Longtime Raytown schools superintendent Allan Markley announces his retirement
After 13 years with the school district, Raytown Superintendent Allan Markley will retire next June, district officials announced.
Markley joined the district in the fall of 2008 as superintendent. He will retire June 30, 2022.
“We are grateful for the leadership and insight Dr. Markley has provided during his tenure in Raytown,” school board president Alonzo Burton said in a statement. “ … We now have the very important task of finding Dr. Markley’s successor. We ensure our stakeholders that we will work diligently to identify the best possible candidate for this job.”
In a letter to staff, Markley wrote, “It is incredibly hard to think that my time in the Raytown C-2 School District is nearing its end. I take so much pride in the memories and successes that have filled the last 13 years of my career.”
Markley spent his career in several Missouri school districts. He began in 1995 as a high school history teacher in Stockton, and later moved on to become principal at Sparta High School. In 2001, Markley took over as superintendent for the Sparta school district before serving as superintendent of the Logan-Rogersville district in 2005. He is currently an adjunct professor at Saint Louis University.
He received his bachelor’s in education from Southwest Missouri State University, and then a doctorate in educational leadership from St. Louis University in 2003.
Under his leadership in Raytown, officials touted in a news release that the district has increased student ACT scores, attendance and graduation rate. He led the district as it opened Three Trails Preschool, the Herndon Career Center Culinary Arts Institute, the Raytown Schools Wellness Center and the employee onsite Quality Care Clinic.
“When my wife Kathy and I moved to Raytown, we were a family of four, uncertain as to what the future had in store for us. This community not only welcomed us, but also accepted us. Raytown gave us the home we needed to grow,” Markley said in the release. “Now 13 years later, we have a senior and junior at Raytown High School and a fifth grader at Norfleet. Seth, Luke and Josh are learning to become outstanding citizens because of the staff, students, families and community members who make this a wonderful place to raise children.”
In the 2018 school year, Markley received the Missouri Association of School Administrators Robert L. Pearce Award, which is presented to an outstanding superintendent. In 2013, he was awarded the Missouri PTA Distinguished Service Award. And that same year, he was recognized as Administrator of the Year by the Missouri School Public Relations Association.
