Mount Greylock Superintendent Grady Steps Down
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Mount Greylock Regional School Superintendent Kimberley Grady has tendered her resignation.
In an email sent to the Lanesborough-Williamstown district's community on Saturday afternoon, Grady confirmed what had been implied by an agenda item posted for a special School Committee meeting on Monday morning: She is leaving the district after 10 years as an administrator.
Grady said she was proud of the accomplishments of her administrative team and cited her health as one reason for her decision to leave.
"[O]ver the past two plus years the job of Superintendent was more than just running the schools within the District," Grady wrote in an email forwarded to the community by the district's director of operations at 3:25 p.m.
Last week, the School Committee appointed Robert Putnam to serve as the district's interim superintendent while Grady was on medical leave.
The last public meeting attended by Grady in her capacity as superintendent was a meeting of the district's Parent Advisory Council on June 24. iBerkshires.com learned that on Friday, June 26, then Assistant Superintendent Andrea Wadsworth informed district personnel that she would serve as acting superintendent while Grady was "unavailable."
On July 1, the School Committee held the fourth of four closed-door meetings in a month's time to "conduct strategy sessions in preparations for negotiations with non-union personnel (Superintendent)."
Five days later, the School Committee appointed Putnam on an interim basis.
A question to School Committee Chair Christina Conry about when the committee received Grady's letter of resignation was not immediately answered.
Grady's email to the community did not elaborate on what she meant by "more than just running the schools within the district." Nor did she give details on the health concerns that kept her out of her office the last two weeks.
She did, however, recognize the turbulence facing all school districts in the commonwealth as they prepare to reopen in September after closing the doors for in-person classes in March because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Although, this does not seem like the right time to step down with all of the uncertainties of the fall reopening, the time has come for me to step down and attend to my health," Grady wrote.
Grady has served as the director of pupil services for the Tri-District (the shared services agreement that preceded the full regionalization of the Mount Greylock District in 2017), assistant superintendent, acting superintendent, interim superintendent and, since spring 2018, full-time superintendent.
In her Saturday afternoon email to faculty, staff, students and families, Grady talked about her time as the district's chief executive officer.
"I have had the pleasure of working at MGRSD since 2010," she wrote. "During my tenure, I worked with several Superintendents, Business Managers and School Committee members.
"My administrative team and I have worked together to get through many new initiatives as well as obstacles. I am proud of the work we have accomplished.
"We have had great successes. Among other things, we created new programming, maintained DESE compliance, fully regionalized, negotiated contracts, developed a strategic plan, started community conversations on racism, managed COVID-19 closure with remote learning plans and worked hard on the building project, with still some lingering pieces for closeout."
Tags: MGRSD, resignation, superintendent,
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