Moles Shares Experiences as Executive Director of NRCSA

Jack Moles has officially retired as the executive director of the Nebraska Rural Community Schools Association (NRCSA). His last day was Thursday, August 27. Moles started his role at NRCSA in August 2018. “The plan was for me to work alongside Jon Habben through December of that year. He was going to retire then. Thus, we were going to have about a 5 month transition. During the fall, though, he had some issues which kept him from being able to do his job duties. I simply took over at that time,” Moles explained.
Moles indicated that he was very involved in NRCSA throughout his administrative career. “It is an organization I believe in and thought it would be a good opportunity for me to give back to the organization. I believe the two main jobs I had as the Executive Director were to serve our members in any way possible and to act as the organization’s Chief Lobbyist. I tried to grow what NRCSA offered.”
Overall, he enjoyed watching leadership grow in rural districts and ESUs. “I had the opportunity to watch people who I thought had good leadership qualities grow into outstanding leaders. The other thing I liked was watching administrators develop into great advocates for not only their district, but for rural education as well.”
During his tenure as executive director, Moles said the scholarship program was expanded. “We now provide 25 $2,000 scholarships annually, with 23 going to kids in NRCSA-member districts who are going into the field of education, and two of them going to kids going into the fine arts,” Moles said. NRCSA also started a scholarship program over the past couple of years that provides three $1,000 scholarships each semester to employees of member schools who are going into teaching in a “non-traditional” way, either in a para to teacher program or a transition to teaching program. “We need more great teachers in our rural schools, so this is a way NRCSA can help to reach that goal,” Moles stated.
“One of my main messages to legislators was that they needed to respect local control; that is the ability of local elected Board of Education members and the administrators whom they hire, to make decisions for their individual districts. Too many times Senators wanted to ‘fix’ something in schools or to insert their own beliefs about how schools should operate. When this happens, too many times the bill serves to take away from the authority of the Board of Education. It is the belief of NRCSA that the local Board knows what is best for its schools, students, and staff.
“I don’t know that I’ve really helped solve issues as much as I worked to provide resources for our members to make good decisions. I did help some districts with difficulties in hiring a Superintendent in that I was able to provide them with some options to think through,” Moles said.
Over the years, Moles has had the opportunity to present some NRCSA awards to people whose work he admires. “Two of those awards presentations that stand out to me recently were (1) Mary Teten, the recipient of the inaugural NRCSA Outstanding Support Staff Member and (2) a year ago the Outstanding Elementary Teacher Award to Kari (Ruenholl) Schroeder of Syracuse. I worked with Mary for 22 years and had Kari as a student at Nemaha Valley. I was also involved in recognizing Gary Anderson, Jane Antholz, Kathie Grotrian, and Sally Hutt with NRCSA awards in my Superintendent days, as well as many people for whom I had a lot of admiration from other districts and ESUs.
“I believe the biggest issue facing rural education today is recognizing the value of rural schools to their communities, but also to the State. Bigger is not necessarily better. The ability of rural districts to maintain their schools needs to be protected as a local decision,” Moles affirmed.
“By far my most rewarding experience with NRCSA has been the interactions with so many of our members. Being able to have great relationships not only with Superintendents, but also with Board of Education members, Principals and teachers from our members has been great.” Moles felt the most challenging aspect has been the few times when NRCSA has been the only voice for rural districts on a given issue. When a piece of legislation does not benefit both rural schools and large schools, some of the organizations cannot weigh in as they support both large and small districts. When that is the case, NRCSA becomes the only entity fighting for or against the bill, based on how it treats rural districts.
Moles explained that when he first started as Superintendent for JCC, most of Nebraska's rural schools, including JCC, still received State Aid. “This helped to take some of the load off of our local tax payers,” said Moles. As ag land valuations started to escalate, districts started losing State Aid until the point, such as with JCC, where they no longer received State Aid. A few years ago, Governor Pillen was able to push through some school funding legislation that did provide all districts with some State Aid, but it was not at the level needed by most of the rural districts.
NRCSA and Moles received the Friend of Education Award this July from the Nebraska Council of School Administrators, which is a group that Moles was very involved with during his administrative career and he continued to work very closely them during his time with NRCSA.
In his retirement, Moles plans to be involved with helping schools in Superintendent searches. “I am also very involved with the Peru State College Foundation and the Nebraska Academic Decathlon Foundation Board of Directors. I plan to follow the Cornhuskers and Peru State a lot.”
Jack and Shelly do plan to stay in Lincoln. “It is very convenient to get to Husker games from our home.”
The Moles' daughter, Ann, continues to work for the Securities Exchange Commission in Washington D.C. Her daughter Jane (their first grandchild) is now in 5th grade and plays softball and volleyball. Daughter Megan is in management for her company in Omaha. Son Daniel, works for the same company as Megan. He and his wife Shannon have the Moles' two other grandchildren: Vivian (4) and Anthony (2). Youngest son, Dr. Grant Moles, is a Math Professor at Union College in Schenechtady, NY.
“Shelley and I go to the Nebraska Volleyball games and she continues to do blanket tying at Grace Lutheran in Cook and a church here in Lincoln,” Moles said. “My biggest goal in retirement is to have more 'grandpa’ time.”
Moles will continue to attend as many Husker games as he can and try to get to some MLB games each year. He also intends to get back into his workout regimen. “I also plan to take on a little writing project, but need to get motivated in getting started,” he concluded.