A retrospective Q&A With Superintendent Samantha Fuhrey

By Gabriel Stovall gstovall@covnews.com

In all, Samantha Fuhrey has spent 31 years as a teacher, principal, director of professional learning and superintendent at NCSS, which means she’s done, seen and heard a lot — more than most, in fact — within the confines of Newton County’s educational system. Earlier in the school year, we had a chance to chat with Fuhrey regarding her time and tenure both in and out of the Superintendent’s chair, and how she has seen the district grow over the years.

STOVALL: How would you describe your comprehensive experience here at NCSS, especially as superintendent?

FUHREY: “Let me just start by saying everything that’s been done in our school system has not been me. It’s been the work of the staff, the teachers, the principals, the school board, the parents. Push-pull. It’s been a collective effort, and I just get to be the lucky person to lead us through those efforts. You’re only as good as the people who are working with you, and I’ve been blessed to have a wonderful team that has really mastered doing a lot of great things without a lot of resources. I’ve just been lucky to be the leader of our school system, and to live here and have a daughter go here who started in our Pre-K program and graduated from Newton High School last school year and is now in college at West Georgia, enjoying the fruits of the labor of all the teachers and school administrators she had along the way. She had a positive experience here in the system, and we’re really grateful for that.”

STOVALL: What’s been one of the most difficult stretches during your tenure?

FUHREY: “I think, definitely the pandemic. You know, over the course of the 10 years as superintendent, we’ve been through some trials and some things happen, but we hadn’t seen anything like the setbacks that came because of the pandemic. Academically speaking, we had made such progress pre-pandemic, and during that time, we had to make some tough calls and determine the best courses of action. I think we, like so many other school systems across the nation, did what we believed was best, but that pandemic time did play out in students’ academic skills suffering. Again, that’s not unlike any school district in the country. But I can say that as we’re moving more into post-pandemic mode, I’m confident we’re doing the right work to help our kids gain some grounds in those areas.”

STOVALL: When you started, what did you want to make sure you did most for your students?

FUHREY: “We’ve just wanted to be committed to making sure our kids could work to choose what they wanted to do after high school. Whether that meant being the best in the workforce, to going into the military, to entering a technical school, to go on to college and get professional degrees. But more than that, to be happy, fulfilled kids and citizens in the community who are civically engaged and have the skillsets to have that kind of engagement and to position themselves to do whatever they wanted to do.”

STOVALL: When you began as superintendent, what were some of the first things you wanted to do?

FUHREY: “There were a host of things because we experienced a recession when I first came on board here. And unlike many school systems around us, the impact of the recession was long lasting. So you’re talking about 2008, 2009 when the recession came. The school system did not generate in terms of ad valorem taxes, the same amount as it did in 2008 until just two years ago (2020). Because of that, we’ve been paddling and paddling. Looking through that lens, when I started working, we were still patching holes, but as things improved, we needed to restore the calendar, restore the full 190 day work day, we had to buy textbooks, we had to do facilities. The long term vision for me was at the end of my time serving, to make it better than it was when I found it, because it wasn’t horrible. It was in pretty good shape. But given all the challenges, we wanted to make it better in every way, salary, achievement — not just test scores — but competitions, engaging with community. It’s so multifaceted.”

STOVALL: What’s one of the things you’ve done that you’re most proud during your time specifically as superintendent?

FUHREY: “I think one of those things is helping people to more widely acknowledge that we have poverty in our community. We’ve done community outreach to help our community become informed. That was a big reckoning that had to happen where people had to realize poverty isn’t an excuse. It’s a fact. Kids who are impacted by poverty, families who are impacted by poverty don’t have the same experiences as those who are not. Some are starting on the 50-yard line and some aren’t even on the field. When your school system is 72% impacted by poverty as measured by free and reduced lunch, that’s a challenge and a different way of looking at things. There’s a lot of poverty in Georgia period. But we’ve had some great opportunities to help people understand how that all works in the life of a student and a community. Money is not the answer to everything, but it does help. And, having a community that understands that and recognize that, it helps make all of our kids successful. The more people who are informed, the better we can be.”

STOVALL: As the county and community continues to grow, and even as you’re making a move away, what do you see as the next frontier of growth for NCSS?

FUHREY: “The end point will always be that students are well-rounded and prepared for the future. That’s our vision statement. The world around us is constantly changing. The requirements for being successful are different than they were 20 years ago, five years ago, and because of that, when you’re trying to achieve your vision you have to create experiences to make sure you get there, and those experiences lean heavily on what’s happening in our community, state, vision and world. Leaning hard in providing excellence in all we do and making sure our kids are the best at whatever they want to be. Technology is going to be a large part of that. It’s not going to go away. It’ll always be an integral part, and we’ve got to shift from the paper-pencil world to the electronic world. Making sure that there’s a long term plan in place to continue to replace and improve technology, I think, is so vital to where we’re headed and how we need to help our kids stay on the cutting edge.”