master’s degree, Dr. McGraw returned to UNC-Chapel Hill to earn a Ph.D. in educational administration. While he was studying for his doctorate, he designed and taught an independent studies program at a Charlotte high school, and also worked as an assistant for public information in the school district office.
As he neared completion on his Ph.D., Dr. McGraw was named to be the principal at a newly integrated high school in Edenton, N.C. After four years as a principal, he said, he was ready to move up the career ladder. He wanted to become an assistant superintendent of schools.
One of Dr. McGraw’s academic advisors suggested that he should find such a job in another state and then return to North Carolina after a few years. Dr. McGraw heeded that advice, and applied to the Lawrence Township School District. He met then-Schools Superintendent Thomas Looby, and they "hit it off," he said.
"I was hired with the expectation that I would be here for three to five years and then go back to North Carolina," Dr. McGraw said. But acknowledging the need to provide stability for their young family, Dr. McGraw and his wife decided to remain in Lawrence.
Lawrence was a good place to live, he was having fun and he was contributing, Dr. McGraw said. Also, there have been new initiatives through the years, and that’s what has kept him fresh and the job interesting, he said.
Asked to name the achievements of which he is most proud, Dr. McGraw quickly pointed to the simultaneous accreditation of all seven schools by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools in the late 1980s. Prior to that time, only Lawrence High School was required to be accredited, he said.
Dr. McGraw also is proud of the curriculum councils that he initiated soon after he arrived. The curriculum councils involved teachers in evaluating the instructional process and planning the curriculum in math, science, language arts and social studies.
"When I came here, the only curriculum guide was an elementary school reading handbook," he said. There were no curriculum guides for other subjects, which would have outlined what was going to be taught and how it was to be taught. At that time, the teacher’s textbook was the "major" guide, he said.
One of the results of the curriculum councils was the push for inquiry-based science education, which calls for hands-on teaching of science, Dr. McGraw said. Science courses typically had been taught by the textbook, so that students only read about science.
While he is proud of his accomplishments, Dr. McGraw said there are challenges awaiting his successor not the least of which is making certain that all children are learning.
"We need to do a better job of assessments," he said. "It is a mistake to rely on the state assessments, although that is encouraged by the state. We need to do more. We need to look at different kinds of assessments. We need to start defining what data is acceptable."
The Lawrence district has always been a believer in the concept that all students shall learn, he said. The federal No Child Left Behind Act codified it and made it a national priority, he said. It’s the right thing to do, he added.
"It’s getting people to put their heads together to see that (educating all of the children) happens," he said. "(The new assistant superintendent) should be a good listener. That person needs to understand the culture, values and work that have been done so far. This is a fine school district.
"I would also tell that person that nothing is sacred. That person should have the ability and freedom to make substantive changes. Don’t be afraid to make changes. Just because this is the way it has always been done, doesn’t mean it is still the right way."
Making changes doesn’t mean things were wrong, he said. There is a new context, new demands, new data and new evidence. The new assistant superintendent should have the ability to make changes, based on the data and evidence, he added.
"I am still having fun, but where the field of education is heading, it’s the right time for me, personally, to retire," Dr. McGraw said. "I think it requires a new skills set for an individual in my position (as the assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction)."
Looking to his own future, Dr. McGraw said he plans to volunteer and do consulting work for school districts. He does not intend to move from Lawrence, noting that his wife, Jean McGraw, teaches history at Notre Dame High School.
"I am not going to sit around," Dr. McGraw said of his post-retirement plans. "I am not that kind of person."