By Adam Swift
Winthrop’s new assistant superintendent is a familiar face in the district and will be doing a familiar job.
Monday night, the School Committee approved a new contract to appoint Lori Gallivan as assistant superintendent.
The title will be added to her current title of Executive Director of Curriculum, Instruction, and Accountability and she will continue to perform those duties in the district as the official assistant superintendent.
“I think the School Committee did a great job and we’re very incredibly lucky to have Lori,” said Town Council President Jim Letterie. “She has done very well over a number of years, and hopefully, she will continue to do that for a long time.”
The only discussion about the contract at Monday night’s meeting was over how Gallivan is compensated for her work writing and administering grants. Currently, she receives two annual stipends for that work, and those stipends remain in her contract as assistant superintendent.
Letterie said he doesn’t like to see stipends included in contracts for positions such as assistant superintendent or superintendent.
“It’s either part of the job, or someone else should be doing it,” said Letterie. “I think curriculum is priority number one, and I think it’s an incredible amount of time to just do the job she has.”
Letterie said he had no issues with the work Gallivan has been doing, or with the financial aspect of the contract, but said that if there is additional work that needs to be done, it might be best to post the job to find another qualified person to do it.
“In this situation, it might be a little different in the fact that she might be one of the only ones qualified to do some of these tasks, so if that is the case, I think it should be written into the contract,” said Letterie. “I will support the contract, I just wanted to note my objection in the precedent of giving stipends to this type of position.”
Superintendent of Schools Lisa Howard said she would not have an issue if the grant responsibilities were added to the job description for the position and the salary adjusted to reflect that.
School Committee member Suzanne Swope noted that in some other districts, there are staff members solely responsible for grant writing and management, and that by leaving the stipend in, it could open the door to bring a similar position to Winthrop in the future.
“Eventually, I would hope as we grow we would hire a grant writer in addition (to Gallivan) who would report to her,” said Swope.