The Crookston School Board hopes the second search for a Superintendent is a charm and it is off to a good start. The first time the school district opened up applications for a new superintendent, they had four candidates, and one took a job before the interview process, which forced the school board to shut down the process and try again later.
On Thursday afternoon, the school board met at the District Office and was joined by Lee Warne from the Minnesota School Board Association. Warne said they had 11 candidates and suggested five finalists for the board to consider. Warne said he was thrilled with the pool of candidates and said the five he suggested met most of the criteria, if not all the criteria, and they were excellent candidates. “It was a night and day difference from the first go around,” said School Board member TimDufault. “This time, we had 11 candidates, five solid candidates. The five we are going to interview, from the paper (the board received with their credentials), any one of those would make a good superintendent for us, so it will be exciting to see them in person and see what they are made of.”
Dufault asked the board if they wanted to go with the recommended candidates. The board agreed to go with all five before board chair Frank Fee made a motion to interview all five candidates, and Patty Dillabough seconded. The board unanimously approved interviewing all five candidates.
NAMES (current job)
Jason Stanoch – Hight School Principal at Bemidji
Randy Berquist – Superintendent at Osakis
Jill Louters – Superintendent at New Rockford-Sheyenne, ND
Kevin Wellin – Superintendent at Menagha
Nate Walbruch – High School Principal at Rochester Century
After selecting the five candidates, the board discussed the interview process. The board will ask the candidates 15 questions, and the interviews will take place on March 28, with the first interview at 12:30 p.m. “We will bring them in, and Dave Kuehn will give them a tour of the school and show them a tour of the community and bring them in for interviews with us,” said Dufault. “We will have some citizens in attendance and get their feedback and spend the day with those five candidates, and we will see what happens at the end of the day.”
