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After turning around Kaneohe Ranch as its CEO and president, Randy Moore started taking classes in 2001 at Chaminade University because he thought teaching would be “interesting.”

He could have simply retired, traveled and relaxed. Instead, he spent the next decade helping the Hawaii Department of Education make significant changes in operations and services.

Moore, 73, retired last week after serving the past six years as assistant superintendent for the Office of School Facilities and Support Services.

Before he was “vacuumed” into the administrative side of the system, he taught math for a few years at Central Middle School. Moore described his time in the classroom as the most rewarding and most difficult.

“Being a teacher is the hardest job I ever had,” he said.

In an interview last Thursday at his third-floor office in the Queen Liliuokalani Building, Moore talked about overcoming a natural human resistance to change.

“Most people are happy about change as long as it’s somebody else that has to do it,” he said. “But to really get change out of any organization, a lot of people have to change.”

Identifying that change needs to happen is the easy part, he said. Putting that into practice — changing habits person by person — is the hard part.

As an example, he described an “ah-ha” moment he had as a teacher after realizing the tests didn’t line up with what was being taught, contributing to poor scores.

“You can be the greatest Spanish teacher, and your kids can be outstanding, but if the exam comes and it’s in Mandarin, the students aren’t going to do well,” Moore said.

He and colleagues spent a week mapping the programs and aligning them with the standards. Moore considered this change easy, as a new teacher, but he said others who had been doing the same thing for years found it harder.

Moore also struggled to overcome the public’s negative perception of the department.

“Contrary to popular opinion that the Department of Education has a bloated bureacracy, we’re significantly under-resourced logistically,” he said.

For example, the school food service state staff is probably 50 percent understaffed, he said. If you look at a mainland school district by comparison, he said the Hawaii crew is probably carrying twice the load and has geographic challenges to boot.

While excited about his upcoming trip to Europe — his first vacation in seven years — Moore said still had loose ends to wrap up last week. One of these was a list of what school bus routes would be cut or consolidated due to budget cuts.

The Board of Education has grilled Moore over ways to make up multi-million-dollar shortfalls for student transportation services. He candidly answers their questions with thought and repose at one meeting after another, revising the department’s recommendations based on the board’s direction.

In a way, he’s been caught in the middle of a tug of war between the board and the contractors. The board wants budget cuts, the contractors say the escalating costs can’t be helped.

The department on Saturday finalized a list of 103 bus routes to cut, impacting almost 2,400 students.

Moore played a key role in the school bus issue in recent years, serving as the point person before the board and working with others behind the scenes to find solutions.

Civil Beat’s investigative series Taken for a Ride found that the cost of transporting students to and from school more than doubled in the last several years as competition among contractors dropped off. The tides may be turning now due to public pressure, a newly appointed school board, bidding competition returning and lawmakers who have restricted funding to force the district to rein in costs.

While the controversy over this issue may have dominated headlines off and on over the past year and the decision on what routes to cut was “painful,” Moore considers it to be just one of many problems he has worked to solve.

He was pulled into the administrative side in September 2004 to help the department implement Act 51, a broad state law aimed at revamping Hawaii’s ailing education system. The act transferred major accountabilities for school repair, new construction and other major tasks to the DOE.

“We were extremely fortunate to have Randy to assist the department with this transition,” Board Chair Don Horner told Civil Beat.

Horner, who has led the board over the past year, said Moore has made significant contributions to public education, including his leadership in support services — which is accountable for everything from food service to school repair.

“Under his leadership, the result was not only a major increase in service level improvements, reduced backlog of deferred maintenance and cost savings but equally important was a culture of ‘caring’ was established throughout his departments,” Horner said. “Our state and our students have been and will continue to be beneficiaries of a humble man with tremendous experience, talent and leadership.”

Education Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi agreed, noting Moore’s leadership implementing Act 51 to improve efficiency, effectiveness, accountability and transparency.

She said Moore always called it the way he saw it, with clarity and integrity.

“Through tough and uncertain economic times, Randy’s business acumen coupled with his common sense, his people skills and his positive attitude allowed us to always see the possibilities and to overcome obstacles,” Matayoshi said in an email.

“Randy is a transformational and strategic leader who has gained the respect of his students, fellow educators, colleagues, and the community,” she said. “He inspires others with his vision, integrity, fairness, and wonderful sense of humor. I have the deepest respect for Randy. He will be missed.”

When asked about high and low points over the course of his career, Moore said there were no real low points.

“The people are outstanding and it’s a great mission. Every day is good and it’s very interesting work,” he said, adding that if there’s a negative it’s that “everyone works too much.”

Raymond L’Heureux will pick up where Moore left off. The retired Marine’s first day on the job was Monday.

He’ll undoubtedly be tackling the school bus issue in his new role. Five state representatives and a handful of angry parents have already come out on what bus routes to cut.

Horner said L’Heureux has equally strong leadership and administrative skills, but has large shoes to fill.

“Ray brings extensive military and operational leadership experience to the department,” Matayoshi said. “We look forward to his contributions to our ongoing efforts to continually improve our public education system.”

Moore said getting up to speed will be tough, but L’Heureux will succeed if he relies on “common sense and a reasonably open mind.”