Steve King, the former Cottonwood-Oak Creek School District superintendent, started his new job as Yavapai County school superintendent at the start of the year.
“I’m grateful to be in the position I am,” King said. “I’m very excited. It’s a daunting task, and we got a lot of work to do, and I think that we can do a lot of good work together. But I’m going to need everybody’s help, and I’m going to be reaching out and asking for a lot of help. I hope that they’re open to that.”
King succeeded the county’s longest-serving elected official, Tim Carter, who was reelected to the post in every election since Carter’s appointment in 2005. Carter had endorsed King in the Republican primary, in which King defeated Prescott Unified School District Governing Board member Kara Woods.
With no Democrats running for the office, King was the defacto winner of the Nov. 5 general election and was sworn in on Dec. 16 along with other county officials.
“I was pleased to actively support [King’s] candidacy, as I have the greatest respect, admiration and trust in him, as a school leader and advocate who believes in providing quality service and leadership and doing what is right for kids,” Carter wrote in a statement. “He has an experienced and awesome staff that will support him as they have me. He plans to maintain the motto ‘Listen, innovate, serve.’”
King said that continuing Carter’s work running the Yavapai County Education Service Agency, learning how the county’s bureaucracy works and learning the needs of his constituents would be his three priorities for his first year.
“It’s going to be mostly a learning year,” King said.
One less responsibility for King’s office will be the Yavapai County Broadband Initiative that seeks to bring broadband internet access to underserved homes and businesses in the unincorporated areas.
“That project is not going to go through [YCESA] any longer. That’s going to be handled by Corey Christians with the Yavapai County Library Network, so I’ll have very little to do with that,” King said.
King also said he would be looking for ways to expand teacher training programs to get more highly qualified teachers in front of students.
“We have to grow our cadre of [teachers]. I think that’s a huge challenge in the coming years. It has been, it’s going to continue to be,” King said.
A Sept. 26 press release from the Arizona School Board Personnel Administrators Association stated that 25% of teaching positions are vacant across the state, while 52% are filled by teachers who do not meet Arizona’s certification requirements.
“Sixty-nine percent of current educators said that they have considered leaving in the last year,” the 2023 Educator Working Conditions Report commissioned by the state of Arizona stated. “Among those educators, slightly more than half [54%] said that they are at least somewhat likely to leave within the next one to two years.”
“If we can get more highly qualified teachers into classrooms to replace those ones that are retiring or moving out, that’s going to be a big role for [YCESA],” King said. “Specifically what that looks like. I have no specific plans right now. My most specific plan right now is just learning how everything works and to continue on what is already put in place. [Over] the last three months, I’ve gone around almost every district, 25 to 26 districts. I’m hearing a lot of the same kinds of challenges. Number one is finding those highly qualified teachers.”
King said other goals would be meeting the increasing needs of special needs students and technology.
“It was not anywhere in my campaign or on my radar, even as a superintendent, is the coming of artificial intelligence and what that means to educators,” King said.
Another challenge facing school districts is a shortage of school bus drivers. The Sedona-Oak Creek School District recently adding about 30 minutes onto bus rides to compensate for operating with 50% fewer drivers. The COCSD also announced on Dec. 31 that several stops have been removed and the district had created community stops because of a driver shortage.
“This role doesn’t have any direct supervisory role over those districts,” King said.
The YCSEA announced on Monday, Jan. 6, that it launched a new website at yavapaicoesa.gov and that the previous URL would no longer be accessible by the middle of the yea