Permanent Superintendent Search: Update #3
Dear Weston School Community,
At last night’s School Committee meeting, we accepted the Permanent Superintendent Search Subcommittee’s three superintendent candidate finalists. They were each unanimously supported by the 29 members of the screening and interview subcommittees. The two school committee members who oversaw the process did not participate in the formal assessments or voted in the actual selection process itself.
Acceptance of the recommended finalists marks the beginning of the public portion of our search.
Our three finalists are:
- Allison Borchers, Assistant Superintendent of Westwood Public Schools
- Dr. Dave Thomson, Superintendent of Norwood Public Schools
- Dr. Karen Zaleski, Interim Superintendent of Weston Public Schools.
Our search consultant, Glenn Koocher, the executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees, made it clear that we are in an enviable position having three very well-qualified candidates, each of whom would serve Weston with distinction. You can find out more about our three finalists and read their application packets on our website.
We are excited to learn about our finalists and introduce them to the Weston community over the coming weeks. Our collective community task has moved from finding qualified candidates, to identifying the candidate best suited to lead Weston into its promising next chapter.
There are a series of events that have been planned to allow our community to meet the candidates, and for our candidates to better know us.
- On Monday, November 27th, sessions will be held for our teachers and administrators to hear from and ask questions of the candidates. These sessions will be held in three parts during the morning portion of this professional development day. We will solicit feedback from attendees after each session.
- A Community Zoom Forum, similar to the one held during our Interim Superintendent Search in April, will be held on Wednesday, November 29th from 7:00-9:15pm. Each candidate will have 45 minutes to answer questions submitted by community members. You can submit questions using this link before November 21. As in the Spring, there will be a form for attendees to provide feedback on the candidates for School Committee consideration.
- The public portion will conclude with the final interviews lasting most of the day on Friday, December 1st. During these interviews the School Committee will engage in structured questioning of each candidate. These interviews, which will be held at Case House, are open to the public. They will also be livestreamed and recorded by Weston Media, similar to our regular meetings.
The process of getting to this final stage took a great deal of work from many members of our community. We would again like to thank the 22 individuals on the Application Screening Subcommittee and the 7 members of the Preliminary Interview Subcommittee. They each spent many hours reviewing and assessing applications, interviewing candidates, and thoughtfully deliberating in our meetings.
We would also like to thank all of the applicants. A diverse pool of 14 highly qualified candidates applied for the position. We will not release the names of applicants who did not make it to finalist status. We can say that our pool included:
- 6 individuals either current or former superintendents from four states
- 2 interim superintendents
- 3 assistant superintendents
- 9 holders of doctoral degrees
- 3 individuals currently working in the private sector.
Our search process will conclude on Monday, December 4th, with a special School Committee meeting where members will decide on our next Superintendent.
As we get closer to our public events to be held the week after Thanksgiving, we will be posting links and ways to participate on our website, school newsletters, and social media channels.
We look forward to learning more about our candidates and hearing your feedback in the coming weeks.
Sincerely,
Ken Newberg & Maija Cirulis-Gooch
Chair & Vice Chair of the Weston School Committee
