UPDATED: Names of those on the community interview panels were released on Thursday, Feb. 23.
The choice for the next superintendent of the Salem-Keizer School District is expected to become public in the next two weeks as a months-long process winds down.
The Salem-Keizer School Board recently winnowed the list of applicants to three but has not identified them, holding to its decision last year to keep much of the process confidential.
The candidate who takes the job would start on July 1, taking over for the retiring Christy Perry.
“We had a great pool of impressive and highly qualified applicants,” according to an email from Ashley Carson Cottingham, school board chair.
The new superintendent will take over the second largest school district in Oregon with just over 40,000 students. The district traces its roots to 1855 – four years before Oregon became a state.
Perry became superintendent in 2014 and announced her retirement last July. In September, the school board hired search firm Human Capital Enterprises to help with recruitment and vetting.
The school board declared from the start that no names of candidates would be shared, but it did turn to the public for thoughts on what the community wanted in its next superintendent.
An online survey generated responses from 646 parents or guardians, 429 district employees, 63 other community members and 49 students.
That was supplemented by 20 community sessions involving 331 people, according to school district officials.
The three finalists faced interviews before three panels of people from the community who were sworn to secrecy. One session was conducted in Spanish. The panels involved 10 district employees, eight parents or guardians, seven other community representatives and seven students.
The board met in executive session, closed to the public, to question the three finalists on Saturday, Feb. 11.
“The board was pleased with the quality of the candidates and their demonstrated ability to lead” the district, Carson Cottingham said. “The board will post and hold a meeting in the near future to when it has information to report regarding the board’s first-choice candidate.”
COMMUNITY INTERVIEWERS
Those participating in interviews of finalists:
District employees: Mari Vasquez, Pedro Espinosa Gomez, Kathleen McElliott, Gweneth Bruey-Finck, Sheila Englert, Sylvia McDaniel, Rahel Owenya, Heather Rutkowski, Marc Morris, Sue Luft, Olga Cobb
Union representatives: Maraline Ellis, Edie Buchanan
Parents or guardians (one name withheld by district): Serena Sischo, Frieda Bikele, Jacques Jones, Oscar Porras, Elpido Lopez, Angelica Lagos, Mirna Cazarez
Community representatives: Gaelen McAllister (higher education), Corri Falardeau (business community), Salam Noor (business community), Brenda Tuomi (tribal representative), Patrice Altenhofen (nonprofit community), Yadira Juarez, Salem Keizer Coalition for Equity programs director
High school students (names withheld): One each from McKay, McNary, North Salem, Roberts, South Salem, Sprague, West Salem.
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Les Zaitz is editor and CEO of Salem Reporter. He co-founded the news organization in 2018. He has been a journalist in Oregon for nearly 50 years in both daily and community newspapers and digital news services. He is nationally recognized for his commitment to local journalism. He also is editor and publisher of the Malheur Enterprise in Vale, Oregon.
