The Concord school district was at a crossroads and knew it needed the right leader to move forward.
In the throes of both a global pandemic and the fallout from a grossly mishandled sexual assault case involving a teacher and students, the district required stability.
Faced with the decision to choose Kathleen Murphy as the next superintendent in 2020, school board members were divided. While Murphy brought with her a library of experience as a teacher, principal and superintendent, she also had some up and downs in her career.
Five years later, no one is questioning if she was the right choice.
“Today we have people who enjoy working together, that are unafraid to share struggles and challenges that are occurring. We have a board and a board-superintendent relationship that feels mutual and open,” school board member Barb Higgins said. “No one is afraid to take a risk or share something or make a decision on the job that some might disagree with.”
Murphy passed away Tuesday night at the age of 76. While she had been on medical leave, both her illness and her death were sudden.
“I love the work that I do, and I love it every single day,” Murphy said in February. “I don’t know what will transpire in [20]26 but I think, for me, the bottom line is that I have an opportunity to spend some more time here and doing the work that is so important.”
With her contract ending earlier this year, she had agreed to stay on for another. Murphy was the epitome of someone passionate about their job, and it wasn’t easy for her to request medical leave.
“Her expectation, her hope,” board President Pamela Walsh said Wednesday, “was that she would be back.”
Murphy got her start as an elementary school teacher in Derry in 1971. She later spent over a decade as a principal at schools across that area, six years as an assistant superintendent, five years as superintendent in Newmarket and 10 years as superintendent in Hampton. She also oversaw the state Department of Education’s Division of Instruction from 2008 to 2011.
In 2017, the New Hampshire School Administrators Association named her Superintendent of the Year.
The steadiness she brought to Concord schools came from Murphy’s combination of unflappability, diligence and care, colleagues said.
“It hurts me to think that we don’t get the chance to tell her thank you.”
Barb higgins, school board member
She showed up early and went home late. Parents called her directly with questions and concerns, and she called them back. She’d ring up school board members while on a Saturday morning walk because she wanted their input on something. She wasn’t afraid to stand up for her own proposals or those of her staff. She didn’t take sides.
Through personal relationships, Murphy helped rebuild communal trust in a district where, as Higgins put it, many new or returning staff didn’t know who to look to for leadership.
She was the leader the district needed.
“She could be a tough boss, but she was a fair person who wanted everyone to do well,” Walsh said. “She genuinely cared about every person.”
Michael Macri was president of the teachers union in Concord for much of Murphy’s time in the city. Staying on as a negotiator, he said, he was looking forward to sitting down at the table with Murphy this year.
“I think she went out of her way to listen to both sides of an argument,” he said. “She really respected the teachers in the district, and she also respected her administrators.”
Education Commissioner Caitlin Davis hailed Murphy for “her passionate pursuit of statewide educational improvement.”
“Kathleen Murphy was a dedicated and unwavering advocate for students across New Hampshire,” Davis said in a statement. “Her leadership and deep commitment to education left a lasting impact on every initiative she led.”
Superintendents, while at the helm of school districts, aren’t always known well by every parent, student or teacher. In her decades in the classroom at Broken Ground, Brenda Hastings didn’t grasp everything the role entails. As vice president of the school board, she saw Murphy’s ability to create a team atmosphere as “magical.”
“Just when you were thinking, ‘There’s no way – no way I’ll ever be able to figure all this out,’ she’d help you get where you need to be, and and she would do it in a way that made you feel like,’ yeah, this is doable,'” Hastings said. “I will miss her humor. I will miss her grace. I will miss her passion.”
With the announcement this winter that the superintendent would depart after this school year, the board put in motion a search process to find her replacement. In the meantime, Concord High School Principal Tim Herbert is serving as acting superintendent.
The news weighed heavily over staff on Wednesday, the first day of school.
Murphy lived in Chester with her husband, Tom, who passed away in February. They shared two children and four grandchildren, according to his obituary.
“My sadness for her,” Higgins said, “is that she’ll never get all the accolades that she so richly deserves. She’ll never get the big retirement party and the big celebrations, and she’ll never get to sit on a beach with her family or go skiing or play a round of golf and reminisce on all that she did in her life.”
“It hurts me to think that we don’t get the chance to tell her thank you.”