Teachers, principals hit search; Superintendent plan in sights.

Byline: Jacqueline Reis

WORCESTER - The giant colander through which the city's superintendent candidates will be sifted is developing a few cracks in its bowl.

With the announcement this month that the city will likely need an interim superintendent for the first time in recent memory, the head of the teachers union and the leader of the city principals association have sent letters to the School Committee criticizing the relatively slow pace of the search process.

"With your process in place, we are ... looking at many months without an appointed superintendent. Instead, we could have been starting the new school year with a well-qualified leader," wrote union President Cheryl A. DelSignore.

"I know that I am speaking not only for myself, but for many of my colleagues in saying that we are extremely concerned with the lengthy timeline for the superintendent search and also the impact that an interim superintendent will have on the WPS system and the start of the 2008-2009 school year," wrote Albert G. Ganem Jr., principal of City View School and head of the principals association.

Mayor Konstantina B. Lukes, who as chairwoman of the School Committee and of the ad hoc superintendent search committee has been at the helm of the search, said people may be unduly worried about having an interim.

"We haven't had to do an interim for the last three superintendents, so because it's an experience we've never had to go through, I think the reaction is that it is much more traumatic than anyone intends to make it," she said. "I am not troubled by the concept, because we have the best interests of the system at heart."

The process for hiring an interim is still up in the air, and it's possible the district won't even need a fill-in superintendent, she said.

Ms. DelSignore and Mr. Ganem believe the process has been too slow. Brian A. O'Connell, a School Committee member who is on the ad hoc committee, said three factors have slowed things down: Mr. Caradonio giving his notice in January, which would lead the process to culminate in summer, a "difficult time logistically" to run a search; the mayor's decision to incorporate an ad hoc committee, which delayed things but gives "a level of expertise that would not have been there otherwise," Mr. O'Connell argued; and the fact that most search firms bidding for the contract did not include all the needed information the first time around, forcing a second round of bids.

In the end, the School Committee hired Illinois-based Hazard,Young, Attea & Associates on May 1 for about $24,000. In her letter to Ms. Lukes and the School Committee, Ms. DelSignore asked how the mayor could "justify spending money unnecessarily" and noted that the past three superintendents were chosen from within the system.

The last time the city did a superintendent search, in 1999 for the search that ultimately produced Mr. Caradonio, a candidate from within, it hired the New England School Development Council for $17,750 and received other bids of $25,000 and $56,250.

Hazard Young wasn't the low bid this time around, but they were less than $2,000 above the low bid, Ms. Lukes said. The committee chose them because "they had a greater range of school superintendents that they had filled geographically," she said.

The letter from Ms. DelSignore accuses Ms. Lukes of searching for an outsider "who will work against all the progress made in labor management and contract rights" for school employees. Ms. DelSignore accuses The Research Bureau President Roberta R. Schaefer of the same thing, although Ms. Schaefer is not a member of the search committee. (Neither, for that matter, is Ms. DelSignore or any Worcester public school teacher, although the committee includes an assistant principal, businessmen and college presidents.)

For her part, Ms. Lukes said she hasn't formed an opinion on whether the new superintendent would need to take labor contracts in a new direction, though earlier this year she was in favor of having an outside organization review the district's agreements.

She said the union is "welcome... to participate in all the public meetings."

The process will inch forward this month, with Hazard, Young interviewing community members today and tomorrow and holding a public forum at 7 p.m. today in the auditorium of South High Community School. The School Committee will discuss what was gathered from those events and from an online survey (at www.wpsweb.com/lpa.asp), put together a job description and start advertising in late June or early July, Ms. Lukes said.

On two related notes, School Committee members will be privy to the names of all applicants, not just finalists, as voted at a School Committee meeting earlier this month, and Ms. Lukes denied that she is looking for a particular type of superintendent, such as someone from the business world.

Contact Jacqueline Reis at [e-mail].

NAME: WORCESTER SCHOOL COMMITTEE

ART: TIMELINE

CUTLINE: What has happened, what's to come in superintendent search

PHOTOG: T&G Staff/TOM HUNT