The company hired to find the next Bibb County school superintendent is scheduled to present a dozen or more top applicants to the Bibb County school board Thursday.
The school system hired PROACT Search, based in Illinois, in May to find Bibb a new leader who can help turn around the school system’s image, gain community trust and boost student test scores.
Officials say more than 100 people applied for the job by the time the process closed at the end of August.
The narrowed-down list of hopefuls will be given to the school board behind closed doors Thursday.
“We have a very deep and broad pool of candidates from which we are certain the board of education will be pleased,” said PROACT Chief Executive Officer Gary Solomon. “These candidates represent a tremendous amount of diversity in experience, race and gender.”
Company officials would not discuss anything about the candidates, not even saying which states they’re from.
“There are applicants from across the United States and Canada from some of the largest school districts in the country, some medium-sized school districts and some small school districts,” Solomon said.
The superintendent search is costing the system about $50,000.
The school board planned to have a new superintendent hired by Sept. 1, then pushed the deadline to Sept. 15 to allow the community more time to give input to build a candidate profile.
Over the summer, 18 focus groups were held and more than 1,000 people filled out an online survey to rank the traits needed in the next leader, and that feedback was used to advertise for the job nationally.
Now it appears a new superintendent may not be hired until after October, school board President Gary Bechtel said.
The deadline for applicants originally was Aug. 13, but the school board agreed to extend the application period to Aug. 27 to allow for some last-minute applicants, he said.
“There were additional people out there interested, so we wanted to give them the requisite time to get their packages in,” Bechtel said. “It didn’t put us behind much.”
The profiles presented to the school board Thursday will include the candidate’s summary, résumé, responses to preinterview questions, data supporting their work, and information from a background check.
The school board will need to create a scoring process to rank candidates and create a timeline for interviewing the top picks, Bechtel said.
The board does not want to rush to meet any deadline, he added.
“There isn’t anyone on the board in a hurry to do this,” Bechtel said.
Many teachers are anxious to see who the system’s new leader will be, while some of them have been so busy with school work that they had almost forgotten about the search.
“We’ve been having so much to do, that has not been a top priority,” said Monica Williams-Harris, a Rutland High School math teacher.
In February, former Bibb Superintendent Sharon Patterson left with 17 months remaining on her contract amid allegations to the Georgia Professional Standards Commission that she had violated the code of ethics for educators.
The commission subsequently recommended to suspend her teaching license for two years. The case is on appeal.
The system’s acting superintendent, Sylvia McGee, also is appealing a commission recommendation to suspend her license for one year. She will stay on the job until a new superintendent is hired and has time to transition into the role.
McGee then plans to retire by the end of 2010, both she and Bechtel said.
To contact writer Julie Hubbard, call 744-4331.
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