DECATUR -- With the imminent departure of Decatur superintendent Larry Ben at the end of June, the school board, led by board president Ike Owens, began the search for a replacement.
The board met in executive session April 14 to interview its first candidate for Ben's position. The interview lasted two hours. When the board emerged they announced that they had offered the position to this candidate.
By 10 a.m. April 15, the Decatur School District had a new superintendent of schools, Jeff Gravette.
Gravette, who currently serves as principal of Northside Elementary, will assume his new position effective July 1, the beginning of the 2015-16 school year.
Gravette has been in the teaching profession for 12 years. He taught middle school social studies in the Gravette School District for 10 years before taking his first principal's position at Northside Elementary in Decatur. Like Ben, Gravette will be tackling his first superintendent's job.
But unlike Ben, Gravette will inherit a system that has shed its failures for a more successful school district.
Since Decatur emerged from fiscal distress in 2010, the district has enjoyed positive growth and a wealth of good news. The 2013 graduating class made above-average test scores on the ACT for the first time in 10 years. Their level of college readiness led Decatur High School to earn a bronze medal in the U.S. News and World Report "Best High Schools in America" list.
The enrollment numbers continued to climb, reaching the highest levels in 10 years, 556 as of March 17. This growth has prompted the district to reopen the old elementary/middle school for the 2014-15 school year and to begin a complete 1.2 million dollar restoration of this facility in the near future.
This is the foundation on which Gravette can build a bright and promising future for the Decatur School District. With the possibility of new industries and business moving into the area, Gravette will have a unique opportunity to expand the district beyond current expectations.
Gravette is not one to bask in the limelight alone. He is quick to recognize those many coworkers in both the Gravette and Decatur school districts for their contribution that led to his accepting the offer as Decatur superintendent.
"I would like to express my appreciation to the folks that I have worked with in Gravette over the years," Gravette commented. "I feel like they have prepared me to be a principal."
"Everyone that I have worked with here in Decatur, they are all part of this move for me," Gravette said. "I just want to tell everyone in this community, 'Thank you.'"
General News on 04/23/2014