MARIETTA - Less than two weeks into the new school year, Cobb Deputy Superintendent Dr. Steven Constantino will be moonlighting in Wichita Falls, Texas, in a speaking engagement for Family Friendly Schools, a company he founded in 1999. He is scheduled to be in Wichita Falls on Aug. 18 to deliver a keynote speech to teachers and staff in the north Texas district as they prepare for a new school year. Cobb's school year starts Aug. 5.

The Wichita Falls Independent School District is paying Family Friendly Schools $5,500 for Constantino's speech, plus about $1,200 for his expenses, a spokeswoman for that district said.

Constantino will be taking a vacation day from Cobb to make the trip, which is appropriate, Superintendent Fred Sanderson said. The district does not require employees to notify their bosses of their moonlighting jobs, he said.

"Any employee can take a vacation day, and what they do on a vacation is their business," Sanderson said. "If he's doing a speaking engagement and he takes a vacation day, he does the courtesy of telling me, but he doesn't have to."

When asked how many other central office employees moonlight on what would otherwise be workdays for them in Cobb, Sanderson did not answer.

"One of the things in school systems and a lot of organizations, is if you have somebody with national credentials and they get asked to speak, that's a feather in the cap for a lot of school systems," Sanderson said. "If they earn pay, they have to take a vacation day. Anytime there's any compensation involved, you either forfeit the money or you take a personal day. I can't tell somebody what to do on vacation. It's a very standard procedure."

For the 2010-11 school year, nearly all Cobb district employees - including teachers, staff and central office administrators - will see their pay reduced by five furlough days.

For Constantino, his annual salary of $132,300 will be reduced to $129,544 because of the furlough days, or about $550 per day. Still, his total compensation this year, which includes a $6,000 car allowance and benefits, totals more than $182,600.

Constantino said after reviewing his calendar for the last 12 months that he had four other such outside speaking engagements, though he would not say when or where those were.

He and his wife, Peggie Constantino, moved to Cobb in 2004, when Peggie was hired by the school district as an assistant principal at McEachern High School. Peggie Constantino, who is now the district's director of special education, told the Journal in a 2007 interview that she and Steven chose Cobb in part because he needed to be near Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport.

The Cobb school board hired Steven Constantino in July 2008 as an associate superintendent. In May, the board secretly promoted him to deputy superintendent, reorganizing the superintendent's cabinet, but making no public mention of the change in Constantino's title or duties.

He founded Family Friendly Schools, a for-profit corporation, in 1999, according to the organization's website, and he previously told the Journal that he sold the intellectual property rights of the company in 2008. The Virginia-based company has two full-time employees.

Racheal Lepchitz, the parent involvement coordinator for the Wichita Falls school district, said she and her boss specifically requested that Constantino speak to their employees, in part because they are fans of his book. Wichita Falls has about 14,000 students in its 28 schools. Wichita Falls is about 120 miles northwest of Dallas-Fort Worth, and the school district includes Sheppard Air Force Base.

Cobb's conflicts of interest policy leaves it up to the employee to notify his or her boss about a potential conflict, rather than a system where the district decides what outside work employees can or cannot perform.

"While the Cobb County School District recognizes the right of employees to engage in private activities outside their employment with the school district, business dealings that create a conflict with the interests of the Cobb County School District are not acceptable. Employees should disclose any potential conflicts of interest, including those where the employee's influence could result in personal gain for the employee or an immediate family member," the policy states.

In Fulton County Schools, professional and classified employees "must have prior approval of their immediate supervisor before accepting consulting positions. Personal or vacation leave shall be used in situations where personnel are serving as paid consultants," according to that district's employee handbook.

Marietta City Schools and Cherokee County schools also do not restrict employees from taking time off to do outside work, so long as it doesn't conflict with the interests of the district. Like Cobb, they only require the employee to get prior permission to take the day off - but they do not have to tell the district what they will be doing.

Kurt Schulzke, associate professor of accounting and business law at Kennesaw State University, said moonlighting policies vary widely across corporate America.

"It all depends on the contract and the employee code of conduct or the employee handbook. Every company has its own policy," Schulzke said. "In a situation like the CCSD, there really isn't any good reason why the school system should feel like they ought to be told when someone is going to be giving a speech somewhere - if it isn't on the clock. It keeps these people fresh and allows the school district to keep people who are talented people who the district can't pay what they're worth. That said, there are a lot of people in public school administration who for whatever reason feel like they need to control everything."