Ex-chief of schools’ new role criticized

Benjamin Grove

Tuesday, May 26, 1998 | 10 a.m.

A member of the Nevada State Board of Education says the former state schools chief has a conflict of interest in his job as a consultant paid to analyze academic standards.

State Board member Bill Hanlon said he was "more than a little irate" that former Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction Eugene Paslov had been hired by the Legislative Committee on Education.

"What irritates me greatly is that this is the person who established the educational policies that we are reeling from now," Hanlon said. "Why in the hell would we bring back someone like him? It seems like absolute folly."

Paslov, who served as state superintendent for 9 1/2 years until 1995, said there was no conflict of interest. He said the Legislative Committee on Education paid him $20,000 to analyze TerraNova test scores from the 1995-96 and 1996-97 school years, a task he said he was well qualified to do objectively.

Paslov said he and Hanlon have had a long-standing "antagonistic" relationship.

"Hanlon is trying to say something that isn't true," Paslov said. "Bill goes spinning off into the outer atmosphere sometimes."

Hanlon said Paslov as superintendent lowered standards in the state by recommending to the state board such changes as the elimination of certain math requirements. Hanlon also said Paslov endorsed a graduation examination that tested high school seniors on eighth-grade math and held a passing grade at 57.

"Of all the people in the United States, believe me, there has to be somebody better qualified than him," Hanlon said.

The Legislative Committee on Education is made up of eight lawmakers, who considered three consultants who submitted bids for the analysis work. The Legislative Council Bureau had recommended Paslov to the Legislative Committee on Education.

"We took the lowest of the bids and his happened to be the lowest," said Sen. Maurice Washington, a member of the Legislative Committee on Education. "I can understand there could be some conflict of interest."

Washington said the committee did not discuss a perceived conflict of interest before hiring Paslov. The committee did consider Paslov's wide experience in Nevada education, Washington said.

"You'd like to think that he is not part of the problem," Washington said.