May 5, 2010

Two Racine Unified directors to retire this spring

Jim Linstroth, assistant director of continuing education at the Mack Center, Jim Kerkvliet, Park High School activities director, will be honored at Racine Unified's annual retirement dinner on Thursday night.

Together, Linstroth and Kerkvliet have contributed 61 years of service to the school district. They are among 44 retirees from Racine Unified this spring.

Linstroth has worked in the Mack Center for 34 years – having seen four name changes and many building changes over the years. He started his career as a social studies and English teacher for 11 years, then spent 10 years as Work Experience Coordinator and finally spent the most recent 13 years as Assistant Director at the Mack Center. Linstroth also served as head boys and girls swim coach for 10 years at Park High School. During that time, he was recognized as Racine All County Coach of the Year five times. In 2006, Linstroth was selected RAMAC Administrator of the Year.

Kerkvliet will retire after 27 years with RUSD. Most recently, Kervliet served as Park High School Activities Director for eight years. He began his career in the District as a physical education teacher at Mitchell Elementary for three years and at the Mack Center for 12 years. He taught health at Park High School for four years as well. During his tenure, Kerkvliet also spent 19 years coaching girls basketball at Park High School with a career record of 303 wins and 126 defeats, seven conference championships, 12 regional championships, four state tournament appearances and a state championship in 1997. In addition, Kerkvliet coached JV softball for eight years.

16 comments:

  1. John Dickert should appoint more of his friends.

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  2. Racine's two newest millionaires will land safely with their golden Unified retirement parachute!

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  3. Assistant Director of Continuing Education and Activities Director...will these positions be filled or will they be phased out to help reduce the budget shortfall?

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  4. Please disregard the immaturity of the negative bloggers. We know you spent years of service to the students and up and beyond. Have a wonderful retirement and don't let the uneducated on these blogs destroy your day.

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  5. 6:39 - Apparently you do not know the distinguish the difference between City government and RUSD - IDIOT

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  6. Urban Pioneer5/06/2010 12:28 PM

    Good luck in your retirement. Now hopefully while you will enjoying the extremely generous Taxpayer funded pension. I hope you will ignore the WEAC Union recommendation of moving south so that Wisconsin and Racine won't be able overtax you as we have been doing for so many years.
    Hopefully you will stay here and realize the best way to help the citizens of Racine and Wisconsin now is to urge the reduction of all taxes. Perhaps your positions can be merged, blended or dissolved and save the taxpayers a huge financial commitment going forward.

    Perhaps volunteering your recommendations for phasing out or merging would be an EXTREMELY generous return on investment to those who have paid your salaries and now your Pensions going forward. I welcome your suggestions.

    Seriously good luck to you both, in your retirement..Racine has got to change our RUSD system we cannot afford it under it's current make-up. Business make adjustments to changing economics it's time for the Schools to "Right-size", too!

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  7. The pension they will receive is not funded by taxpayer dollars. Pulic employees pay a portion of the annual pension contributions and the school district pays some, which was negotiated with the teachers getting lower salaries for the pension benefit. Know your facts before posting misleading information.

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  8. What about all the other teachers who are retiring this year. Don't they deserve as much recognition for their dedicated service to the children in our community? Activity directors spend little time in direct contact with the children.

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  9. Wondering if the new PR person for RUSD is sending out this information? It does seem odd to only acknowledge a few RUSD people who are entering retirement. I believe there is a retirement dinner tonight.

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  10. Oh yes, we should praise everyone at RUSD. We have one of the highest dropout and failure rates in the state and the country, yet we have one of the most lucrative compensation plans for employeees. They even have their own private health clinic now! Kudos to all you underperformers!

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  11. Anon 4:14 - just how foolish are you with your misleading comment:

    "The pension they will receive is not funded by taxpayer dollars. Pulic employees pay a portion of the annual pension contributions and the school district pays some"

    Where do you think the school district gets their money to "pay some"????? Taxpayers you moron!! The money doesn't just magically appear in the RUSD slush fund. And its not "some" its "a lot" that we pay!!

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  12. Yes, it is taxpayer money, and teachers are also taxpayers so they are actually paying part of their own salaries. Your implication seems to be that teachers should teach for free or not be able to have a secure pension. Would you be willing to do that too? I am not Unified's spokesperson. I'm an educated member of the community who vaues an education. Most teachers are hardworking and dedicated. It is not necessarily the teachers who are responsible for the high dropout rate. Students and parents should take ownership for getting the good education this district does provide. Students not attending school, not doing homework and just plain not caring are more to blame for their own failure. Your negativity is an excellent example of that kind of attitude.

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  13. Anon 10:30

    Would I be willing to not have a secure pension? Funny you ask, because myself and probably 95% of the private sector fall into that category. I would hardly consider teachers in RUSD or any community hardworking and dedicated. All they do is complain and demand more. Paying $15 for insurance is a slap to the face of every hardworking person. How arrogant are you and your fellow teachers to pay so little and yet still cry for more?

    It is your job to teach students and inspire them to learn. Simply putting in a video is hardly "teaching" our students. If you are such great educators and call yourselves "professionals" then why do you need to hide behind a union? A real professional doesn't need a union, they let their performance speak for itself and dictate their pay.

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  14. Why are you assuming I'm a teacher. I am not. I am one of the 95% of the community who do not enjoy a secure pension. But my emplorer matches funds into my 401K. Your spitefulness and moronish babbling leads me to believe you unable to achieve the level of employment that begets perks. Perhaps you are one of the dropouts you refer to.

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  15. Some of you are obsessed with dropouts in the unified system - get a life. None of the private schools couls come close to helping these students. The top students in unified would far exceed the top students in any private school on a comparitive basis. Students from the public schools made America great!

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  16. What really gets me (and nothing against these two educators) is that all we hear about is sports. Absolutely no mention of how many students either of these two men helped academically during their careers, but we sure know their win/loss record for athletics. Where are the priorities in education?

    The article above says they have 61 years of combined work in RUSD and they couldn't even come up with one academic accomplishment for either? I find it alarming that 1/2 the paragraph is devoted to their athletic accomplishments. Where is the focus anymore? We hired both of these men to teach, not coash!

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