The School Board's Big Decision

by Gary Toebben

The Board of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) has embarked on its most important decision – the selection of a new superintendent. Current Superintendent Ray Cortines has announced that he will be leaving during this school year after completing his third stint at the helm. During each of these voyages, he has demonstrated determined leadership to unify the board and steer the district ship forward.

What happens in LAUSD classrooms determines the economic opportunities that lie ahead for nearly 700,000 K-12 students. It also determines whether L.A.’s businesses and their employees will be able to compete in the global marketplace in the future.

The School Board, under new President Steve Zimmer, is working collaboratively to reach consensus on the desired leadership skills of the candidates. They have issued an RFP to select a search firm that will assist the Board in identifying those candidates. Read more.

The Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce has researched and shared with School Board Members a report titled "Best Practices in Superintendent Search and Selection in Large Urban School Districts" (May 21, 2015). Through a national scan, the report identified these best practices:

• Best Practice 1: Convene an external Superintendent Search Committee
• Best Practice 2: Select and Contract with an experienced search firm
• Best Practice 3: Agree on the Desired Characteristics of a New Superintendent (Leadership Profile) with extensive community input
• Best Practice 4: Communicate actively with all stakeholders
• Best Practice 5: Optimize public engagement as much as is practical

Readers can download this report and its appendices here.

Transparency is especially valuable in the early stages and then tempered in later stages to ensure that candidates who are successful sitting superintendents agree to be considered without the fear of jeopardizing public support in their current communities.

The business community is anxious to help because it is our obligation to our young people and our economic future. The Chamber, as the convener of the L.A. Compact, is ready to assist the school board in engaging the civic community and key stakeholders of the district.

Outgoing Superintendent Ray Cortines has provided a template for an effective leader. It would be wise for the School Board to leverage and solicit his experience and wisdom in this selection and transition. Cortines laid the groundwork for the future LAUSD in a recent reorganization, creating six largely autonomous local districts (see Here's How to (Really) Decentralize L.A. Schools, by Charles Taylor Kerchner, On California blog, Education Week, Aug. 31, 2015). It will be important for the Board to utilize his expertise.

This search is a community priority. It will impact all of us for many years.

And that's The Business Perspective.