Newark superintendent interviews set

Newark school students, staff, parents and community members who want to participate in the interview process for the position of Newark school superintendent with Interim Superintendent Henry Hann will be able to do so in September.

Because of their own busy summer schedules and the belief that many who would like to participate in the interview process might not be able to in late July or August because of vacation schedules, Board of Education members decided to postpone the interviews until September.

Hann, who's been interim superintendent since February 5, when Robert Christmann left the district after 17 years as superintendent to become superintendent of the Grand Island Central School District, was the only candidate to apply from within the Newark school district. A Lyons native, Hann was appointed assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction in 1992.

Board members decided not to initially seek applicants from outside the district after a list of desirable superintendent qualities and qualifications was developed by Board members based on input in January from committees of students, staff, parents and community members.

'If we believe we have a person in our midst who fits the criteria we are looking for in a superintendent, we hoped we could look at him first,' Board President Roberta Colacino said. 'This Board certainly is not opposed to hiring administrators from outside the district. In January, we hired Greg Kern, the former director of financial services of the Medina School District, to become our new assistant superintendent for business to replace Bob Fogel.'

Dr. Bill Silky, a professor of education at SUNY Oswego, who has been involved for 18 years in helping school districts in the region find superintendents, and who was retained at the beginning of the year to provide some assistance to the Newark School Board in its process of finding a replacement for Christmann, met with groups of students, teachers, parents and various community members January 31 to help develop a profile of what characteristics they would like to see in a new school superintendent.

He then met with the Board of Education to receive its input for the profile and shared information gleaned from the other meetings. Silky who then developed the profile, is being retained again to train the so-called stakeholder groups.

While Dr. Silky does full superintendent searches for school districts at a cost often in excess of $20,000, our Board felt it prudent to engage him to train lay people in question development and interviewing techniques for $1500 - a fraction of that cost, Colacino said.

Anyone who is interested in participating in the interviews should call the district office at 332.3200. Information on the times of each meetings will be announced soon so that individuals who want to participant will have ample time to plan to attend.

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