STATE ASSOCIATION UPDATES SEARCH FOR SUPERINTENDENT

The next Cape Girardeau School District superintendent should have strong fiscal management and curriculum development skills, a recent survey said.

Dr. Jacques Cowherd of the Missouri School Boards Association presented the findings of volunteer surveys to Monday night's Cape Girardeau Board of Education meeting. The school board has contracted with MSBA to help find a replacement for Dr. Dan Tallent, whose contract expires June 30.

An MSBA team visited the district earlier this month to gather information on qualities the next superintendent should have. The team interviewed representatives from 19 education, business and civic organizations and collected 39 surveys during the visit.

Sixty-eight school patrons also responded to a weeklong voice poll hotline that MSBA set up for community opinion.

Community leaders surveyed listed high moral standards and integrity, strong teaching background, ability to work with and provide leadership to the staff and school board, and expertise in oral and written communication as desirable qualities for an applicant.

Conversely, the telephone poll indicated people put more emphasis on experience in fiscal management, ability to work with and provide leadership for the school board, sensitivity in human relations, ability to work with and provide leadership to the staff and expertise in curriculum development.

Cowherd said the difference in survey opinions could result in two very different types of administrators. Generally, superintendents are either academically minded or have strong fiscal management skills.

"We think these were essentially two different groups of people because of the way the survey results differed," said Cowherd. "People would think all teachers responded to the voice poll, but these results were not consistent with what we know was given by the staff."

School board member Mark Carver expressed concern the board might base its hiring selection on such a small community opinion sample and asked that other methods of sampling the community should be tried before reviewing applications.

"I would not be at all comfortable accepting this data as accurate with 68 respondents," he said. "In a community of this size, hearing from only 68 people, my opinion is you may be hearing from folks who have a strong opinion one way or another, but you're not getting a good barometer on what the community's thinking."

Cowherd said the amount of response to the surveys was low but consistent with similar surveys in other towns. Voluntary surveys rarely have a large amount of response, although newspaper surveys have been more successful in some communities, he said.

"There are no better tools that we're aware of," said Cowherd. "Whenever you're relying on perceptual data and volunteer surveys there will be a variance in the rate of participation."

Cowherd said 31 inquiries have been received regarding the superintendent's job. Applications will be accepted through Nov. 12, and board members will begin to screen applications Nov. 17. He said a superintendent could be named in December.