Crocker leaving SPHS

The longtime principal and school’s ‘heart and soul’ cites cut in state benefits as she announces her retirement.

Jeanne Crocker

After 28 years at South Portland High School, including the last 13 as principal, Jeanne Crocker chose a nonchalant, almost offhand way to announce her retirement.

Crocker, who in June will cap off 35 years as an educator to take a position with the Maine Principals’ Association, simply placed the announcement at the end of newsletter to parents.

While the announcement was made with little fanfare, the reason Crocker cited for leaving what she calls her “No. 1 dream job,” however, may cause a bit of a stir.

Less than three hours after the news broke, Crocker, who started as a French and Spanish teacher before moving to administration, sat alone in a room at the school district’s central office, facing a reporter she’d never met. Even then, she had trouble controlling her emotions. Her voice caught in her throat, her eyes welled up, and she had to stop more than once to regain her composure before continuing.

Over and over again, Crocker stressed that she has not lost her passion for the high school, its students or its staff. What drove her from her job, she said, are the policies of Gov. Paul LePage.

“The impetus for this early retirement is the Governor’s proposal to reduce retirement benefits for teachers and administrators, including the elimination of health insurance payments,” she said, in her newsletter.

In person, she did not back off of those claims.

“I am very conflicted and emotional about leaving,” she said. “I bleed Red Riot. That’s my place. I love it there. I am not leaving to leave South Portland. I am leaving because there was another factor I was not anticipating which gave me a shove. I am very sorry and sad to leave, because it has been the most wonderful way to spend my life.

“It was not my plan to leave at this time, but I was really shaken up by the governor’s proposal,” said Crocker, “especially the part about withdrawing health insurance through age 65. There’s a level of resentment, I think it would be fair to say.”

In his biennial budget, unveiled Feb. 10, LePage announced a multi-pronged attack on Maine’s $4.3 million unfunded liability in retirement pensions. By law, the state must pay down that debt by 2028.

Among the changes was a cut in retirement benefits. The state now pays 45 percent of the Maine State Employee Health Plan premium for teachers and school administrators who retire before age 65, so long as they served at least 10 years. LePage’s plan would have taken away that benefit, forcing all public employees retiring after Jan. 1, 2012, to pay 100 percent of their health insurance premiums until reaching age 65.

“My message is clear,” said LePage, in his first budget address. “If you come to work to fill in time until you are age-eligible for retirement, we have built in incentives for you to expedite the process.”

“I am not dead wood,” said Crocker. “I feel like I have been forced to make this decision and that he [LePage] should not have put me in a position where I would be forced to say, do I continue my lifetime commitment to the children of South Portland and give up the benefits I feel I have earned.”

On Tuesday, the governor’s press secretary, Adrienne Bennett, declined comment.

“It’s her prerogative and she should do what she feels is right for her,” said Bennett. “Other than that, we have no direct comment.

Crocker, now 56, says she had planned to wait “at least a couple of years” before retiring. Although she admitted to not having run the exact numbers, Crocker estimates that paying 100 percent of her health insurance bill for five years would have cost her “tens of thousands of dollars.” By retiring before the effective date of the governor’s plan, Crocker locks in the terms now in place.

On May 6, LePage released changes to his plan, restoring the 45 percent payment to those who reach “normal retirement age” – either 60 or 62, depending on date of hire. The cut off date is now July 1, 2012.

However, by that time, the die had been cast. Uncertain what was to come, Crocker submitted a resume to the Maine Principals’ Association (MPA) in mid-April for a job she’d previously been headhunted for, but declined. She interviewed for the position on May 17, and accepted an offer three days later.

“Even though we have strung this out, it still feels very tenuous to me,” said Crocker. “Even if the change in eligibility does go away, in the current atmosphere, it could resurface at an time. To have to pay 100 percent of health insurance for all those years would be very significant. I feel that, after 35 years of these [retirement] plans in place, to change them now should not be a viable consideration.

”Just the fact that a proposal with things like that was put forth gives me some reason to fear,” said Crocker. “The status of educators in our country has changed and I find that to be sad and without basis.

“I worked 90 hours per week,” said Crocker. “I did that gladly and with enthusiasm and I have never felt in and way that I have not been working sufficiently wisely or efficiently to merit my compensation, whether current compensation or future compensating.”

Although Crocker says the jump means a cut in pay – from a base salary of $98,082 in 2009, according to the website maineopengov.org – avoiding a potential cut in insurance benefits means a net gain.

Crocker will leave her SPHS post on June 30 to become MPA’s assistant executive director. In that position, she will “lead professional development for K-12 principals and assistant principals, statewide.”

“This would be my dream job No. 2, perhaps,” she said, noting that her new role seems a natural extension of the “Great Beginnings” seminar she’s given for first-year principals for the past six years, under the auspices of the MPA. “I’m anxious to work with my colleagues on always improving our practice.”

Superintendent Suzanne Godin says Crocker’s job was posted May 20. Applications will be accepted though June 8.

“Jeanne has been the heart and soul of South Portland High School,” Godin said Tuesday. “I am very sorry to see her go. Her leadership has truly moved teaching and learning at the high school to focus on preparing each student for post-secondary learning, career and citizenship, which is their mission.”

Crocker said shifting the focus of instruction from content areas to the individual has been one of her most valued accomplishments at the high school.

“Education, like everything else, is about relationships first,” she said. 

Fostering ninth- and tenth-grade “teams” to smooth the transition from middle school also ranks high, as does last fall’s vote by residents to finance a major renovation and addition to the high school, following an earlier unsuccessful vote.

“That’s been a major commitment of my professional time over the past seven years,” she said of the high school project. “It was very much needed. So to see that that is going to happen is a huge, huge accomplishment that I share with may others.”

As she prepares for a new phase of her professional life, Crocker says she is not the only one looking for the escape hatch.

“A number of people have chosen to retire based on the information they are receiving about changes to the retirement system,” agrees Godin, noting that of 39 open positions going into the next fiscal year, 21 – a recent high – are the result of retirements.

And the exodus is not limited to South Portland, although some educators can retire and be rehired, a move some in the LePage administration refer to as “double-dipping.”

Crocker’s husband, Lloyd Crocker, is principal of the Loranger Middle School, in Old Orchard Beach. He also is retiring this year. However, because he is above age 60, state law would allow him to collect retirement pay while earning full salary and benefits.

“His hope is that he will be successful in being re-hired to continue in his current position,” said Crocker. “Because I am not yet 60, that was not an option for me.”

For now, however, it’s time for goodbyes.

“It will be the people that I miss the most,” said Crocker. “Education is a people business, and I spend way more hours in South Portland High School than I do in my own home.

“It has been an honor and a joy to have spent my professional lifetime here,” said Crocker. “But there is a fabulous staff at South Portland High School and they will absolutely carry on and continue to do exciting things in exciting times.”