The pool of potential choices to become superintendent of Evanston/Skokie School District 65 has been winnowed down to five, with “a couple of rounds” of interviews to start on Jan. 29.
Board President Sergio Hernandez Jr. gave a brief update at Monday night’s Board of Education meeting, on the search to replace Devon Horton, who left for a higher paying job in a larger district in Georgia last summer.
Assistant Superintendent Angel Turner has been Interim Superintendent since then.
It’s not known if she has applied for the permanent position.
Hernandez says there will be a second closed-door interview date on Feb. 7.
District 65 hired the Illinois Association of School Boards to find the new superintendent. IASB has an executive search department.
Hernandez said the application period closed on Jan. 8. He didn’t say how many candidates had applied, but as of last November, 27 people had expressed interest.
Horton was paid $262,500 per year.
Hernandez said the district will post updates as the process moves forward.
The hope, expressed when the search firm was hired, was to have the new superintendent selected by the end of February.
The new school leader will face a series of challenges, including opening the 5th Ward School, probably closing the Bessie Rhodes building and dealing with the fate of that program, potentially shutting other schools due to enrollment declines and cutting the budget.
Let’s hope that this selection is not one made behind closed doors, seeing how well the selection of Dr. Horton played out. Unfortunately, that seems to be the direction this is headed.
District 65- Teacher Contract
Another issue that will need to be addressed by District 65 this year is the renegotiation of the contract between the District and the teacher organization, District Educators’ Council (DEC) which ends this school year. I commented on this to the Board at the December 18, 2023 meeting. Here is part of what I said:
The Agreement between the Board of Education of District 65 and the District Educators’ Council (DEC) ends in 2024 and will be renegotiated this year. It is a 100 page document that is entirely devoted to what the District will do for the teachers in pay, benefits and work rules. There is no stated commitment in the contract on the part of the Teachers other than “to provide the best education possible for
students and youth of the District”. I advocate that any new agreement have a preamble that states the following:
“The Board of Education of District 65 and the District Educators’ Council are mutually committed to the education of children in the District. The Board of Education is committed to provide the necessary resources to meet this objective; The District Educators’ Council is committed to provide the professional skills to meet the objective. During the term of this agreement, a primary objective will be to increase measurably the educational achievement of minority children, without diminution of the achievement of non-minority children. In the absence of other public measurable criteria, the parties agree that a primary measurement of whether improved achievement has occurred will be the annual results of the District’s Illinois Statewide test results. A mutually agreed upon goal is an increase in the percentage of minority children “meeting or exceeding” state standards each year. Specifically, the goal will be an increase of 4 percent each year, beginning in 2024-25, of minority Third Graders “meeting or exceeding standards”.
(End of Proposed Preamble)
“I regard the District Educators’ Council as a professional, responsible organization whose members, individually and collectively, will make every good faith effort to achieve this objective. They deserve help in policies and materials that support the objective.”
An updated Board of Education and a new Superintendent will likely have to deal with this issue. In terms of the education of District children, Bessie Rhodes and a new Foster School are minor, by comparison. I urge Evanston Now to focus on the topic.
Jeremy Wilson