St. Paul school board trims superintendent field from six to three

The St. Paul school board narrowed its search for a superintendent from six to three candidates on Saturday, creating a field with two local executives and one from the West Coast.

After interviews with six candidates from Friday evening through Saturday morning, the board agreed on its first ballot to proceed with Valeria Silva, currently the district's chief academic officer; Deborah Henton, North Branch superintendent of schools, and Charles Hopson, deputy superintendent of the Portland, Ore., school district.

Board members asked the same questions of all candidates, probing their views on the lines of authority between the board and the superintendent (often a point of contention in any school district), and their thoughts on diversity and on leading complex initiatives, such as tax levies.

Silva seemed to have the largest number of supporters at Saturday's public interview at district headquarters; she got the biggest round of applause at the end of a question-and-answer session. She stressed her national standing as an advocate and developer of programs for English-language learners.

"We are on a good path, and it needs to continue," Silva said. Board members said they admire Silva's energy and passion, and the collaboration she displayed recently when she met personally with high school athletic directors as part of the district's plan to cut its budget.

Hopson cast himself as a calm and reassuring personality. He's been called the "quiet storm" he says, for being simultaneously unassuming and effective.

He also said he has experienced his greatest successes in raising academic levels of black students, while noting that the largest achievement gaps in the St. Paul district are between white and black students.

He also said that if hired, he intends to stay in Minnesota for a number of years. "The St. Paul School District is not a stepping stone for me," Hopson said, adding that he's built his career around eliminating academic disparities, seeing his efforts through "from start to finish."

Henton told the board her greatest leadership attribute is her emotional strength. She's also weathered two rounds of steep budget cuts over the past two years amid enrollment declines.

Her district is one of the few in the state that doesn't have a local operating levy, meaning schools exist only on state funding with none specifically from local taxpayers.

Henton said she already knows the St. Paul schools well from her experience working as a school principal in the district and as its chief of staff. And now she has gained leadership experience running the North Branch schools.

A busy week ahead

The process gets more intense this week. Each candidate will spend a full day in the district, shuttling between schools, meetings with community members and district offices, where they will face questions from the public and board member interviews again. Hopson will interview Monday, Silva on Wednesday and Henton on Thursday.

More than 40 people applied for the job. Of the six semifinalists selected to interview over the weekend, five were local. The departure of former Superintendent Meria Carstarphen to be schools chief in Austin, Texas, after only three years in St. Paul had led many to call for a local superintendent.

Kazoua Kong-Thao, chairman of the school board, said members want to hire the best fit for the school district, and will use the profile the board developed for the position in making the decision.

Selecting a superintendent is the first and perhaps most significant joint effort this new board will tackle. Vallay Varro and Jean O'Connell joined the board just last week after winning their seats in the Nov. 3 elections.

Choosing a superintendent, "is actually the single most important decision a school board can make," said Charlie Kyte, executive director of the Minnesota Association of School Administrators. "Almost every other decision a school board makes just pales."

The biggest obstacle is that, "there probably is not a relationship between the new board members and the ones who have been sitting on the board," Kyte said.

Nonetheless, the newness of board members need not affect the quality of their decisions, he said. Just because a board has been working together for a while "doesn't mean they have cornered the market on wisdom," he added.

Varro and O'Connell "hit the ground running," said Ted Blaesing of Hazard, Young and Attea, the firm that is leading the search. The board "functioned at a high level this week," he said.

Gregory A. Patterson • 651-238-9293