Photos by Joseph A. Garcia / Star staff Betty Roark, left, a former PTA president, thanks Charles Weis for his work as Ventura County superintendent of schools during a farewell reception for Weis last week.

Charles Weis, departing Ventura County superintendent of schools, hugs his daughter K.D. at a farewell reception last week.

Charles Weis was destined to be a firefighter.

His father and grandfather were firefighters, and when Weis turned 21, he took the tests and got a job offer.

But the college senior chose a bachelor's degree at UCLA instead. It was "a big disappointment" for his family, he said, but a move that eventually led him to become Ventura County schools superintendent — a position he has held for the past 15 years.

Weis, 58, will step down Monday to take a job as Santa Clara County superintendent.

"He will be greatly missed," said Ventura schools Superintendent Trudy Tuttle Arriaga. "He is a leader of leaders."

Weis, who went on to receive a master's and a doctorate degree, was first appointed as county superintendent in 1993. He was elected the following year and now is serving his fourth four-year term.

"For me, the most important thing in life is to have the respect of the people you live with and work with," Weis said in an interview last week. And according to local education officials, he has earned that during his tenure here.

During that time, the Ventura County Office of Education has changed dramatically, going from 350 employees and an annual budget of $28 million to 690 employees and a $160 million budget.

Weis brought a focus on customer service to the county office, said Cary Dritz, an associate superintendent there and a longtime friend. Weis and the county staff expanded services offered to local school districts, including training programs for teachers, board members, principals and others, and technical assistance in areas from instruction to technology.

This past school year, about 13,000 local educators received professional development training from the county office.

"I have now worked in two states and six different districts," said Fillmore Assistant Superintendent Katherine Hadley, "and Ventura County has one of the best professional development (programs) I have ever seen."

Weis attributed many of his accomplishments to teamwork with others in the county office, and elsewhere. Being a superintendent is like being a turtle on a post, Weis told a crowd of 250 at a recent reception in his honor. "You know you didn't get there alone."

While lauded for his strong relationships locally and throughout the state, Weis has clashed with the Ventura County Board of Education over the years. After he took office, controversy heated up at times, including when trustees tried to stop the county office from accepting federal funds and when board members pushed for creationism to be taught in science class.

'Some rough times'

Weis said he spent a lot of time in those years redirecting the board, becoming an expert in California's education code and working to protect the separation in authority between the county board and elected county superintendent.

"We went through some rough times," said Trustee Marty Bates, who took office shortly after Weis and still sits on the board. "Dr. Weis didn't like the fact that he didn't control the board."

But Bates, the most veteran member of the current board, said he thinks he and Weis have come a long way over the past decade and developed a mutual respect.

"I really firmly believe that he has more knowledge about the education code and the management of education systems than anyone I have ever met," Bates said of Weis.

"He's an excellent, excellent administrator and a great manager. If he had run for state superintendent of schools, I would have supported him in a minute."

Trustees and Weis have continued to be at odds at times, recently over the process to find his successor and a lawsuit filed against the county board by the Fillmore Unified School District.

The county board plans to appoint his replacement, but is conducting a search and doesn't expect to hire someone until late summer — a schedule chosen even though Weis urged the board to make an appointment before his departure so the position would not be left vacant.

"The Ventura County Board of Education made it very easy for me to accept a job in Santa Clara County," Weis said.

He considers his greatest failure as a superintendent the fact that the county board did not become more supportive of local schools during his tenure. As an example, he cited the failure to resolve issues that led to the Fillmore Unified lawsuit.

Board President Chris Valenzano accused Weis of wrongly trying to prevent the board from taking several actions on many issues. He also called it disheartening that Weis is choosing to leave before his elected term runs out in 2010.

Despite the criticisms, however, Valenzano said, Weis "is genuinely concerned about the students," is innovative, well liked, and "it's going to be hard to replace him."

Local education officials said Weis made an impact statewide during the past 15 years, including through his work serving on a state universal preschool task force and on a committee helping to develop the state's academic accountability system.

Familiar face in schools

Locally, Weis visited all 187 schools in the county during his first year on the job. Even in his fourth term, he was on track to visit a quarter of the county's schools each year.

Weis said he's proud that court and community schools, which are run by the county office, received the highest accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges in 2007.

In the mid-1990s, the county's juvenile court schools were accused of failing to provide adequate services for students, assigning too few teachers to the toughest inmates and retaliating against complaining staff members. Weis' office faced two lawsuits from terminated staff members. One settled with the county office, and the other won his suit after a long legal battle.

It was five years after issues surfaced that the schools received WASC accreditation for the first time, which critics and supporters at the time called a sign of real change.

Weis said he had no desire to leave Ventura County when he ran for his most recent term as superintendent two years ago.

Larger county, larger salary

He was recruited for the Santa Clara job earlier this year. It's a larger county office, and it's an appointed position, a change Weis said he welcomes, describing it as more of a partnership between himself and the board. Santa Clara also will pay him an annual salary of about $285,000, compared to $177,000 that he received annually in Ventura County.

Weis said his wife, Patricia Walsh, an educational consultant, plans to travel back and forth between the two counties as she continues to work with Ventura Unified and Mesa Union schools. The couple plans to keep their Silver Strand Beach home. And Weis, who has two grown sons in Southern California and a 17-year-old daughter, said he plans to return to Ventura County when he retires.

Last week, about 250 local education officials, county office employees, family members and friends filled a Camarillo conference room to celebrate his career here. More than a dozen took turns on stage thanking him, including his son Charlie Weis, 19.

"I appreciate everything they taught me, every opportunity they have given me and every bit of friendship that they provide," Weis said later about his colleagues and friends in Ventura County. "I'll never forget, and I'll take that with me."