BY MARY KATE MURPHY, SLI Reporter
With the Jan. 28 retirement of Moore County Schools Superintendent Bob Grimesey, Seven Lakes West resident Tim Locklair has taken over leadership for the 22-school district.
Locklair, a Seven Lakes West resident for several years, will spend at least half of this year as interim superintendent after more than five years as Grimesey’s right-hand man at the district’s central office. He was sworn in on Jan. 14 and spent a couple of weeks working on the transition with Grimesey.
Locklair became Moore County School’s first, and so far only, chief officer for academics and student support services in 2016. The newly created position developed from an administrative reshuffling in the first few years of Grimesey’s tenure that consolidated four jobs into two.
Next to the superintendency itself, it’s arguably the weightiest position at the district’s central office: overseeing curriculum, school improvement, technical education, technology and federally supported programs that include services for students with special needs.
So Locklair is no stranger to supervising a diversity of departments — with their own rules, regulations and inner workings — and ensuring they work well with Moore County Schools’ campuses.
“The thing you always say when you become a principal the first time, it’s kind of like becoming a parent: you’re never truly ready. You learn things when you get there. So I look at this as an opportunity, not a challenge,” said Locklair.
Before he came to Carthage, he worked as an area superintendent in Wake County, where he previously served as a middle and high school principal. But Locklair got his start in education as a teacher and assistant principal at Pinecrest, where he was once a student.
In some ways, Moore County Schools will be in a holding pattern during his time as interim superintendent. Matters like tackling the next generation of building projects — most prominently a replacement or renovation of Carthage Elementary — and overcoming the district’s perennial reliance on short-term federal funding to balance its budget may be looming in the near future but will be jobs for the next superintendent.
The Moore County Board of Education was unified late last year in its vote to appoint Locklair as interim superintendent until Aug. 1. So far they’ve been in similar agreement when it comes to how they’ll identify the district’s next long-term leader.
The board moved in December to hire the N.C. School Boards Association to lead the search, which will heavily involve the board in interviewing candidates and whittling down the field over the next six months.
In the meantime, Locklair’s job will be to keep the district on its course. Another administrator will step up to serve in Locklair’s current role in an interim capacity while he’s in the district’s top job.
“My focus is immediately on making sure we have a smooth transition, ensuring that our school district continues to move forward in a positive way and that we begin the budget development process as we go into the new year,” he said. “That’s the immediate focus — and part of the reason for having an interim superintendent that can come right in and be part of that transition.”
Locklair’s tenure as superintendent will cover most of the months-long process behind developing the district’s 2022-2023 budget. Working with Grimesey and Andrew Cox, Moore County Schools’ executive officer for budget and finance, on fiscal matters has been one of the most immediate priorities as he prepares to take on the superintendent’s role.
“I’m very appreciative that the school board trusted me to take on this role as interim superintendent and help support them through this transition. So I’m very honored by that and humbled by that,” said Locklair. “I’m 100 percent committed to Moore County and look forward to doing that work.”
The budget isn’t the only significant project that the school board will navigate with an interim superintendent in place, though.
In addition to formulating and recommending a budget — and presenting the budget as the school board eventually approves it to the county commissioners — the board is also due to revisit how it defines its educational mission and the broad goals it wants to achieve in the next few years.
The board last conducted a wholesale review of that strategic plan in 2018, generating new mission and vision statements. A set of minor updates was approved in 2020.
“It’s, I think, very timely for Moore County Schools for the board to have that conversation while the board is engaging with the public on what type of leader would embody that vision,” said Grimesey.
“The determination of mission, vision, core beliefs and strategic goals is not something that the superintendent dictates; it’s something that the superintendent facilitates and that’s precisely what I did the last time the board did this in a major way. So he’s just going to be in that role to facilitate that. He’s going to have his hands full with that. That alone would be a major contribution to the answer to the ultimate question of what next?”
While the timing of the transition will give Locklair the chance to help with significant work beyond managing Moore County Schools’ day-to-day operations, he’ll remain focused on short-term demands and staying on top of recurring processes so the next person the board hires can plan for the future.
“I look at it as an opportunity to serve, an opportunity to get to work with the board at a closer level,” he said, “and to collaborate and be focused on this transition, be focused on launching the budget, be focused on moving us through the next six months.”
Contact Mary Kate Murphy at (910) 693-2479 or mkmurphy@thepilot.com.
