Two finalists selected for Kansas City Public Schools top job

Kansas City will soon meet the finalists selected for the Kansas City Public Schools superintendent’s job.

The Kansas City Board of Education on Wednesday evening announced it had selected two finalists from among five candidates for the job left vacant earlier this year when the district’s 27th superintendent, Stephen Green, left to take a similar position with a district just outside Atlanta.

Board chairman Jon Hile said that at the advice of the superintendent search firm, the board would not be revealing the names of the two candidates until about a week before each arrives in Kansas City next month to meet with parents, community and business leaders. Candidate visits will also include a trip to a district school.

“We confirmed tonight that each of the candidates are as interested in us as we are in them,” Hile said in an interview before Wednesday night’s school board meeting.

He said dates — in January — for when the public can meet and talk with each of the candidates before a final selection is made will be announced sometime next week.

Whoever is selected for the job would be paid an annual salary in the range of $210,000 to $250,000 and must have shown experience with a set of criteria, including leading urban children toward being high-achieving critical thinkers and “assessing existing realities before introducing changes in programs and initiatives,” according to information on the district's website.

Kansas City school leaders hired an outside search firm — Ray and Associates — to find a new superintendent and to collect public suggestions on the type of leader the district needed. The firm conducted a national search for the candidate who best fits the Kansas City school district. A list of 19 expectations were developed after a series of public sessions earlier this year to identify, as a profile, who would be the district's best leader.

More than 70 applications were received from people interested in the position.

Hile said, “There is a tremendous appetite on the board to identify a candidate for whom Kansas City would be a destination job.”

This story was originally published December 16, 2015 at 8:18 PM with the headline "Two finalists selected for Kansas City Public Schools top job."