Crowd Provides Criteria for Superintendent Search

Based on the feedback generated from a public forum Monday night regarding its search for a new superintendent, if  placed a personal ad for the job, it might read something like this:

“Blue-ribbon school district seeks superintendent who is approachable, passionate, has experience working with children, possesses good business sense, is open to technology but not slavishly devoted to it, and has experience leading through periods of change.”

That’s just a sampling of what Bill Librera and Judith Ferguson—representatives from West Hudson Associates, the firm to aid in the search—heard from the mixed crowd of parents, teachers and parents/teachers at .

One member of the audience, a teacher, told the pair it was important the next superintendent possess a teaching background.

“If you’re going to be at the head (of a school district) … I believe that you have to have been in the system to understand it, dealing with kids and dealing with adults who deal with kids,” the teacher said.

Another said they want a superintendent who is “actively engaged in learning.”

Amy Penwell, a parent with two children in the district, wants the next superintendent to be someone who “understands how public education functions in a community … (who possesses) on a very fundamental level, a commitment to the ideals of public education and the role that it plays (in society).”

“It might not be possible (to find that person),” she added.

“I think it is possible,” said Librera, president of West Hudson, who explained that on average 80 percent of a town’s population do not have school-age children and the ideal candidate is someone who recognizes reaching that segment is just as important as reaching the parents who do have kids in school.

“Thinking how we’re going to engage the community without engaging that 80 percent is a terrible mistake,” he said. “There is an advocacy to that. There is an outreach to that.”

In the midst of discussing the traits the ideal candidate would possess, one teacher in the audience offered up high praise for the current superintendent John Bach, who is leaving at the end of the 2012 school year due to the governor’s cap on superintendent salaries.

“This is John Bach. He is that natural leader,” she said. “If you want to know literally the criteria, it’s him.”

Ferguson also polled the crowd’s opinions on the district’s positives (a community that cares about education, a talented pool of educators, etc.) and its challenges (budgetary constraints, a bad experience with a previous superintendent, etc.).

Prompted by a comment from an audience member, Librera also discussed the importance of the district having a vision for the future, of crafting a plan centered around what its students need to succeed after high school.

“It’s a conversation that’s important to have because it gives you a unified focus,” he said. “You have to watch to not have (the vision) be so narrowly defined as to exclude anyone, but you do have to think, ‘What is the answer to this basic question? What do we think students need to be able to do when they leave us?’”

Using the feedback from the forum, as well as results from about 400 surveys, Librera said over the next few weeks West Hudson will craft a profile of what the district is looking for, which once it’s proofed and approved by the school board, will be posted online.

West Hudson will spend the first couple weeks of January interviewing candidates who respond to that profile, Librera said, and in the latter half of the month and early February the school board will interview candidates. By late February/early March, the board should have narrowed its candidates down to a very select few, he said.