Mentoring mentors and students at Paul R. Brown Leadership Academy

ELIZABETHTOWN – Each month, like clockwork, you will see the same out-of-town vehicle from Winston-Salem, North Carolina, parked for 48 hours at the Elizabethtown Bed and Breakfast – with two very special people in tow.

Chico and Bertha Caldwell are two educational professionals who have made it a quest to be servant-leaders to the staff and student body of Paul R. Brown Leadership Academy, (PRBLA) which is a military charter school in Elizabethtown.

“As you know, Paul R. Brown Leadership Academy opened its doors in 2011,” Chico Caldwell said. “It was named after a much-beloved principal of Bladen Central High School years ago. The building that they are in now closed down years ago. I think it was a youth group here in Elizabethtown along with some alumni from BCHS wanted to start a charter school that was no charge to attend.”

The idea came to fruition and throughout their early meetings, they decided to make it a military academy, associated with the military in Fayetteville. It was actually modeled after a military academy in Virginia, according to Caldwell.

“They did a good job of organizing and getting all the information into the State of North Carolina,” he said. “How we got involved, is that it is a public charter school and therefore it has to be run based on the North Carolina Department of Instruction who was doing the hiring. Now, the school couldn’t meet the academic standards for over 10 years and were rated an “F” school. As a result, the threat of closing hung over their heads.”

There was a federal grant approved that was specifically written to help low performing schools. A company called Drive High Education System were registered with this grant. When Paul R. Brown’s officials found out about it, they realized that there was a grant available to pay for outside support for the school.

“It was then that my wife and I were hired,” he said. “My background is in higher ed and all my 38 years I’ve been there. My forte is leadership and I just love working with leaders. I know that if you are going to be successful, you better start at the top.”

The Caldwells have been married for 52 years and their passion for their relationship goes right along with their passion for teaching, leading, mentoring and education.

“My background is that of a teacher,” Bertha Caldwell said. “In addition, I’ve been an assistant principal, a principal and also worked with the State department of education when I lived in Iowa. I was an assistant superintendent for a district in Georgia and a director for professional development.”

Together, the Caldwells possess the experience and the wisdom that has helped the leadership at Paul R. Brown Leadership Academy begin to climb from the bottom of the graded results to the middle range in the past few years, in route to aspirations of making it a top ranked academic military academy not only in North Carolina, but in the nation.

“I was very successful working in low performance schools,” she said. “In Winston-Salem I worked in an alternative school and so I also had experience in that area as well. I tried to build the culture of that school to where it was recognized in the state.”

Looking at their record, the Caldwells have a reputation as a team that knows how to pull the Phoenix from ashes and causes it to fly again. They do this on a one-on-one basis with students, leaders and the facilities they have worked in as a whole.

With small town roots, they have never forgotten where they came from and know that there is no excuse for a lack of excellence due to roots or small beginnings. Bertha was born and went to high school in Louisburg at both Louisburg and Riverside which was originally a private school established in 1893.

Chico was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi, which is incredible knowing that both he and the President of the Cape Fear Valley Bladen County Hospital, Spencer Cummings is also from that small little town. Someone said that it must be something in the water.

“Clarksdale is right outside of Memphis, Tennessee,” Cummings said. “We like to call it the Blues capital of the world because most blues musicians have come through there at some point in their life. You hear about the crossroads? That’s right there in Clarksville, Mississippi.”

“We grew up in the delta and my father was a chemistry professor, so we eventually moved to Holly Springs, Mississippi,” Caldwell said. “I went to St. Mary’s High School and went on to get his undergraduate degree from Miles Colleges in Birmingham, Alabama.”

Caldwell was an MP during the Vietnam War and was part of one of the largest military prisons in Germany. It was there that he gained his military background that enabled greater understanding and ability to mentor at PRBLA.

It was there that he was in charge of all physical fitness for prisoners that began every morning at 4 a.m. Discipline, duty, respect and honor. It was all preparing him for his time in Bladen County.

“I also went on to coach basketball for 17 years and always wanted to get into administration,” he said. “When I went to Iowa State, they accepted me right away and they also paid a stipend that was almost as much as I was making as a coach.”

While in Iowa, Bertha was working in the state school system while Chico worked on gaining his Ph.D.

“When you combine my background in coaching and how to build a team, both as a coach and athletic director, along with her ability to build a successful team in a secondary school, when you put those two together, I think we became a pretty powerful team.”

What this team brings to PRBLA is a combination of things, according to the Caldwells.

“We started with drive and they were all about culture,” he said. “It’s an all-science base, and when you can change the culture, you can change the game. So, the idea is, when you build a success culture, teaching and learning can be at its best. We are also very aware that it starts with the leadership.”

According to Caldwell, changing the culture was good until it reached a stalemate not being able to break through with the leadership.

“The academy then hired Dr. Jason Wray as the superintendent at PRBLA,” he said. “He had the vision. He bought in and began asking questions about determination and drive and Wray wanted to know exactly what I did when I came to his building. That question just pumped me up because I knew then that he wanted to know how I planned on changing the game.”

From that question, Caldwell started a one-on-one process with Wray explaining to him what they do in his building.

“What was amazing about him, was that he took that information and aligned it with the direction he wanted to take the school,” Caldwell said. “We still meet every first and third Tuesday of every month just to talk about alignment.”

Bertha spends most of her time in classrooms, evaluating and observing.

“I do more observations and having conversations than I do monitoring,” she said. “I go into the classrooms and observe and knowing that culture plays such an important part, I not only observe, but sometimes work with students and help them work with the teacher and help the teacher work with the students. After the class, we have conversations that focus on the goals that were set and reached during that particular teaching. We also talk about what they were proud of, what worked and what didn’t and the progression from the point of learning.”

In talking with the Caldwells, they not only know they have a part in the future of those who graduate from PRBLA, but treat each one as if they were their own children and have followed their progress long after they leave the halls of Elizabethtown.

They are helping to build a culture; they are changing the game and they are making a difference with the wisdom and experience they are imparting into young lives. They are sowing into the fields of the next generation and making sure that the fruit will be strong and healthy and sustainable.

Mark DeLap is a journalist, photographer and the editor and general manager of the Bladen Journal. To email him, send a message to: mdelap@bladenjournal.com