By Andrew Coen
School Board president Richard Braverman also announced his intention to retire after the 2004 school year after 20 years on the board of education.
After a long service as superintendent, I am looking forward to spending more time with my family, said Fowler, who said heÕs announcing his plans now in order to give the school board a full year to conduct a search for his replacement.
Fowler said he hopes that he has helped maintain the districtÕs level of excellence that existed before he arrived. This community has always had high expectations for our schools and I hope we have been able to meet those, said Fowler.
Even though the condition of the Woodmere Middle School building is still unresolved, Hewlett High School has been expanded and the overall facilities were improved, according to Fowler. We have succeeded with most but not all of our facility needs, he said.
Fowler said he will most miss the relationship he has developed with the people in the district. The wonderful thing about any superintendent job is the relationship with people. If I can help someone with a problem, it makes the job very rewarding, said Fowler.
Dr. Fowler is one of the most pre-eminent educators in the United States today, said Braverman. His decision to retire is understandable given his more than 30 years of service to children as superintendent which leaves our district with some very large shoes to fill.
He [Dr. Fowler] is so supportive of people, said Marcy Goldberg, who has served as co-president of Central Council PTA and was recently elected to the school board. He is wonderful to work with. His door is always open and returns calls and responds to you immediately.
FowlerÕs superintendent days go back four decades when he was first appointed as a school superintendent in DeKalb, Ill. in 1969. Following seven years in that position, he became superintendent of schools in Fairfield, Conn., where he served for 10 years, then superintendent of schools for Sarasota County, Fla. for 10 years. Just prior to coming to Hewlett-Woodmere, he had served as district superintendent of schools for Nassau County and Nassau BOCES for three years.
Thirty-six years as a superintendent probably ties or sets a national record, in a profession where the average stay of a superintendent in a district is three years but I have enjoyed every minute of it, said Fowler.
Dr. Fowler is currently president of the Nassau County Council of School Superintendents and is a past president of the National Association of Suburban School Superintendents. He is an adjunct professor of School Organization and Leadership at Teachers College, Columbia University, and has published more than 50 books,
monographs and articles in scholarly journals and the national press. In 1989, he was awarded the Medal of Honor by former United States Surgeon General C. Everett Koop in recognition of his courage, compassion and skills in permitting children with HIV infection to attend school. He has been named Educator of the Year both by Phi Delta Kappa and the State Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Braverman, an attorney, has been on the school board for 20 years and as board president for the last 12. I anticipate that planning for this transition in leadership in July, 2004 will occupy a good part of our boardÕs time this year, he said. "It is something I have been mulling over for the last two years," said Braverman of retiring.
The man never had an agenda. He always put the district and kids first, said Goldberg of Braverman.
