Ashland superintendent likely to be voted in during Feb. 8 school board meeting
By Holly Dillemuth, Ashland.news
In the near future, Ashland schools will have selected the next superintendent of Ashland School District, who will start in the new role July 1.
Two candidates were interviewed for the post on Thursday. Two more interviews are set for Friday. It is the second round of interviews by the Community Interview Panel since Jan. 20.
The school board will discuss the merits of each candidate in an executive session held via Zoom on Sunday. The candidates’ names are confidential until the board meets to vote on the selection in a special public session the week of Feb. 12. The meeting will be held in person with an opportunity to view online.
Rebecca Dyson, school board chair, shared optimism via phone with Ashland.news following the first day of interviews on Thursday afternoon.
“We are super excited,” Dyson said. “We got four fabulous people.
“Our big problem … it isn’t who could do this job,” she added, “it’s hard to just say no to any of them.”
A community panel of 12 individuals, including an Ashland Middle School eighth grade student and an Ashland High School student, are interviewing finalists picked from a pool of 60 applicants.
Dyson emphasized how critical it is for the board to select the right individual for the post.
Declining enrollment in public schools across the state and the nation plays a factor in the need for the best leader to manage a school district.
“Curriculum changes, artificial intelligence … there’s so many new things happening in education right now that I think we are at this huge juncture where we’re really going to be seeing huge changes, not just in our district, but across the board in public education and how schools are run and how curriculum is handled so we definitely, we’re really looking for somebody whose very innovative, who is very visionary, and again, all four of these people definitely fit those criteria,” Dyson said.
“There will be definitely be some big changes coming in the district in the next few years,” she added, “and so we’re very excited to find a leader who can help guide us through that.”
Maintaining a high level of excellence despite lower enrollment numbers in coming years for the Ashland School District, as is projected, is key for an incoming superintendent, according to Dyson.
Ashland Superintendent Samuel Bogdanove announced in fall 2023 he will retire at the end of the school year in June.
For more information on the search for a new superintendent, go online to ashland.k12.or.us/o/school-board/page/superintendent-search.
Reach Ashland.news reporter Holly Dillemuth at hollyd@ashland.news.
Feb. 2: Number of applicants added and timeline updated to reflect changes since original publication.
