Last member of Huff Administration team, Jennifer Doshier, resigns

The last remaining person of the group C. J. Huff brought into upper administration in the Joplin R-8 School District no longer works in the district, according to an update posted on her Facebook page Friday.

Jennifer Doshier, who had been serving as executive director of curriculum, assessment, and instruction,  told her Facebook followers, "Today, I said goodbye to a place and people who have been a part of my life for the past 19 years....Joplin Schools.

"I have accepted another position and am excited about my new journey in education which begins this Monday, April 24th."

Only two other people who served on the Huff upper administrative team remain in the district. One of those, CFO Paul Barr, was serving in that position before Huff arrived in 2008. The other, former Executive Director of Secondary Education Jason Cravens, now serves as principal at East Middle School.

In the past three years, Huff and other members of his administrative team, including Assistant Superintendent Angie Besendorfer, buildings project manager Mike Johnson, curriculum, assessment and instruction director Sarah Stevens, chief operating officer and human resources director Tina Smith, executive director of student services Mark Barlass, communications director Kelli Price, director of early childhood education Amanda Boyer, and director of special services Lisa Orem, departed, with some resigning to take other jobs, some "retiring" and others being pushed out the door.

Doshier's departure comes as no surprise. When a list of administrators hired for the 2017-2018 school year was released recently, Doshier's name was not included. Since Doshier has 19 years in the district, including enough as a classroom teacher to qualify for tenure, the district was required to offer her a teaching position. That would have been a pay cut of approximately $60,000 a year for Doshier, who was making $100,580 a year as recently as the 2015-2016 school year.

Before being promoted to upper administration, Doshier served as principal at McKinley Elementary, where her primary notoriety came from what became called the "McKinley Massacre" when a group of younger teachers and a veteran teacher shared serious problems in Doshier's building with Besendorfer. The younger teachers did not have their contracts renewed while the veteran teacher, who had tenure, was transferred to another position.

After that shaky year as principal, Huff and Besendorfer rewarded Doshier by promoting her to upper administration and replaced her at McKinley with Terri Hart, who was not even certified as a principal and who did not receive her certification until she had already been at the job for a semester.

Doshier became executive director of elementary education, advocating for costly consultants and admitting at an R-8 Board of Education meeting that she had no idea if the computers that the district was buying for its students were actually helping them with their education.