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Date: 7/2/2015
EAST?LONGMEADOW – Assistant Superintendent for Business Theresa Olejarz retired on June 30 after 17 years serving the school district.
Her successor, former Business Manager for Holyoke Community Charter School Pamela Blair, started on July 1.
“It’s kind of a surreal feeling,” Olejarz, a Hampden resident, said. “I’ve known every day where I’m going to work and who I’m going to be with and I love it here. East Longmeadow’s been an absolutely wonderful town supportive of education and many people have been supportive of me … I will definitely miss it and the people. Sometimes you think about; you spend more time with the people that you work with than you do with your family.”
Olejarz said during her years as business manager and later in 2010 as assistant superintendent for business, the district has seen high points and low ones in terms of budgets.
She added that the fiscal year 2015 (FY15) budget was the most challenging one during the last five years. There was a reduction of $446,115 in the FY15 budget compared to the previous fiscal year budget.
“For the most part, with the exception of [FY15], if you look at the last five years we’ve been level services and a little bit more,” Superintendent of Schools Gordon Smith.
Olejarz came to the East Longmeadow School District in October 1998. Prior to that, she was the business manager for the Gateway Regional School District in Huntington.
During the School Committee’s June 22 meeting, Olejarz received a special citation from the state senate in recognition of her 17 years of service to the district.
Blair said she has known Olejarz for more than a decade and looked forward to working in the district.
“I think it’s a great district,” she added. “I like the size of it. I’ve only heard wonderful things about Gordon Smith and the School Committee. I got to know Terry through the [Massachusetts Association of School Business Officials]. Terry and I are a lot alike in our thinking process when it comes to being a school business manager.”
Smith said Blair was also the business manager for the Westfield Public Schools before she began serving in a similar position at Holyoke Community Charter School.
“She has worked in her current position since 2009 and Ms. Blair is looking forward to joining a school district once again,” he added.
Blair signed a three-year contract with the district with a starting salary of $95,000, Smith said.
He added that the district posted an advertisement for the position on Jan. 5, which closed on Jan. 31. Smith said a pool of 14 to 15 applicants were narrowed down to six who were interviewed by a screening committee consisting of School Committee members, administrative officials, Appropriations Chair Eric Madison, Town Accountant Sara Menard, district staff, and other town officials.
Smith said the interviews then produced three finalists and the School Committee made its final decision to hire Blair in late March. Negotiations for Blair’s contract began and concluded the week of March 30 through April 3.