I think this article in the Las Vegas Sun sums up some of the problems:

Churchill County High School Principal John Riley says he's retiring partly because the school was labeled as being "in need of improvement" for three straight years.

And now to the last line of the article:

Last week, the school board added 18 months to Riley's tenure in the district so he would be fully vested in retirement benefits because he is not yet 65.

Obviously, this school board has taken a page from our corpoate practice; when someone can't do the job, you reward them with a nice package or retirement. That money has to come from somewhere and he certainly didn't earn it. Maybe it was part of an incentive to get him to leave early, thereby releasing the school from its contract with him. All I know is that the more I consider the role of school boards, the more amazed I am at their ability to have little clue over the consequences of their decisions. Bottom line--school boards seem to be made up of some of the least competent and poorly educated people known to be making educational decisions.