Dr. Lynn Pulliam notified Canadian ISD board and staff members Monday of his resignation as superintendent, effective July 31.

Pulliam—a Vega High School graduate with a Bachelor of Science degree from Texas Tech University and a Master of Education from West Texas A&M University—first joined the CISD staff in 2002, when he was hired to take the helm from veteran Canadian Elementary School Principal Karen Minyen, who retired after a 28-year reign on that campus.

Pulliam’s wife, Lawana, was hired at the same time to serve as Title I teacher at BES.

At the time, Canadian ISD was experiencing a surge of end-of-school-year vacancies left by the resignation, retirement, or re-assignment of several key administrative staffers and teachers—including three principals and a basketball coach.

During his tenure as CES principal, Pulliam completed the Scholars of Practice doctoral program at Baylor University. At the end of the 2004-05 school year, he was hired by Amarillo ISD, where he served as principal of South Lawn Elementary for a year, at Crockett Middle School for two, and at Tascosa for eight. During that time, he completed his dissertation and earned his doctorate at Baylor.

Dr. Pulliam returned to Canadian in 2016 as high school principal, and three years later, was named the successor to then-Superintendent Kyle Lynch. Lawana Pulliam was hired as the district’s Director of Curriculum and Instructional Technology.

In a letter to the CISD family announcing his decision, Pulliam wrote, “The past 5 years in this role have been a blessing, both professionally and personally. The Pulliam family has been positively impacted through our relationships with the wonderful people of CISD and the Canadian community. 

“From the very start when we returned in 2016, Canadian was a good move for our family – Lawana and I learned and grew in our careers while the kids were exposed to an awesome group of teachers, sponsors, coaches, directors, counselors, principals, and mentors.  We have loved our school family, our church family, and just being a part of this great community.”

Pulliam’s decision to resign was driven, in part, by Lawana Pulliam’s appointment last year as Assistant Director of Innovative Solutions with Region 16 in Amarillo.

“I will miss working with you as well as our dedicated school board,” he told his staff, “but I have found that at the age of 55, I’m just not cut out to live on my own. For much of this school year, especially while Region 16 was under renovation, Lawana was able to work from home on her office days, but in the past couple of months, the renovations have been completed and just recently Lawana was promoted and now provides supervision and oversight to some of R16’s service teams, requiring her presence on site in Amarillo.”

“Her absence during the work week has been a difficult adjustment for me,” Dr. Pulliam said, “and, after 31 years, I figure it’s time I start adjusting my career to support hers.”

Pulliam assured the staff that he would continue to work hard this summer on ongoing projects, revenue projections, budget-building, and assisting the Board of Trustees in the transition process. 

“We work for an incredible Board,” he said, “and I am confident they will do an outstanding job identifying the next leader of this amazing school system.”