By Josh Resnek
Late Friday afternoon marked the end of the open period when those considering Everett’s public school superintendent’s position were able to submit their applications to the search committee.
The search committee, comprised of 15 men and women, all with deep connections to public school education, the administration and the school department and committee, has not yet released a list of those who have applied.
That list is expected to be revealed in the coming week or two and will be shared with all the stakeholders in the education community here before being whittled down to three finalists.
It is believed and expected that acting Superintendent of Schools Janice Gauthier has submitted an application.
She had previously confided with friends and associates that she was going to apply.
Also, Assistant Superintendent Charlie Obremski is believed to have filed an application.
He, too, had confided to friends and colleagues that he was thinking seriously of putting in an application.
There are approximately an additional dozen Everett public school administrators who are qualified to be superintendents.
However, it is unknown who or how many, if any, have applied.
Three months from now, one of the three finalists will be chosen as the next fulltime superintendent of schools for the year beginning next July. The new superintendent will preside over a sprawling, growing school system with more than 7,000 students bursting at the seams for space despite having a number of new and larger modern school facilities built during the past decade.
Although the public schools have excelled at aiding many individual students, a vast number of students unable to speak or to read or write in English plagues the school system and keeps the reading scores in a lower category compared with other suburban school systems statewide.
Also, school children with single parents and no fathers coming from broken families struggling against difficult economic forces abound in Everett.
The superintendent finalists are expected to be a combination of known and unknown, local and far away, men and women.
What the search committee is apparently looking for is a perfect fit for the educational community and the school population, someone who does not need the next two years to become familiar with the city or who does not understand the social, moral and economic construct here.