DISTRICTS LOOK FOR -- AND FIND -- BEST LEADERS

After exhaustive searches, school boards at Jackson and Perryville have chosen superintendents to guide their respective school districts into the next century.

The Jackson Board of Education hired Dr. Ron Anderson of Liberty to replace Dr. Howard Jones, who will retire. The Perryville Board of Education hired Dr. Stephen Doerr of St. Louis County to replace Dr. Rex Miller, who is resigning.

Both men, who assume their jobs this summer, come to the schools with impressive credentials. By taking the jobs when they are, the new superintendents will be in a position, if they so choose, to offer fresh approaches to school administration and education in general with the dawning of the next century.

Anderson and Doerr were chosen from dozens of other applicants, many of whom carried equally impressive credentials with experience. The boards spend countless hours wading through applications and interviewing candidates.

Anytime a school board hires a superintendent, it does so at some risk and can only hope the superintendent will meet up not only to the board's expectations but to the teachers', parents' and students' hopes as well. The chief administrator of a tax-supported public school district has many roles to fill. He must understand school financing and how to make budgets work, he must be fair in looking out for teachers' and students' interests, he must be able to work with the board of education, and he must be a leader and cast a good image on the school district wherever he goes.

Indeed, it takes a very talented person to be a good school superintendent, and that is why both boards put in so much time and effort in seeking just the right individuals to run the school districts.

They easily could have tried to swipe a good superintendent from another district in the region with some degree of assurance that they would be getting someone who could run their school district as equally well as the districts they came from. But instead they looked for the best superintendent available within their means, as they should have done.

We wish Anderson and Doerr the best in their new pursuits and commend both school boards for the effort they have put into making their selections.