Bruce goes from Supt. to Prof.

La Conner Schools Superin-tendent Dr. Tim Bruce said his heart is not into leaving, but a once-in-a-really-long-time opportunity presented itself, and his head told him he’d better take it.

Bruce, who holds a Ph.D., will be a professor in the Woodring College of Education at Western Washington University after his contract with La Conner expires on June 30.

He’ll be working with graduate students developing school principals and superintendents. Bruce, who has been the superintendent in La Conner for 26 years, said, “This was something in my life plan for the future.”

But the job opened up a couple of years earlier than he’d anticipated. “A full-time position on tenure track at Western doesn’t come up very often,” he said. “It was now and maybe not later.”

The optics on the timing couldn’t be worse — Bruce announced his intention to resign on Feb. 22, weeks after La Conner’s replacement school levies failed for the first time in history. The schools had the only election taxpayers could use to protest an unfair tax situation that developed after the so-called Great Wolf Lodge decision by a federal court. Now a smaller pool of taxpayers are left to fund the schools, which have most of their enrollment and registered voters living on tribal land that is not taxable by the district.

Bruce said the levy failure and his resignation were not related; he was more than ready to stay and help the school board make tough decisions.

But he’d been mulling over the position at Western since November, and he wasn’t allowed to put off his decision any longer — the position would be filled and it could be many years before it became open again.

Nevertheless, leaving now is tough. “I feel like I always have one more thing to get done,” he said.

Still, he and his wife Gale plan to keep their home in La Conner, where they raised their family. And Bruce, 57, said that if La Conner folks come through Western seeking a Masters in Education, they’ll be in his program.

Meanwhile, multi-tasking La Conner Schools administrator Peg Seeling, who holds superintendent certification, will take the helm while a search is conducted for Bruce’s replacement, who is expected to be on board by September 2017.