A Tift County Board of Education member who formally resigned his post Tuesday night told the Tifton Gazette Friday that he has been given no guarantee he’ll be offered either of the two entry-level positions he’s applied for in the school system.

Erick Willis, citing professional reasons, turned in his letter of resignation from the board Tuesday, nine months before his term ended.

“I really enjoyed serving on the board,” Willis said. “Our board now is completely committed to student achievement. They have the big picture in mind, they really do.”

Willis, who is in the turf business, said he scaled back that operation “because of the recent decline in the housing market.” He considered several options.

“I want to go back to what I love to do and what I’m educated to do,” Willis said.

He also owns National Athlete, a recruiting system that links high school athletes and college coaches together to share information. Students pay the company a fee to use the service. Willis said Nike liked the idea of his business and “gave us an account to sell their products.” Nike is also one of the sponsors on the company’s Web site.

“I can’t sell products to the Tift County school system as a board member and I couldn’t sell to any other system in the state,” Willis said. “Nike wanted to help sponsor the Web site and I had to be cautious about who I sold to.

“If I’m teaching and coaching, I have to be cautious.”

Willis said several Georgia counties have expressed an interest in doing business with National Athlete.

Willis said he earned a bachelor’s of education degree from the University of Georgia and plans to begin work on his master’s in education degree at Valdosta State University this fall. He said he traveled to Macon two weeks ago and took the GACE test for re-certification of his teaching credentials.

Willis isn’t new to teaching or coaching. He said in the 1989-1990 school year, he coached basketball, football and track at G.O. Bailey and J. T. Reddick and boys and girls basketball and track and served as an assistant varsity coach at Tift County High School. Willis also assisted Rusty Smith with coaching middle school girls and boys basketball for eight years. He said he didn’t get paid for those duties.

Thursday night, Willis logged into the Teach Georgia Web site and applied for two positions. One, he said, is a health and physical education teacher position available at Sixth Street Academy and the other is a teacher and physical education teacher/assistant administrative position at Eighth Street Middle School.

Kevin Dobard, the school systems human resources director, told the Tifton Gazette Thursday that enrollment in ESMS’ home economics class had declined and overall enrollment at the school has increased, creating a need for an additional physical education teacher there.

“The only new positions that we would create would be those that would require FTE funding based on enrollment,” Dobard said. “Those will be at the elementary school level, and when principals ask for a new position we have to wait for the (enrollment) numbers to come in to see if it warrants the new position.”

Dobard also said that he is using the Teach Georgia system to assist him in screening applicants for positions in the school system.