Escondido Unified Votes Today on Peacemaker

The Escondido Unified High School board, in a special meeting today, will vote on the contract of a new superintendent to replace John Cooper, whom the school board asked to resign at the end of last year because of displeasure with his management style.

Jane Gawronski, now the superintendent at West Covina Unified School District, was chosen for her “open and candid” management style, said Lee Newcomer, consultant to the board during the two-month search.

The board had narrowed a field of six candidates to three before deciding on 48-year-old Gawronski, whom Newcomer described as a peacemaker and “extremely skillful at participatory management.”

Gawronski succeeds Cooper, who was asked to step down because of the “turmoil in the district” that included criticism from employees concerning personnel matters, school board president Bruce Studebaker said at the time.

Newcomer said the board felt that conflict at the board level and at the central office required a strong leader.

“The board recognized that they need somebody to pull the board together and pull the central office together. They wanted someone who was strong enough to do that, somebody who knew how to work with and through people,” Newcomer said.

The previous administration suffered from poor and ineffective communication, and a lack of teamwork, Newcomer said.

Gawronski, whose contract would begin July 16 with a yet undetermined salary, will leave her post in West Covina where she inherited a $3.3-million deficit three years ago and brought the district back to solvency, Newcomer and Studebaker said.

In order to do so, however, Gawronski closed down one of the district’s two high schools, two junior highs and an elementary school. She was also forced to lay off about 50 faculty and staff members, a move that sparked protest among the staff.

“She’s been through every roadblock, every stumbling block a superintendent can have,” Studebaker said, noting that Gawronski will not be officially hired until the contract is signed, which is planned for this morning.

“She’s been through the mill in West Covina. The district went bankrupt, and she brought it back to financial health,” Studebaker said. “She got good marks from everybody up there.”

“The people that were really involved in the school closures are now her supporters,” Newcomer said.

Gawronski, who could not be reached for comment, had spent four years as assistant superintendent at the Walnut Valley Unified School District in Walnut.