New East Tallahatchie School District Superintendent Dr. Darron L. Edwards said he is glad to be back in Tallahatchie County and is excited about the possibilities that the opportunity affords.
In June, Edwards, 49, inked a two-year deal with an annual base salary of $121,000 to become the Charleston schools’ chief, a position he officially assumed on July 1.
If Edwards’ name sounds familiar, perhaps it is because from July 1, 2013, until June 30, 2016, he served as superintendent of the West Tallahatchie School District — his first role as a districtwide administrator after serving more than 20 years in the field of education in the Delta.
In 2016, he left the 850-student WTSD to become superintendent of the Yazoo City Municipal School District, which has an enrollment of more than 2,500 students.
At the time, he cited “an opportunity to impact more students and lead a larger school district” as reasons for his exodus, just months after he was granted a one-year extension to his original three-year contract at WTSD.
In Yazoo City, as had been the case at West Tallahatchie, under Edwards’ leadership the school system experienced growth and improvement in numerous measurable areas, including on statewide achievement tests.
“Yazoo City had never been a successful school district. All the schools had either been an F or the district was an F the entire time the state accountability model was in place,” Edwards explained during a recent interview in his new Charleston office.
“For the first time, during my first year in Yazoo City, none of the schools were failing, and neither was the district. That probably would be one of the highlights that stands out the most, to give those students an opportunity to be proud of their academic success. It was special, and it’s one of the things that I’m really proud of that we did in Yazoo City.”
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In spite of the achievements, Edwards this spring made a decision to forego the remaining year of his three-year contract at Yazoo City and pursue a job that would take him closer to his hometown of Ruleville, to be nearer his ailing 70-year-old father.
When he learned of the pending vacancy in the superintendent’s office at East Tallahatchie, Edwards saw it as an answer to prayer.
“My father is my best friend, and he is having a lot of health issues,” Edwards noted. “To be closer to my father, I was willing to take an assistant superintendent’s position, a principal’s position, a federal programs job, a job that would simply put me closer to my father, to spend more time with him. This opportunity presented itself, and I thought it was great.
“I’m very, very thankful, first, to God and, secondly, to the East Tallahatchie School Board for their trust and confidence in me as their new leader. I’m truly humbled to have this special opportunity to lead this district into a new era of excellence.”
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Edwards and his parents share more than the fact they all now live in Ruleville. They are all also trailblazers.
Edwards’ father, Thomas Edwards Sr., made history years ago as the first African-American school superintendent in Sunflower County. He dedicated over 40 years of his life to the field of education.
Edwards’ mother, Shirley J. Edwards, is the first African-American to be elected as the mayor of Ruleville, a position she continues to fill.
Now, the younger Edwards is the first African-American superintendent of the East Tallahatchie School District.
“I think in 2018, it’s special,” said Edwards. “I don’t dwell on it a lot, but I think it’s really good that we can put that behind us. ... I want everyone to know that I’m the superintendent for the entire district...”
In the end, such milestones are not paramount to the task at hand, Edwards explained.
“As humbling as it is to be the first African-American superintendent, let’s make sure that we keep our priorities straight,” he said. “This is not about me, it’s not about you, but it’s about the children of the East Tallahatchie School District who are depending on the leadership to produce better results and create a better pathway for their future. ... I want to make this school district better, and I want to make the individuals in this community proud of their superintendent.”
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Edwards also owns the distinction of being the first person to have served as district superintendent for both the West and East Tallahatchie public schools — experience that he considers to be an asset now that he is in Charleston.
“I’m so familiar with the community, the demographics,” he said. “Working in West Tallahatchie, we collaborated a lot with East Tallahatchie for professional development, for a lot of different things that took place. ... I knew what previously took place here, I knew about the results, I knew about the climate and culture of excellence that existed here.”
Just as basketball has historically ruled the athletic roost in Webb, Edwards understands that the pigskin is top dog in Charleston, but he said the ultimate prize comes not in athletics, but academics.
“This is a football town, but it also has had a lot of academic promise in the past that we’re equally proud of. So we want to make sure that we can bring that back to the community,” he noted.
“We want our community — black, white, it doesn’t matter what race you are — to be proud of Charleston, and not just as it relates to sports, but we want to make you academically proud to know that the direction we’re going is going to make this district better, make our communities better, make our parents proud, make our students proud to be a part of a successful school district.”
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Edwards said coming to ETSD, which had a 2017-18 enrollment of roughly 1,200 students — about half that of Yazoo City’s — will be different yet familiar.
“The challenges are the same from one district to another. It’s to make sure that you’re putting students first,” he said. “Teaching and learning are always at the forefront of what we’re trying to do. We want to make every district and every school better than what it was before I came or anyone who works under my leadership. That’s our number one priority.”
Edwards has a feel for the academic hurdles.
Each year, the Mississippi Department of Education’s (MDE) State Accountability System assigns a letter grade, on a scale of A through F, to each school district and individual school in the state.
Those grades are based, in part, on how well students perform and progress from year to year on state standardized tests in such subject areas as English language arts and mathematics. Graduation rates and participation in advanced placement subjects also figure into the equation.
For a second consecutive year, MDE’s annual report card in 2016-17 graded the East Tallahatchie School District at D overall.
Charleston Elementary School, for years the crown jewel of ETSD with perennial A rankings, for the second year in a row graded at F during the 2016-17 period.
Charleston Middle School improved from F to D, while Charleston High School rose from D to B.
Results for the 2017-18 school year have not yet been made public.
In addition to bringing in Edwards, the ETSD Board of Trustees has a new principal in place at each campus.
Coretta Miller is now the leader at Charleston Elementary School, Milton Hardrict Jr. guides Charleston Middle School and Mark Beechem has moved from CMS to Charleston High School.
While strong leadership and personnel are essential, Edwards said devising and executing a plan in perfect harmony is crucial.
“We’re going to do a lot of assessing, looking at what we previously had in place, even in terms of the academic measuring tools that we used, with our benchmarks, with our pacing guides,” he noted. “We’re going to look at what we used versus what results were produced by these particular systems. ... We cannot afford to play learning games with the lives of children. It’s important for us to collaborate to make sure that we can produce better results. ... In order for us to do it, we have to do it together.”
The district’s new mantra is, “Excellence Is Our Only Option,” and, Edwards said, “That’s one of the things I’m emphasizing for the principals, that we’re going to create a new culture of excellence for this community.”
Edwards said there will be new district goals, new school goals and “the expectations will be higher than they’ve ever been.”
“We want to make sure that we look at everything, which, of course, starts with safety,” he noted. “We want to make sure that our schools are safe to protect our children and staff and to create a climate that’s conducive to teaching and learning.”
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Edwards said just a cursory visual inspection of the facilities of the ETSD reveals glaring areas of need.
In fact, he noted, “We want to do an assessment of all of our schools from a physical standpoint.”
Even under present financial constraints, Edwards said there are possible funding avenues to explore.
While he was at West Tallahatchie, for instance, the district secured a $1.5 million school construction bond to make needed repairs, renovations and improvements, upgrading all facilities, including the high school gymnasium, with heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.
In Yazoo City, under Edwards’ leadership, the district applied for and obtained a $2 million school improvement grant to address physical deficiencies at Woolfolk Middle School.
“It’s amazing how God works,” said Edwards, “to have had an opportunity to bring some necessary financial benefits to West Tallahatchie, being able to get a school improvement grant for Yazoo City, and now with what that experience gives you, to bring a plethora of knowledge to East Tallahatchie. ... To know that you put students first and you’ve been able to work diligently to improve those districts is something that I feel really, really good about bringing to East Tallahatchie.”
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Community outreach and engagement will be another conscious, deliberate effort for the new superintendent.
The district has a new and, according to Edwards, more user-friendly website — www.etsd.k12.ms.us — as well as new social media accounts. The official Facebook account is named East Tallahatchie School District.
In Yazoo City, Edwards said the school district held a lot of community meetings, something he hopes to emulate in Charleston.
“We did parent academies. We visited a lot of churches,” he said. “The new social media outlets that we have are just one way that we want to try to engage and involve our parents more. Something that I always tell everyone is, we can’t win with you being on the sideline. ... If we’re going to improve this school district and make it better, we need everybody on the field, everybody participating, everybody engaged and everybody focused on what we can do for the children. As long as we keep our priorities in line with what’s most important — that’s the 1,200 students that we have in the school district — there’s nothing that we can’t accomplish together.”
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Edwards said he is “super proud to be a part of this Charleston tradition” and is excited for the new school year to begin. Classes are set to start on Aug. 8.
“I can’t wait for the students to get here,” he noted. “I want to interact with them. That’s something that I did a lot of in Yazoo City, because I want them to be able to see their superintendent. I want to talk to them about what the data says about their score reports. I want to talk to them about being in school every day. I want to talk to them about their behavior. I want to talk to them about sports, if that’s what they’re interested in. But I also want to talk to them about being excellent, being greater than you were yesterday.”
Edwards and his wife, Stephanie, have two children, daughter Chelbe’, 24, and son Myles, 16.
IN THE PHOTO: While seated in his office recently, Dr. Darron L. Edwards shows off where his new allegiance lies, with the Charleston Tigers. (Photo by Clay McFerrin)
