12 weeks, $40,000 spent, can a new superintendent search for Fresno Unified succeed?

After spending 12 weeks and $40,000 on a search that focused on internal candidates, the Fresno Unified School Board announced a new search that will be broader and include external applicants.

At least one board member told The Fresno Bee that it will likely be a nationwide search, once the details are hammered out.

“The board is considering options for the superintendent search process and for purposes of transparency, the board will proceed with an external search for qualified candidates,” Susan Wittrup, the board president, said at the April 10 board meeting.

Details about the process and timeline will be provided at subsequent board meetings, she said.

The board has not made decisions for the next steps, Trustee Veva Islas told The Bee, and has yet to discuss the scope of the search. Islas said she assumes it would go nationwide.

Islas also said the board should hire another consulting firm. The previous headhunter, Leadership Associates, withdrew from the search on April 3 after the board canceled internal interviews at the last minute in response to public outcry.

Over the past two months, Leadership Associates hosted 24 listening sessions to gather community feedback. It summarized a report and a proposed job description to the board, but the full material hasn’t been made public, and Islas said the board hasn’t decided on the information it has already gathered.

“I do know we have heard repeatedly that the community wants an opportunity to meet the potential candidates and hear from them directly, so I would envision some type of forum where that could happen,” she said.

Though the clock is ticking, Islas said she still hopes a new superintendent can be hired before the end of July. Superintendent Bob Nelson announced his departure in late January and his last day would be July 31. Deputy Superintendent Misty Her became interim superintendent if the position remains vacant beyond Nelson’s last day.

Nelson, chief of staff when the district fired its previous Superintendent Michael Hanson in January 2017, was appointed acting superintendent and interim superintendent a few weeks later, while the board conducted a nationwide search and held public meetings to seek community input with the help of the same headhunter, Leadership Associates.

In September 2017, Nelson beat 24 candidates and was unanimously approved to take the position permanently.

That was the first time since 1988 that Fresno Unified hired one of its own employees to become superintendent.

Internal or external?

Hiring a superintendent might be tougher nowadays, said David Cash, a superintendent headhunter from another consulting firm Education Leadership Services. Cash has 15 years of superintendent experience, including serving for two years at Clovis Unified School District.

“Not a lot of people applying to be superintendents these days, it’s highly political in nature,” said Cash. “It used to be a very different job, there’s not a lot of people are interested in the job as much as they used to be 10 or 15 years ago.”

Because of this, it was common for the district to consider internal candidates first, or solely, Cash said.

“If they have qualified candidates inside, it’s often the best route to go, particularly if they are happy with the direction the district is going,” Cash added. “Trouble in the boardroom at the superintendent’s office has a direct result in student achievement, so if they got good internal candidates, it’s probably the best thing they can do to avoid wasting the time of external candidates.”

Last year, the nearby Sanger Unified School District spent three months recruiting for a superintendent with the help of Leadership Associates, and its board decided to limit the candidates to district employees, Sanger Unified Trustee Va Her told The Bee. Sanger Unified has over 13,000 students enrolled in the school year 2022-23.

There are more than two dozen school districts across California currently seeking superintendents or assistant superintendents with publicly-available job postings, including big districts such as San Francisco Unified and Orange Unified. The nearby Merced City School District, which serves over 12,000 students through 14 elementary schools, 4 middle schools, and preschool program, has been trying to fill the vacancy for more than a year.

Wittrup said at Wednesday’s board meeting that she wants to take the opportunity for the community and the board to pick the very best qualified superintendent.

“This is the most important work that we do, we cannot allow fragmented competing interest to continue to ply bumper cars,” she said. “We have to join together, ground ourselves, and follow the process.”

Trustee Keshia Thomas, who has been in support of prioritizing internal candidates, was absent from the board meeting. When contacted by The Bee, she said she wasn’t feeling well on Wednesday and sent a brief statement regarding her stand in the search.

“I still stand by the employees of Fresno Unified as I believe they deserve to be at the forefront of this search. I appreciate their hard work and dedication, in the end, they will shine,” the message read.