PINE GROVE — Pine Grove Area Superintendent Kendy Klahr Hinkel confirmed Wednesday she has signed a separation agreement with the district, and will no longer be serving as superintendent.
“It’s effective immediately. I signed it,” Hinkel said during a phone interview with The Republican-Herald.
When pressed for details on the arrangement and if there were provisions in the agreement in regard to her future employment, she said she couldn’t comment.
“It’s to remain confidential,” David Lukasewicz, school board president, said Wednesday, when questioned about how much the arrangement was going to cost the district.
During a Feb. 11 work session, the school board approved the agreement with Hinkel and it was signed Friday, he said. Hinkel is also able to use up her “banked time” until May 19, 2016, Lukasewicz said.
Her current contract was slated to expire in 2017. In October 2013, Hinkel was hired and received a unanimous vote from the board for a four-year contract at $115,000 annually. She had filled the position vacated by Brian Uplinger, who left to take a superintendent position with the Central Greene School District, Waynesburg.
Hinkel had been on bereavement leave since January 2016, following the death of her husband in 2015.
The board on Feb. 11 also appointed Terrence Maher, who had formerly served as Pine Grove’s superintendent, as acting superintendent at a stipend of $325 per day, Lukasewicz said.
The school board was slated to meet at 6:30 p.m. today in the Pine Grove Area Middle School library for its regular monthly board meeting.