Thursday, September 27, 2007

Board of Education Plans to do its Homework on Next Kentucky Commissioner

This from Toni Konz at the Courier-Journal:
Board of Education chief impressed with commissioner candidates

In the second search for a state education commissioner this year, the chairman of the Board of Education said today that the number of applicants is “very encouraging.”

So far, approximately 40 people have applied, said Chairman Joe Brothers. ...

...Rather than appoint a separate screening committee, the full board will review the applications itself and narrow the pool to several semifinalists at its meeting Wednesday.

“We are going to hire someone to assist us with the criminal background and initial reference check,” Brothers said. “Once the applicants get through that stage, we will publicly identify about seven semifinalists.”

This is the second search conducted for a commissioner this year after Barbara Erwin...resigned three days before she was to start work....after a series of revelations about her background, including inaccurate information on her resume. Ray and Associates Inc., ...offered to conduct the second [search] at no cost, but...Board members criticized the firm, saying it should have vetted Erwin more closely.

Some board members also said that a lack of board leadership was partly to blame, and the former chairman, Keith Travis, was ousted last month.

Brothers, who replaced Travis, said he expects the semifinalists to be named by mid-October.

He said once their names are released, the board will spend “a lot of time” checking out each candidate’s background.“We will be doing all of the investigations and the footwork ourselves” for the second search, Brothers said. “I expect that we will be doing site visits, as well as checking with a number of people in each of the candidates’ communities and with places they have worked before.”

Once the board is done checking out the candidates, it will publicly identify between two and four finalists and interview them on Nov. 13, the same day the board would like to name the new commissioner....

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It seems the Board of Education treated the Erwin affair as a learning experience.

A better process should yield a better result.