Fisher: ‘It’s about the children’

By Cindy Landrum  

APRIL 19, 2012 10:48 a.m. (0)

It’s not surprising that when Dr. Phinnize Fisher is asked about her biggest accomplishments as Greenville County Schools superintendent, she turns the conversation to children.

Not surprising at all, since “doing what’s best for children” was Fisher’s mantra during her eight years as superintendent of the nation’s 49th largest school district.

Fisher’s last day as superintendent is Friday, which is also the first day that her former deputy superintendent Burke Royster is elevated to the district’s top administrative position.

Instead of talking about increasing test scores in some of the worst state budget cuts ever faced by South Carolina school districts, Fisher talks about a second-grader who asked her to be a part of her Flat Stanley project.

Instead of talking about getting the district’s $1 billion construction program completed, she talks about how a group of students on a Blue Ridge High activity bus recognized her as she walked out of the hospital and hollered their greetings to her out the windows.

Instead of talking about being a finalist for national Superintendent of the Year, she talks about being stopped in the grocery store by parents who want to tell her how well their child is doing in school or by a student wanting to brag about the grade he got on a school paper.

“The school district and education is not about the superintendent, it’s about the children,” she said. “I want the children and the school district to speak for themselves. If that’s a result of my work, that’s good.”

Fisher thought the district was losing its focus when she was tapped in 2004 to replace former Army Lt. Col. Bill Harner, a leader who found himself constantly in the spotlight and often mired in controversy.

“I said it was time for us to go back to educating children,” she said. “It was my duty to try to handle the political outcries, management issues and other issues to allow our principals and teachers to focus on the most important duty – to educate our children.”

She made a point of going to every one of the district’s schools each year to show school personnel that she and the district’s other central office staff were there to support them.

Fisher considers the district becoming nationally accredited as her biggest accomplishment.

“That was verification to me of what we were doing and that we were doing right,” she said.

Fisher said her focus on educating every child – no matter the learning style or what neighborhoods they come from – is evident in some of the new schools built during her tenure.

Fisher pushed for the Sterling School, a unique combination of a traditional community-based elementary school with a center for highly gifted students.

She pushed for A.J. Whittenberg Elementary, the state’s first elementary school with an engineering-based curriculum.

Fisher, who once qualified for a state science fair in Virginia with a project on helical structures (what is known today as DNA), was interested in such a school in 1995, long before STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) became an educational buzzword.

“The timing wasn’t right and I wasn’t in a position to make it happen,” she said.

But Fisher kept a flyer about elementary engineering close to her desk, no matter how many times she changed offices.

“I’m a planner and I’m persistent,” she said.

When the opportunity came up to build an elementary school adjacent to the Kroc Center in downtown Greenville, Fisher knew her chance had finally come.

“I want all of our schools to be a Whittenberg,” she said. “I want all schools to take a look at what they’re really good at, what makes them special, and take advantage of that.”

The problem, Fisher said, is schools are still funded the way schools were when pencil and paper were the main learning instruments.

When she listens to the news and hears about public education failing, Fisher gets angry.

“I don’t think public education is ‘failing’ because teachers aren’t teaching,” she said. “I think (the critics) have got it wrong. I think it’s the adults who are failing education. Let’s move the whole education system forward.”

Half of Greenville County’s children live in poverty, Fisher said. “We’re determined to not let that make a difference in how we educate them. We are here to educate all children.”

During her retirement, Fisher plans to take golf lessons. She already has the name of a female golf pro to call. She wants to get involved in the First Tee program, a program that brings the game to disadvantaged youth. And she wants to spend more time with her three grandchildren.

But she’s not going to forget the other children.

“I plan to continue to work on the national scene and the local scene to transform public education through innovative teaching,” she said. “That conversation not only must be had, but it’s something that must happen.”