Melissa Bailey Photo
From his eighth-floor office at the Board of Ed, Garth Harries opened his computer and called up an interviewer sitting just three floors below. He wasn’t being lazy: He was taking part in a superintendent search that sought to level the playing field for in-house and out-of-town candidates.
Harries (at left in photo with board member Mike Nast), an assistant superintendent in the city school system, made the video conference call Wednesday afternoon as part of the application process for the open superintendent’s job. Harries is considered the frontrunner among the 66 people who applied for the job, which is opening up this month when 21-year Superintendent Reggie Mayo retires.
The school board, acting as the official superintendent search committee, has whittled the field down to nine candidates, according to board President Carlos Torre.
Torre said the board spent a “marathon” day Wednesday interviewing six of those candidates for about an hour each. The other three will be interviewed on Thursday and Friday, he said.
Harries is the only internal candidate for the job, according to Torre. Two others applied from Connecticut. The rest hail from all over the country, including Florida, Georgia and Kentucky, he said.
“The pool looks good,” reported Torre. “We’ve got some very interesting candidates.”
When it came time to interview Harries for the job Wednesday afternoon, the school board made him participate just as the others did — by video conference, not in person. Torre said the board made that decision in order to treat all candidates the same. An in-person interview would give a candidate an advantage.
From his office on the eighth floor of 54 Meadow St., Harries first dialed in to meet Torre via Skype. Then he switched over to WebX, an alternate video conference software. The audio didn’t work well, so he used his office phone for the audio component. He stared into a computer and saw three interviewers. One was in the building. The others were at other locations, dialing in remotely as well, he said.
Harries said the experience was somewhat awkward, because it was hard to point the camera in the right place. “They had a good view of my tie,” then a good view “of my bald head,” he quipped. (Harries, who’s 40, is not actually bald.)
He said the interview lasted about an hour.
The school board took a break from interviewing to conduct a special board meeting Wednesday afternoon to appoint new principals. Then it resumed interviewing via video conference. The interviews were recorded so that board members who weren’t able to make it can view them later, according to Torre.
The board is conducting the search with help from the Illinois-based firm PROACT Search. The board and PROACT plan to whittle down the field to two or three finalists after the interviews are completed Friday.
On July 18 and 19, the finalists will visit New Haven and tour city schools.
Then on Saturday, July 20, the finalists will attend an all-day forum at Gateway Community College, where they’ll describe their vision for the schools and take questions from audience members. The forum, which will be moderated by PROACT, will last from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. After the candidates appear, the public will get a chance to weigh in on the pros and cons of each choice, Torre said.
There will be free parking at the Temple Street Garage as well as “limited” childcare services at Coop High at 177 College St. (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or call 203 – 497-7055 to register for childcare.)
The school board will then rest on Sunday, July 21, and meet on Monday to make a final pick. That choice will be announced Monday evening, July 22, according to Torre. He said the “hand-off” of the superintendency will take place on Wednesday, July 24.
Board member Che Dawson asked how the hand-off would take place so quickly.
Harries is likely the only candidate who could swoop into position with only two days’ notice. Others would have to move from hundreds of miles away.
“Depending on who they are,” Torre clarified, the board would meet with the candidate to figure out a suitable date to start.