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Date: 8/20/2015
LONGMEADOW – The School Committee is looking to hire a search firm to aid its search for a new superintendent of schools.
Superintendent of Schools Marie Doyle recently announced her retirement following the 2015-2016 school year.
School Committee Chair Janet Robinson said the committee assembled a request for proposal (RFP), set to close on Aug. 20, in order to hire a search firm.
A three-member subcommittee consisting of School Committee Vice Chair Michael Clark and School Committee members Elizabeth Bone and Michelle Grodsky would review and evaluate the RFP responses, Robinson said.
“They are going to work to make a recommendation to the School Committee, which we are going to have a special meeting [about] on Aug. 31,” she added. “We’ll accept or reject that recommendation and after that we will be requesting that the company who we chose to award that bid make a presentation to the entire School Committee at our first meeting in September.”
During that meeting, the committee hopes to discuss how the search firm would envision the timeline for hiring a new superintendent as well as who should be involved with a search committee, she noted.
The School Committee hopes to hire a new superintendent by the beginning of next year, Robinson said. Three to five finalists would likely be interviewed in November prior to Thanksgiving.
“The search committee will take all of the applicants and narrow it down, choose who they want to interview and then come to the School Committee [with finalists],” she added
During the finalist interviews, the School Committee would also need to host site visits for the candidates, she noted.
“Our hope is to get all of that done before the Christmas break, including reference checks,” Robinson said.
She added that the committee’s plan is to offer a contract to a new superintendent during the first week of January, who would likely begin working as head of the district in August 2016.
Robinson said the committee would host public forums to gain input from the Longmeadow community. Dates for potential open forums include Sept. 29, as well as Oct. 1 and 7.
The public forums would allow the search firm to tailor its search based on community feedback, such as qualities that the Longmeadow community is looking for in a superintendent, she explained.
“Whether we use all three dates or whether we do two out of three, that would be in conjunction with the recommendations of the search firm that we hire, she added.
Robinson said the committee hasn’t discussed what they qualities they would look for in a new superintendent, but she hopes that conversation could take place once the search firm is hired.