Christopher Furdge has been named interim superintendent of the West Tallahatchie School District.
The decision by the district’s Board of Trustees came during a special called meeting on Wednesday, June 8.
Furdge, 45, presently serves as principal of West Tallahatchie High School, a position he has held for three years. Before that, he worked one year as the assistant principal at R.H. Bearden Elementary School.
He will ascend to the district’s top leadership post on July 1, a day after present superintendent, Dr. Darron La’Monte Edwards, formally vacates the Sumner office.
“I’m very excited,” said Furdge. “I’m looking forward to taking advantage of the opportunity to impact the lives of not just students at West Tallahatchie High School, but each and every child in the West Tallahatchie School District.”
An educator for 20 years, serving as either an assistant principal or principal for 16 of those years, Furdge said his appointment as superintendent is the realization of a long-held dream.
“I always have had as a goal of mine to one day become a superintendent, so if the opportunity to apply presented itself, I was definitely going to do that,” he noted. “And it worked out for me.”
Furdge’s opening came after Edwards, 47, was selected to be the new superintendent of the Yazoo City Municipal School District.
Edwards had been one of 15 applicants for the Yazoo City position, where an interim superintendent has served since the resignation of the previous leader last summer.
The Mississippi School Boards Association helped to spearhead the search for a new superintendent in Yazoo City, advertising the opening far and wide. Edwards, who in January had received a one-year extension to his original three-year contract at West Tallahatchie — where he began July 1, 2013 — said when he learned of the job posting, he decided to apply.
“I had always been interested in having an opportunity to impact more students and lead a larger school district,” Edwards noted. “It was an opportunity that I felt would be really, really good for my career. ... I’m excited about the opportunity.”
Whereas the WTSD has about 850 students, the Yazoo City district has nearly three times the enrollment, at about 2,400 students, Edwards said.
WTSD Board of Trustees President Lucinda Berryhill said Furdge had been one of six applicants for Edwards’ soon to be vacant post.
“We had six dynamic applicants, and all six were local people,” Berryhill noted. “Four of them were from inside the school district.”
As interim superintendent, Berryhill said Furdge was awarded a one-year contract. Near the end of that deal, the board will assess his job performance and decide whether he should continue in the job.
Edwards said he has no doubt Furdge will succeed.
“I was not involved in the [hiring] process, but I think the board made a good selection,” noted Edwards. “I don’t mind saying that he’s done a good job as a principal and I’m confident that he’ll do a good job as superintendent.”
Furdge likewise lauded Edwards’ job performance and said the proof is in the West Tallahatchie district that he will be inheriting.
“I think the district is in an excellent position academically, as well as physically,” Furdge said. “We have enjoyed successes at all of our schools, and as I reflect on the successes, I’m not going to try to create a completely new vision, because what we have in place has been working. So I would just like to continue a lot of the systems and the strategies that we put in place. And I’m looking forward to sustaining the success that we’ve had.”
Asked who might be succeeding him as principal at West Tally, Furdge noted, “I would imagine that Dr. Edwards and I will get together and we’ll decide to post that position, more than likely, take some applications and go about it that way.”
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Despite having mixed feelings about leaving, Edwards said he is proud of the accomplishments that have been made at WTSD during his three-year stint as leader.
“I’m very humble and I’m grateful to the board for giving me an opportunity to be here for three years,” he noted. “It’s a good feeling to be able to have the type of success that we’ve had, and you can say that I’ve done everything possible that I could do as a leader in the district for three years, and we have a lot to be proud of. ... It’s the student achievement that we’ve experienced here that I’m most proud of. I’m grateful and I’m proud of our students. They have done a remarkable job.”
Edwards added, “We’re in good shape academically and financially. So to leave on those terms, that is very unique.”
Asked to cite particular areas of growth during his tenure, Edwards first mentioned the district’s dropout and graduation rates.
“When I came to West Tallahatchie, the graduation rate was 56 percent and the dropout rate was 19.6,” he noted. “Now we have the state’s lowest dropout rate of zero and a graduation rate that is 79.6 percent — the highest in the county and one of the highest in this particular region of the Delta. That is something that I’m really proud of. For two years in a row, we have had 100 percent of our students to graduate, and that is something that is really, really special for us to experience.”
Edwards pointed to other successes, including:
• A $1.5 million bond issue that went to upgrade facilities and to install heating, ventilating and air conditioning units in all classrooms and the gymnasium
• A dual enrollment program, through a collaboration with Coahoma Community College, that has seen more than 150 West Tallahatchie High School students take college-level courses while still in high school
“All of our students who went through that program, we’ve paid for books, we’ve paid for transportation and we’ve also paid for tuition,” Edwards said. “We have students who are in college now with 18 credits that the West Tallahatchie School District has paid for.”
• A collaboration with the Tallahatchie Early Learning Alliance to offer pre-K instruction
• A federal 21st Century Community Learning Centers grant to help fund after-school education programs
“That is something that hadn’t been in our district for more than 10 years,” Edwards said of the 21st Century grant.
• Increasing student academic achievement on standardized state tests
“As a district, my very first year, we were seven points away from being successful. The high school was eight points away. R.H. Bearden Elementary School did go up to a C, which was successful, and it had not been successful before,” said Edwards.
• Improvements in district technology resources
“We’ve been able to modernize and add to technology,” Edwards noted. “We’ve spent over $300,000 in technology since I’ve been here. We’ve purchased free remediation tools for our students and purchased iPads and laptops so students could have access to technology.
“We have e-books now to help bring technology to the homes of our students, where they can actually read the books off of iPads, laptops and desktops at home — at no cost to the parents.”
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Asked about any particular goals for the district that he might be pursuing as interim superintendent, Furdge said, “We’re going to remain focused and we’re going to continue to put students first. We’re going to make sure that we’re meeting all of our academic targets. I want to see our third-graders reading above grade level. I want to continue to graduate each and every senior who enters into 12th grade and hold the dropout rate to zero percent.”
Furdge, a native of Dundee, is the eighth of 10 children born to Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Furdge. He attended Lula and Friars Point elementary schools before graduating from Coahoma Agricultural High School in 1988.
He received an Associate of Arts in biology pre-med from Coahoma Community College in 1990 while maintaining a 3.64 GPA. He was inducted into the first class of Phi Theta Kappa there and served as president of the Science and Math Symposium.
In 1992, he graduated magna cum laude from Alcorn State University, where he received a Bachelor of Science in biology pre-med. There, he joined the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity.
Furdge earned two degrees from Jackson State University — first, a master’s in microbiology in 1995, and then a master’s in educational leadership in 1998.
Furdge has two daughters, Alexandria Marie Furdge, a recent graduate of Holmes Community College who will attend Belhaven College this fall, and Kristin Nicole Furdge, who is entering the ninth grade at Terry High School.
This story was updated at 2:32 p.m. on June 16, 2016.
