Superintendent Robert Wall to end 13-year tenure
By Daniel Hartill
Staff Writer

POLAND – Through the lens of an administrator, Robert Wall watched a kindergarten class grow up.

The children who started here when he did in 1989 became the first freshman class at Poland Regional High School, the school he helped build. On June 14, those same students will graduate.

In a way, so will Wall.

Two weeks after they leave, Wall will step down as the superintendent of School Union 29.

“We’ll graduate together,” said Wall, stopping to compose himself.

“Of course you get emotional,” he said. “If you don’t get emotional about it anymore, then you’re in the wrong profession.”

For a leader who has worked for years in an office far from classrooms and playgrounds, the display may seem surprising. It shouldn’t, he said.

“No curriculum, no building is as important as the children,” Wall said. Though indirectly, everything he has done in his 13-year tenure has been about them, he said.

As the superintendent, Wall oversees the administration of the schools in Poland, Mechanic Falls and Minot. It’s a job of numbers, contracts, rules and regulations.

And because it’s a union – comprised of school committees in each town, a separate committee for the high school and union committee that combines them all – it’s a job of meetings.

Wall figures he attended 39 annual town meetings, crafted 52 budgets and went to 1,300 night meetings.

“This isn’t a job you do in a nine-to-five day,” said Wall. “It’s a commitment that you take into (your) life.”

During his time as administrator, the union has grown from three schools to five.

When Edward Little High School in Auburn decided it was too small to accept students from Poland, Mechanic Falls and Minot, people there decided to build their own school. In 1999, the Bruce M. Whittier Middle School and Poland Regional High School opened.

Their planning and construction became the centerpiece of Wall’s tenure. And when the school’s curriculum came under fire, he weathered it.

A year ago, the meetings became worse. Parents gathered, formed independent watchdog groups and people at two town meetings called for his office’s budget to be eliminated.

They complained that he spent too much and listened to too few people.

“People would like me to be stoic,” Wall said. “That doesn’t mean you have to follow every voice in your head.”

The high school changed. With Wall’s encouragement, Principal Derek Pierce led his staff to reach harder for people’s comments. Public criticism stopped.

In February, the union school committee agreed to buy out Wall’s contract. He’ll leave on June 30.

He doesn’t yet have a job to go to. He has applied for work elsewhere.

He may become a superintendent again. He might be a principal or even teach, he said.

Before coming to School Union 29, he taught elementary school. He was the principal at Leeds Central and Greene Central schools.

At 56, he still has years left in front of him. He won’t retire. However, the white-haired school leader has been given several plaques in recent weeks. One was an award by the Maine Department of Education.

Last month, leaders at the school dedicated the high school’s auditorium to Wall, installing a gold-colored sign above the entrance.

He’s proud of the recognition, but it makes him a little uncomfortable.

“I think everyone likes to have a legacy, some sign that you made a difference,” he said. Schools are run by teams of people. “I probably was in a position to empower people,” he said.

He began listing names, such as Pierce, then he stopped. The list would be too long.

dhartill@sunjournal.com