CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools board members voted Tuesday night to move forward with an accelerated timeline to find a new superintendent of CMS.
The district plans to hire a search firm by the middle of February, have the search firm present candidates ready to interview by mid-March, and want a superintendent hired around April 24.
Tuesday's meeting comes as CMS searches for its first permanent superintendent since Earnest Winston was fired in April of 2021. Crystal Hill was named interim superintendent in December following Hugh Hattabaugh's resignation to care for his father.
District leaders said they expect the process to take about four months, with the Board of Education trying to determine if it wants to continue engaging with national and regional search committees.
The board said it's in a fight for a new superintendent with multiple other schools across the nation.
"When it comes to superintendents, this past year, post-pandemic, you've seen a lot of retirements, you've seen a lot of people turn over their superintendent," Summer Nunn, the CMS Superintendent Search Committee chair, said. "So there are quite a few more out there in the market for superintendents right now."
The first step is asking the public for proposals, also known as "RFP," which stands for request for proposal. Simply put, RFP is the formal way for a school district to inform search committees about its plan to hire a superintendent, allowing them to make their pitch to lead the search.
Finding the right company will shape the quality of the superintendent candidate.
"The end of April, early May is an accelerated ambitious timeline, but it also makes sure that we're doing the work and that the search firm we hire is doing the work too," Nunn said.
The request for finding a superintendent search firm opens in less than one week. You can find the full timeline for the search here.
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