Scour nation for a leader, expert says
Advises school supt. search
A national expert on urban school districts urged the unified school board to look nationally for a superintendent and move quickly before the field gets crowded.
He also said the board should expect to pay more than $100,000 or more. “This is not a cheap process by any stretch of the imagination, which is why you don’t want to do it very often,” said Mike Casserly, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools.
He advised the board to be leery of offers from corporations or philanthropists to cover the costs. “Even though you are spending public money... this is part of your responsibility.”
Casserly told the board it has “the opportunity to remake a school district from top to bottom. I’m jealous. Take advantage of the rare opportunity you have.”
He also advised the board to take advantage of its size, demanding that the search firm brings in top talent, including nontraditional school leaders.
“You mean we could ask them to get Colin Powell for us?” said board member Diane George.
“You can ask,” Casserly said.
Casserly was in Memphis to guide the board, making it clear his organization does not do superintendent searches and he was not being paid for his advice. He was equally firm the complexity of the unified district will require top talent. “You want somebody with good experience with large, complex organizations,” he said, adding that what it will take to run the district, conceivably one of the largest in the country, “is going to make a mortal’s head swim.”
The board’s charge is to determine what it wants the district to be and use those qualities to define what it is looking for in a superintendent.
“We find it hard to get enough people at meetings to come up with a consensus,” said board member Jeff Warren.
“If you throw up your hands and say we can’t agree, the ramifications are much more serious, and a superintendent search won’t solve that,” Casserly said.
The board has wrestled with how to choose a leader since its beginning last fall. In late spring, chairman Billy Orgel appointed a committee to frame what qualities the new leader should have. A second committee, charged with determining what the search should look like if the board chooses to pursue one, began meeting in late August.
“I have a hunch the committee is going to recommend that if you are going to select a new superintendent, it should be done by hiring a national search firm,” said board member Kevin Woods.
“We may very well have the right person now. Until we come together as a board and say, ‘Here is what we expect in the person leading us forward,’ we shouldn’t begin a search.”
Three urban districts are looking for leaders: Duval County in Florida, where Supt. Kriner Cash is one of three finalists, Omaha, and Des Moines, Iowa.
By January or February, the field will swell to 12-15 districts, said Casserly, who advised the board to create its vision of what it wants the district to be and to send out requests for proposals to search firms by the end of the calendar year.
The normal search takes six months, “but I’ve seen them go as quickly as three months,” Casserly said, assuring the board a new leader could be in place by the time the merger happens.