Bittersweet goodbye: Illness curtails career;
 

Bittersweet goodbye: Illness curtails career; Roberts to leave CR in June
By Kate House-Layton, Delaware State News
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Dr. Harold E. Roberts, superintendent of the Caesar Rodney School District, will call it a career June 30. He has spent his entire 35-year career in the district and had planned to retire in four years. His plans were changed when he was diagnosed in May 2006 with amyotrophic lateral sclerois, or Lou Gehrig's disease. Delaware State News/Kate House-Layton
WYOMING - Dr. Harold Roberts didn't like Delaware when he first moved here from western Pennsylvania.

He was used to a hilly landscape and Delaware was flat.

Now he said he can't imagine a community where he'd rather have spent his career and raised his family.

In a field where it's unusual for a superintendent or a school administrator to spend a whole career in one district, Dr. Roberts has spent 35 years in the Caesar Rodney School District, rising through the ranks from high school science teacher, assistant principal, principal and assistant superintendent until he was named superintendent in 2004.

Dr. Roberts, who turns 58 on April 3, had planned to retire at age 62.


Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, which affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, has cut his goal four years short. Dr. Roberts will retire from the district June 30.

The condition, with which he was diagnosed in May 2006, has slurred his speech and stiffened his gait, but his spirit for his job has remained intact.

"I love my job, I love the district, but I can't do my job the way I want to do it."

Dr. Roberts' career began in 1972 with a temporary teaching position at the high school when another teacher went on maternity leave.

By the next year, he had advanced to the first of a series of assistant principal jobs in the district, until he was the junior high's principal from 1990 to 1998. He then became the district's assistant superintendent in charge of support services and was named superintendent six years later.



The community got to know Dr. Roberts when he was a teacher and principal.

Highlights

The chance to work directly with children, he said, was the highlight of that time in his career.

"Knowing that you had an opportunity to touch and influence so many young people is a very rewarding feeling," he said.

Former students still come up to him to say hello and that they appreciated something he did for them years ago.

In some ways, a teacher or principal is akin to parenthood, he said. There are tough days, but the good days override them.

Part of a principal's job is student discipline, and a lot of students don't like authority figures.

Dr. Roberts said he made it a goal to be able to put an arm around the shoulder of any student, no matter how upset, surly or difficult.

"So the fact that all of my students allowed you to do that was a validation," Dr. Roberts said. "That they accepted that you cared about them and treated them fairly, even if you were someone who had to discipline them."

That sense of compassion overlapped into his superintendent's duties, Caesar Rodney High School Principal Kevin Fitzgerald said.



"A lot of times it tends to be overlooked, because the job is a difficult job to make people happy all the time. He brought a lot of compassion to dealing with students, teachers and members of the community. And that, more than anything else, is going to be his legacy," said Mr. Fitzgerald, who is planning a presentation about Mr. Roberts' career at a special June dinner in the superintendent's honor.

He also called Dr. Roberts an innovative leader and credited him with the technological updates the district received in the '90s.

"One of the things he had to do is be pretty creative in getting money for technology," Mr. Fitzgerald said. "People did not look at technology the way they do now."

Dr. Roberts, he said, pushed for classroom computers and laptops for teachers, things now considered standard in schools throughout the state.

Colleagues, such as district administrative assistant Dr. Larry Harrison, say he has earned respect among peers in other districts due to leadership skills and service on state committees such as a professional standard board.

This year marked another highlight for Dr. Roberts when all CR schools received superior ratings, the only district with more than one school to ever earn that status.

Big challenge

Referendums, on the other hand, have been a challenge, Dr. Roberts said. The last two, held in December 2005 and March 2006, failed.

The district will go for a third try May 3.

"I've had to make a lot of decisions and some were harder than others," he said. "And I don't have a problem with that.

"But referendums are a different matter. Referendums I can't control. I'm trained as an educator, not as a politician."

The frustrating part, he said, is to convince a community of the need for school improvements.

"When it's clear to you and you can't convince others," Dr. Roberts said.

Caesar Rodney School District, he argues, has no control over the growth. All it can do is make room for the students the growth brings.

"When (the referendum) failed last time, he took it so hard," Mr. Fitzgerald said. "Not because of the failure itself, but because what it meant to future generations of students.

"If this one is not passed, it will be something that he feels has not been fulfilled.

Just a year ago, Dr. Roberts made his way around the district to tell residents and Kent County Levy Court about the need for more funds to accommodate district growth.

He'll have to rely on others to take care of that this year, due to his impaired speech.

His weakened ability to communicate is one of the main reasons he decided to retire.

He relies a lot more on e-mail to communicate with staff and faculty, but that only goes so far, he said.

Biggest challenge

Instead of dodging his illness, he's remained open about it.

"It is what it is," he said.

It's unnoticeable when he smiles or sits, but obvious as he works to articulate his words.

Fine motor skills give him some trouble, he said, although his handshake is still firm and he can still button his sports jacket.

He first noticed a problem last year, he said, when his words became sluggish. Thinking he'd suffered a small stroke, he went to the doctor. Tests, however, showed a different result.

"Before he became ill, he would just hold people spellbound with his conversation and his jokes and he has a very unique gift about making people feel good about themselves," Dr. Harrison said.

According to ALSA.org, an informational Web site about the disease, it affects motor neurons that reach from the brain to the spinal cord and from the spinal cord to the muscles throughout the body.

This progressive degeneration leads to the patient's death. When the motor neurons die, the ability of the brain to initiate and control muscle movement is lost. With voluntary muscle action progressively affected, patients in the later stages of the disease may become totally paralyzed. The majority of patients, however, remain alert.

ALS, he said, affects patients in different ways. His speech was one of the first things affected, but he can still walk. A friend who developed ALS before his own diagnosis, however, can still speak but cannot walk. Physicist Stephen Hawking is speechless and confined to a wheelchair, but communicates with the aid of a computer and is still considered one of the world's most brilliant scientific minds.

The first reaction to the diagnosis of a terminal illness is anger and questions of why.

"I've been a person who's been into physical fitness my whole life," Dr. Roberts said.

Doing what he can

The diagnosis devastated his wife, Patricia, and three adult sons. But he has decided to make the most of the time he has and focus on what he can still do rather than what he can no longer do.

Although the cause of ALS is not completely understood, recent years have brought a wealth of new scientific understanding regarding the physiology of this disease, according to ALSA.org.

Little progress has been made on ALS since Lou Gehrig's death 60 years ago because it is a fairly rare disease and therefore has not received the research funding that cancer, heart disease and HIV have received, Dr. Roberts said.

But he said that has started to change as more funds have been targeted to ALS and scientists have started to unravel the mysteries of the disease.

Mr. Fitzgerald said the high school held an ALS walk in November that raised thousands of dollars for medical research.

For now, Dr. Roberts said he keeps up with normal activity and stretches to keep his muscles limber, but ultimately exercise, he said will do no good.

He also goes to work every day and continues to attend school board meetings and district functions.

"It's amazed all of us," Dr. Harrison said.

"If it was up to Harry, he would not retire and if it was up to us, he would not retire," Mr. Fitzgerald said.

Board president Dianne Whitby said she knew Dr. Roberts from her own days as a student in the district.

She said he's known for his humor, dedication to his family and work.

"He just has a passion for education and just has an unsurpassed dedication to our district," she said.

Parting thoughts

As he prepares to leave the district, he said he wants to hand it over as one of the premier districts in the state.

"The district is in great shape instructionally," he said.

His concern is leaving it with the lean budget it had this year.

"We are very frugal," he said.

He'd like to pass on to the next superintendent a district in good financial health and one that has plenty of space for students.

Once he retires, he intends to stay active, and perhaps do some writing.

Board member Clifton Coleman Jr., who has known Dr. Roberts since 1998, talked with him at a sports banquet last week and assured him he could slow down or use a cane to walk if he needed.

Dr. Roberts refused.

"He's just very determined," Mr. Coleman said. "Harry's personality is not conducive to just doing nothing, he likes to have something to do."

Staff writer Kate House-Layton can be reached at 741-8242 or khouse@newszap.com.