The look for a brand new superintendent to guide the 7,000-scholar Bozeman School District narrowed Wednesday to three finalists after a fourth failed to expose.
Bozeman School Board trustees interviewed two candidates from larger out-of-kingdom college districts and one from a smaller Montana district. The 3 finalists are Sarah Brown, fifty-four, who these days resigned as human resources director of the forty-eight,000-student Manatee County School District in Florida; Bob Connors, 56, modern-day superintendent of the 842-student Glasgow School District in northeast Montana; and Christopher Hines, fifty-eight, deputy superintendent of the 63,000-student Conroe School District in Texas. Richard Schroeder, a former Illinois school administrator, now operating for an ebook writer, became a no-display. Debra Silk of the Montana School Boards Association, helping with the quest, said she didn’t know why. No one from within the Bozeman School District carried out, said Pat Strauss, human resources director.
“It’s a tough job,” he said.
The school board held an hour-long formal interview with every finalist at Bozeman High, asking a setlist of management patterns, teaching students, and building network trust. Before that, finalists met informally at a reception with about 30 teachers, mothers, fathers, community individuals, and journalists.
Sarah Brown, who earned her undergraduate degree at Montana State University, told the board she believes in “collaboration, communication, and transparency.” She stated she’d like to talk privately with trustees about a few troubles, but after conferring with Andy Willett, faculty board chair, and Silk, she alternatively spoke publicly.
Brown defended her four-12 month’s record in Manatee County colleges. The Bradenton Herald of Florida suggested Tuesday on an essential report using a college superintendents affiliation, which found that schools frequently regarded her human assets branch as an “impediment.”
Brown stated the report is “complete of misleading facts … not correct … (and) ill-intended.” She stated she had accelerated the teacher hiring fee in 3 years through 26%, improved trainer retention by 21%, gotten a faculty advantages device that was $nine million within the red lower back into surplus, and commenced activity fairs that effectively hired greater 500 teachers. Brown said the essential file had been sought using an administrator who was no longer her friend and investigated using the Florida Department of Education for seven counts of unethical conduct.
Though maximum of her experience has been in human resources and large districts, including the Los Angeles County Office of Education, Brown stated that she had labored carefully with instructors and directors on such troubles as turning around failing schools. They consider Bozeman “my community.” “Bozeman is on an exquisite direction right now, and my process would be to make certain we live that manner,” Brown stated. Bob Connors, a former University of Montana quarterback, becomes requested with a reporter’s aid approximately the most cancers he has been presenting for years. He said in 2002, he had pores and skin, most cancers that spread into his shoulder, inflicting him to lose using his left arm. Doctors had been “performed with me,” he said. What stored him was an experimental immunotherapy drug trial in Portland, Oregon.
“I had a 3% risk of survival,” Connors stated. Now, “I’m absolutely most cancers unfastened.”
In education 36 years, Christopher Hines has held for eight years one of the top jobs in a developing faculty district in the Houston location. He said he’s pleased with Glasgow colleges beginning to undertake the expert getting to know network (PLC) version that promotes teachers taking part in higher teaching methods and proud of passing an $18 million constructing bond. Bozeman may be a larger college district than Glasgow, he said, however “the situations are identical.” Hines said the Bozeman job is “beautiful” because the community seems forward questioning, and he’s looking for new demanding situations.
Hines, who described himself as pragmatic and smooth-spoken, stated he is “a large believer in monitoring information” along with taking a look at rankings to enhance pupil success. He said he’s now not acquainted with Montana school policies and legal guidelines, but “I’m a pretty short learner.” Asked about Bozeman’s transition to two high faculties, he stated the district had done an amazing process growing a “culture of excellence” for each college. The Bozeman School Board plans to preserve a special meeting on June 18 to vote on either choosing one of the 3 finalists or selecting a meantime superintendent for subsequent college 12 months and undertaking a brand new seek.
