The Staples© Commercial With the "That Was Easy" Button

This afternoon when I walked into my office I took special note of the “That Was Easy” button that is on my desk. This small electronic device was made popular by Staples © commercials, and over the past few years the number of “That Was Easy’ buttons in offices across America is likely to have multiplied many times. I found this little noise maker in a cabinet in my first office here at Mahar, and I looked for every possible opportunity to use it. I realized today that it has been quite some time since I have heard its familiar sound and for fun, I pressed it.


As soon as I heard “That Was Easy” I responded, “Not Exactly!” My thoughts immediately went to the work that I have been engaged in with fellow Superintendents, Dr. Patricia Martin from the Petersham Elementary School District, Dr. Paul Burnim from the Orange Elementary Schools, and our consultants Mr. Ken Rocke, and Dr. Steve Hemman from the Massachusetts Association of Regional Schools. For the work that we have been doing together there should be another button that when pressed utters, “That Was Challenging” or perhaps “That Was Pretty Complex.”

Together my aforementioned colleagues and I have been working on comprehensive plans to consolidate fiscal, governance, contractual, and data functions of our central offices. This work comes on the heels of our successful consolidation of our three districts’ special education administrative offices. In our shared special education team we have successfully shared professional expertise, services such as Speech and Language Therapy, duties, costs, and have begun to craft a three district counseling corps to meet the social and emotional needs of all students from Pre- K through grade 12.

Since we began working together about a year ago, we have found much common ground. Today we sat together in a Massachusetts Department of Education sponsored workshop put on by the acclaimed National Institute of School Leadership. Several months ago we began a journey together to bring Response to Intervention (RTI) to all of our districts’ classrooms, and together we are analyzing data to improve instruction for our students at all levels. We have been working together with a shared premise – that we can recreate a better system of teaching and learning for the children in our districts by focusing on sharing one piece of our organizations at a time.

For quite some time, each of our school districts have worked “in isolation together” if such a thing is possible. I now find myself thinking of the mathematical fact, “the whole is equal to the sum of its parts” and understand that improving each facet of our individual organizations by combining resources, expertise, experience, and a shared mission with one another, that we will create more promising situations for our students.

Our shared special education team has been made possible with the support of the Ralph C. Mahar Regionalization Planning Committee and our three school committees. The success of the Special Education merger is also rooted in a group of employees who are willing to work together to come up with creative and innovative solutions. In our most recent school committee meetings the Ralph C. Mahar Regional School Committee and Orange School Committees openly discussed and voted the pursuit of consolidated central offices. None of the above has warranted the pressing of the “That Was Easy” button.

I now turn to you, the readers of this blog. If you have any questions about our consolidation effort, please do not hesitate to post them. If appropriate, your question will be seen by all and answered publicly.