Council Rock superintendent leaves with a record of accomplishment

To two generations of students, teachers, and parents in Bucks County's sprawling Council Rock School District, it might seem unfathomable, but Mark Klein once dropped out of the education world.

That was 30 years ago when Klein, then a twenty-something grade-school teacher, was worried about tight school budgets and layoffs. He drove to Rutgers University in Camden four grueling nights a week for four years, earned a law degree, and traded the classroom for the courtroom as a clerk for a Bucks County judge.

But that lasted only a year. "I loved the work," Klein recalled, "but in my heart my passion was public education."

On Aug. 31, Klein, 59, who lives and works in old schoolhouses, is leaving Council Rock a second time - but very much on his own terms. He's stepping down after a widely praised 11-year stint as superintendent of the nearly 12,000-student district, capping a 36-year career at Council Rock in which he also served as principal of three elementary schools.

In an era when superintendents move around like overpaid relief pitchers, Klein is the exception. As many as one in five Pennsylvania school superintendents step down or get ousted every year. Their average tenure is just 4.8 years, said James Buckheit of the Pennsylvania Association of School Administration, who called Klein's staying power "extremely unusual."

Klein's boosters credit his longevity to his remarkable stamina, but mainly to a passion for people that burns brighter than the constant headaches of ever-tighter budgets and a surge of state mandates for student testing - not to mention those frigid 3 a.m. wake-ups to make the tough call on snow days.

"He looks at these kids as students, not as a seat," said Megan Benzio, one of a number of Klein's former grade-school charges now teaching in Council Rock. Benzio, a fifth-grade teacher at Goodnoe Elementary School, recalls Klein giving up his prep time to play soccer with the kids at recess, and she sees that same enthusiasm 30 years later.

"It's really sad to think of our district not having Mark at the helm anymore," said Andy Block, the school board president.

In an interview at the Chancellor Center, a charming 1918 stone school building renovated as district offices, Klein talked about the ups and downs - mainly ups - of his time at a once-rural district now serving five well-to-do bedroom towns that have grown rapidly.

"When you're here for that long, you just develop deep relationships with people, and that's been one of the actual joys," said Klein, who says he still logs too many soccer games or jazz concerts to keep track.

Klein said he could have weathered the remaining two years on his contract, but "I think more than anything I wanted to leave when I knew I was still doing it well."

Although he said it hadn't factored in his decision, Klein sounded alarms about what he sees as troubling education trends, particularly the growing emphasis and time spent on standardized testing to evaluate the performance of students and teachers.

"We test kids far too much," he said, adding that this time of year, between 10 and 20 percent of classroom time is devoted to preparing for standardized tests, including the Keystone Exams. He said the tests were creating more anxiety than data useful to improving instruction.

Klein said he also was deeply concerned about the growing volume of people bashing traditional public schools amid controversy over student achievement, teacher pensions, and the role of charters.

But schools are in Klein's blood. "We call education our family business," he said. His dad was superintendent in the nearby New Hope-Solebury School District. His wife was a fellow teacher whom he met on his first day at Churchville Elementary, in 1979, not long after he had earned his degree at the University of Notre Dame. She now works in the autism program in the Central Bucks district, where her boss is Klein's sister. And two of the couple's three grown children are in teaching.

Klein even lives in a schoolhouse. Seriously. "It's a little crazy - it's an old stone schoolhouse" in Warwick Township, which was built in the 19th century and renovated in the 1960s before the Kleins moved there in 1989. "It's got the original bell out in front."

To peers such as West Chester Superintendent Dr. James R. Scanlon, who has known Klein since they were high school rivals in Central Bucks in the mid-1970s, Klein is an educator's educator. "He has so many skills, from his excellent people skills to his technical skills and knowledge of school law," Scanlon said.

"He's tireless. . . . I don't know how he does it," said Barry Desko, the Council Rock director of secondary education, who goes back decades with his boss.

Klein has put his energy and skills to use in an era when Council Rock - which serves Newtown Borough and Newtown, Northampton, Upper Makefield, and Wrightstown Townships - saw its enrollment nearly double. The district has managed to avoid the labor strife that has plagued other area districts. It doesn't hurt that teachers are among the highest paid in the region, averaging $93,477 in 2012-13, the last year for which state figures are posted. Klein earns $200,178 and oversees 1,974 employees and a $220 million budget. In essence, he has been a CEO of one of the region's larger employers.

And he has dealt with many incalculable smaller challenges, including the weather. When snow was in the forecast, as superintendent he had to set his alarm for 3 a.m., test the roads, and make a cancellation decision that was certain to make some people unhappy, either way.

"I've said to people, I'm going to wait for the first snowfall next year and lay outside and just make snow angels without worrying about it," Klein laughed.

But Klein has faced much darker days, most recently the deaths of three Council Rock High School South sophomores in a Poconos car crash the weekend before the start of the current school year. "Each of those [losses] takes a small chunk out of you and out of your soul," he said.

But the good days greatly outnumbered the bad. Perhaps his favorite moment involves a snow day. He recalled that two years ago, when classes were canceled on Valentine's Day, a Newtown first grader had her mom drive her to his office that afternoon to give Klein a card. It read: "Thank you for keeping me safe."

He'll surely think about that next fall as he anticipates retirement with what he calls "trepidation" - even as he keeps busy teaching as an adjunct at Lehigh University and Delaware Valley University.

"One of the things I'll miss most is walking down the street in Newtown and having kids go, 'Mr. Klein, how are you?' " he said. "That will go away quickly. In two or three years, that will be 'good old Mr. What's-his-name.' "

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@kathyboccella