“I could have raised hell sooner, politically”

It’s been nearly a dozen years since Harold ‘Butch’ Winkler stepped into the pressure cooker that was the Cabarrus County school superintendent‘s job.

But he’s had staying power, when the national average tenure for a school superintendent is just two to six years.

When he arrived in April 1996, the system had 20 schools and just over 15,000 students. And it had to deal with a climate of mistrust in the community.

Today, it has 34 schools and 27,155 students, with school board members working with county commissioners to find the best way to fund school construction. Read more