Press release of December 1, 2011

Volunteers needed to help with BH-BL superintendent search

Total of 43 residents & staff will help Board interview candidates

BURNT HILLS: At a meeting this week, members of the Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake Board of Education reviewed their plans to interview superintendent candidates in the coming months and also heard a search update from Capital Region BOCES superintendent Dr. Charles Dedrick.

Dedrick is facilitating the process of finding a new BH-BL superintendent to replace Jim Schultz, who is retiring next June.

Twenty-five people have expressed interest in the position to date, Dedrick told the Board. Advertising for the opening continues, and applications are due to him by the end of December.

Three rounds of interviews of the top candidates are planned, starting in January. The search timeline calls for Board of Education members to conduct the first round of interviews in late January, at which time they are expected to identify perhaps five to eight semi-finalists who will continue in the process.

Next, three "stakeholder" teams of community and staff representatives will interview the semi-finalists on February 6, 7 and 8. These teams will report their feedback to the Board of Education to help the Board select the finalists, who will then be interviewed again in round three by the Board.

Stakeholder teams' composition

Following a lengthy discussion, the school board agreed to use the same stakeholder interview team composition as was used during the district's last superintendent search in 2003-04.

Dedrick asked that names for the stakeholder teams be collected by BH-BL human resources director Amy Baluch by December 21.

In addition to a facilitator, each stakeholder team will include three or four BH-BL teachers, three or four non-staff PTA representatives, one or two non-staff community at large representatives, one or two administrators, one or two support staff, and one high school student. Also included across the three teams will be one exempt staff member and one support staff supervisor.

All stakeholder team members will be required to attend a training session in January and three days of interviews in February, at locations to be announced, as follows:

Persons who can attend all four of these days are needed to serve on the interview teams.

Staff members who wish to participate should contact their union president, who is responsible for submitting the names of union representatives to Baluch.

A total of 10 non-staff PTA members will be needed, and the names of these representatives will be submitted by PTA Council president Mary Carrier. Names of the three high school students will be coming from principal Maryellen Symer.

Five community at-large representatives are also needed. Any non-staff residents of the district who can attend on the above dates and are interested in participating should send a letter to human resources director Amy Baluch by December 21 describing their past and present involvement with the school district.

Ms. Baluch can be reached at abaluch@bhbl.org or the BH-BL District Office, 50 Cypress Drive, Glenville, NY 12302. She can also answer questions at 399-9141, ext. 5006.

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