Northshore School District Special Meeting: Superintendent Search - Firm interviews. March 3, 2025

001you all right so we look like we're beginning here I'm going to call this meeting to order this is a special meeting of the board to interview our three finalists for superintendent search firms um it's right up there yeah right we we have used this space we haven't used this space for a while because it gives the ability of the search firms to project a PowerPoint um and do Zoom sometimes they like to do Zoom with colleagues so um we have here just for the record we have director TR myself president cast vice president soac director Hayes director mcgi is unfortunately not able to U make it but she is watching along and um will be part of the process going forward so that will work out great so I just wanted to show the

002board before we begin a little um a little house cleaning housekeeping housekeeping that's the phrase we're not C house no not yet right so we have um the interviews of the three firms you'll notice the tight timing because my goal was to conclude by 6:30 so we can hit the road to get to Kenmore city council for 7 um and here ALS right after that we have two new things I don't believe you've seen this is I I talked to director mordi since she was board president during the last superintendent surgeon we did some highlevel summarizing of the community engagement we did both at putting together the superintendent profile stage as well as when it was time to interview finalists so that's there for a reference we have and you can slow me down if

003you need we have this is the tabulation from our purchasing department of the scoring um and it has their calculations of costs so I thought that would be really important for us to have and then we have the questions um and um piggy was kind enough to print us out three coffee so we can take notes because she is that brilliant um so um any questions before we're you know we probably should divvy up some questions but any thoughts or questions before we go into this um I just want to um kick us off uh I'm so grateful for the tabulation summary I know not everybody has access to us that may be watching from home but they range from 30,000 to well really the ones we're looking at today they rain from 31,000 to

004maybe 37 and it it's not a huge amount of money and I know we're in a budget Crunch and it does seem concerning that we're choosing to spend that money um when we're laying potentially laying off people however as we've watched uh districts in the area if you don't have a quality process and a good superintendent in place you can end up paying for two superintendents at the same time so um it could end up costing their there are some smaller districts that are paying a half a million dollars to pay to buy out a superintendent that was not a good fit so it's kind of a Pennywise pound foolish approach of not getting a a good search in and making sure we're getting a great fit so great thank you yep yeah and yeah

005so we'll have after today I I think that that's when the um the data dump process for the community and partners and students and staff and family will really start because it's hard for us to start sharing details about the process before um we have our partner but then after this already spoken with executive director cble they have found the pages from the last search they're getting ready to update them already and so after this I think we'll have a lot more information for people and it'll it'll be easier for folks to understand what's going on because I have been getting ex some questions so I assume maybe we all have so and because of the Kenmore city council meeting we do have kind of a tight timeline so um if the board so the

006these aren't just four questions they're four categories of questions so I don't know if you want to look so this was how we broke it up a couple years ago just into almost um the timeline of the search itself determining the qualifications of the superintendent as one bucket of question finding candidates is another bucket um interviewing um the candidates and then going through the final process of selection is another bucket of questions and then costs details around cost is the fourth bucket so being that um director mcgerty is not here it's just wondering if um there's one for each of us if anyone has something they I mean this the idea is you we don't have a ton of time so we have to be efficient so that's one thing just being efficient um but

007also it is it is kind of um best best practices to have consistent questions asked at the firm sometimes they offer the information in their presentation and good but you want to make sure you're getting the same information so you're valuating Apples to Apples um but is there anything that folks are really I don't know interested in want to put their name next to doesn't matter I saw the communication from executive director camp regarding Communications um I tried my best to roll in some of the questions that I had uh that incorporates some of her feedback um on her review of the RFP uh it was mainly around two things it was um how what is the communication Department's role in this because we saw a comment I believe from mcferson and Jacobson about some

008delays because they use the district leason so I'm curious that was communication related and then um how can we make sure that uh executive director Campbell is empowered during this process um to do what she needs to do to make sure that the community is involved and then the third is the translation I think it was Ry and associates they had included translation costs within their estimates um but she was curious if were human or machine and yeah right because the difference in quality yeah and um these questions are great and I'm wondering if their presentation will answer some of Car Executive Director Campbell's yeah and thanks for the reminder cuz we'll make sure to make sure if they don't they don't get covered we will we will do that in followup that sounds great

009so I have a idea on the questions just so that we can and our first is at 4:30 is that right 415 okay so since we have 6 minutes so what if because there some questions are buckets are meter than others and it's quite possible knowing that some of these people tend to be verose we may not get to them so what if um like you are letter a questions so all questions that start with the letter A have an A in front of them you do those to kick us off the little sub bullets yes and vice president soek you are B sure and then director try on your C and then I will take d and e okay since not all questions have right d and to director tr's point there might be

010some other details that are important yeah um in terms of clarification of costs clarification of rules between even just District resources in general um as well as as the um firm's resources and um the fact that we have a pretty detailed Community engagement process that we expect in our community so we're going to want to make sure that's pretty clear so we if we have to interject we'll do that and I'll explain to them why we have such a short time it's just um schedu in the city council um alignment meeting is is not the easiest thing to get on the calendar it's hard to move I I feel like half hour is pretty standard for what we've done in the past that sounds good for search firms so how long are they presenting for

011that's their call so I'm going to ask them maybe to limit it to 10 or 15 minutes so that gives us enough time for questions okay how's that sound yeah and then we will be the goal is to be done by 6 so then we have between that 6:00 and 6:30 for us to talk about our our um our thoughts around what was presented um with the idea that we have to it'll be a Voice vote but we have to take a vote to decide who we'd like to offer the contract to and go forward there'll be some final negotiation and that way the contract would be on our board meeting in a week from today that's the outcome awesome awesome all right would you like me to be the shutt do you mind Peggy

012if you could be the shuttler all right we're starting with hya correct and this is great because this way they'll have a few minutes to plug in if they need to okay um this is kind of that would be helpful yeah thank you with our letter assignment are we listening for it or what is our role you'll read it out loud it's not it's not terribly complicated and and certainly anybody can ask followup questions if you didn't hear a response but okay yeah this is like 20 Questions yes yes exactly you know CU it's interesting Peggy when she was helping arrange the appointment she's mentioned that we had four questions they're like only four we're like oh no no no four categories categories four topics really that was not a criticism by the way that

013was just a I hope we can fit it in I hope we can fit it in too this will be yeah we'll have to we'll have to be focused hello Danny she's our Tech person and she'll make sure that you're all set up and ready to go fantastic so come on in and make yourself at home just so you know this is a live streaming space so that's the camera just so you know we have microphones along the table so we should be pretty set up but go ahead and um get set up screen is there right the screen and so Danny's going to help plug in the laptop so they can present okay you got hookup options here and you let us know when ready nice to meet you you can go ahead and

014put your video on and then maybe mute from your end and then unmute when it's your turn on stuff okay and I'm going have you I'm going to put you facing the [Music] board and then um un is that the best angle that will work wonderful thank you we had one superintendent candidate that came in with like his resume was in wood carved something it was crazy yes that's commitment yeah it was a bit he a little over at the top okay wow so thank you as we're getting set up here I wanted to explain why we have a relatively short window but I'm sure we are high performing people we can get through 30 minutes but we have a joint meeting with the Kenmore city council at 7 oh wow and we have to

015go down 5:22 to get there oh my the combination thereof and so um we acknowledge it's it's can be a tight time frame but like I said we're very high performing and so we can absolutely work so thank Anthony our neighbor for many years so and we um obviously there's four of us here today our fifth board member is watching virtually as she's out of town but um is absolutely an active participant of this process wonderful as well so director Tran do you want to kick off introductions for us sure uh I am director Han Tran they don't have one of the newer board members okay wonderful nice to meet you oh yeah yeah and Amy Kev it's all good um I'm Amy cast I'm currently serving as president for the board I'm Elizabeth toac

016I'm board vice president currently and I'm Sandy Hayes Sandy yeah well wonderful should we jump in yes absolutely and then we were thinking we want to make sure we have time for questions exactly so um if I don't know the length of your presentation 10 or 15 minutes and then we have time for questions we planned accordingly excellent thank you yes thank you okay well again thank you so much for the invitation to meet with you this afternoon uh it's an honor to be with you um and we appreciate the opportunity to share just a little bit about who we are as a firm and as a team um and a little bit about our process and our guarantees um and then what sets Hy apart we believe so thank you again for the opportunity

017maybe just a little bit about each of us we're going to be brief I'm Chris uh Chris McDuffy and uh 43 years in public education uh in the state of Washington both pk12 and higher ed um served as a superintendent for 17 years was your neighbor um and and also um have been for the last five years helping School boards uh with superintendent searches board superintendent relations and strategic planning and I'm John bash like Chris U my career was here in Washington state 35 years mainly in the southwest region um like my colleagues uh School level leadership experience along with over 20 years at the district level including superintendent service um this is my fourth year conducting searches which include search experience here in the pet sound region um and in Arizona and New Mexico

018with similar Urban settings um we're we're glad to be here and honored to have this opportunity to visit we're similar yet different so uh 40 years in Washington state and pretty much did every position teacher counselor director of curriculum assistant superintendent and then superintendent in two districts so it was wonderful gift 11 years teaching South WBY and then 28 in Riverview and then after after I retired I did an interim position for 6 months in New Mexico so that was just wonderful thing to do and then um at Riverview we were neighbors and it's good to see Amy and Sandy and nice to meet you folks and Sylvia she here good afternoon can you hear me yes yeah wonderful yes syia and very similar to my colleagues 36 years in education uh during that time

019I served in various roles teacher counselor principal and superintendent of schools all of my career was spent in Title One school so I have a great deal of knowledge uh in addressing special populations School Improvement and school Finance upon my retirement I joined hya as an associate and in this capacity I support school districts with superintendent searches most recently I was part of the team and uh that worked on the Mesa Public School Superintendent sech so thank you for the opportunity thank you syvia and the last person on our team uh is Tahira Vincent she's our support staff she couldn't be here in person she's located out of California so just so you got a picture of the whole team so thank you we'll kick off the next SL yeah um so I uh just

020this side this slide I just summarized in three three words responsiveness inclusiveness um and commitment so I think that's one thing that uh those are three things that really set hya apart and then you're going to hear more about those themes as we go go along with the presentation and um as has been all alluded to we're part of a national network and a National Organization that has uh footholds in every state and then we're we're the Washington Plus team um and so uh yeah local team uh we do a thorough process for vetting candidates um uh with internet searches and other uh searches available and I think that's very important in these days of superintendents getting their contracts bought out um yeah we have a great I can attest to this being uh on

021boarding in January that uh the full-time back office and IT staff has been essential for my getting my legs and um uh we're responsive and have great communication is consistent we'll talk a little bit more about that as we go um and Sylvia is up for the next one yes well you know at hya leading with inity lens is a priority of ours and it's one of the core values of our firm and our Associates we Implement practices that promote fairness and Equitable outcomes and we ensure that we recruit a diverse pool of candidates you have our our percentages there on the screen so I won't go over them but we're very proud of the diversity of uh candidates that we bring into our pool and furthermore we have diversity within the firm and even

022this team with 33% of Associates identified as other than white and 46% identified as women I'm very proud to represent two of those categories or both of these categories and that is one of the reasons why I work for hya so again Equity is at the Forefront of our work and effort and it will continue to be thanks syia yeah so uh this basically is a graphic of the search process and then Chris has also prepared a um draft timeline for you folks as well and start just engaging and then uh working as partners to make sure all voices in the NorthShore community and Beyond are heard um and have input into the process and then recruiting selecting and then um working with you on transitioning the higher so engagement the first phase of course

023as Anthony said we are so committed to ensuring that all voices are heard or have an opportunity to participate and we're um coming at this assuming that you would like a inclusive and transparent process that's how we that's how we operate so as you can see this engagement work kicks off with a planning meeting with the board as soon as possible we're ready yesterday to get started with you on a planning meeting to handle all the logistics um and then we do want to do one-on ones with each board member just to get to know you hear your priorities your experiences Etc and then we'll work with you and your team to identify you know staff students families community members who would be able to participate in either a one-on-one interview a small focus group

024interview um or a forum so we structure it based on your guidance of those respective groups so we're looking forward to that we really ask those three questions throughout the engagement phase which is first what's working well what are you proud of you have so much to be proud of we've been watching this Flagship district for uh many many decades um so what are you proud of and secondly what are the challenges or the greatest opportunities moving forward and finally what characteristics or qualities are you looking for and your next superintendent so those consistent questions allow us to call out the themes from all respective groups that results in this leadership profile report that we show here that we would be presenting to you at a board meeting um and again that would guide our

025efforts moving forward um we also offer many different versions iners remote um with language assistance as needed we understand you have 119 different Lang languages spoken here um I had 132 next door in Edmunds when I left um it's it's a challenge but we would work with you and your team and we also have some um support in our own uh Team right here and with our home office so we can talk more about that all right um recruiting you're going to hear all firms talk about this so what's special about us well with our recruiting it's truly an active pursued not just a passive weight you know for folks to respond to advertising in addition um I think Anthony might have alluded to this hya is a company that only brings on Associates who

026are committed to full-time focus on this work it's not a side gig for any of us this is our focus and so with that dedicated time we do a lot of Outreach including activation of the 120 Associates across the country um as we conduct a national uh cast a national net if you will uh to find highly qualified and a diverse candidate fool uh pool that Sylvia mentioned and with that in mind uh recruitment often includes uh National advertising options for you including nasby and alas which we routinely see districts uh with your similar demographic and uh tradition of really um going the extra mile to find underrepresented candidates who are qualified and interested in serving in a place like norshore Sylvia yes so the next phas the third phase is the interview phase this

027is a very exciting and important phase because this is when you're basically interviewing your candidates your top candidates by now you as the board will have identified your best qualified candidates so the interview process begins first the first phase is with the semifinalist uh and the intent is to narrow down the Slate to the top candidates and once you start interviewing the SEC second round of interviews is with your finalist and once you the board are comfortable and and confident with your Top Choice then at that point you offer them um obviously a contract and begin contract negotiations offer them the decision now this uh this particular phase involves is very involves the entire board obviously because of the schedule and the interview so as your firm we work with you to accommodate your schedules

028and make every effort to meet your scheduling needs yeah and then the transition phase is basically working with you in the way you want us to work with you on transitioning your new leader in and um our base fee includes a half day transition Workshop where we're all in the room together working together to make that transition as smooth as possible if that's if that's what you want and we can offer additional Services too extended services for transition yeah we're really committed to walk alongside you for the Long Haul uh we go into the fall and and frequent check-ins and making sure that things are going well and so offer all of that support um the timeline of course you've um seen a rough draft this is uh again just going from your goal of

029having your new superintendent in place by May and backward planning and um we think this is very doable uh and it some flexibility in it of course if you would prefer to maybe name your new superintendent by miday for instance we could collapse the um the time that the posting is is open um by a few weeks that's certainly negotiable um but this is very doable and um would not short change the engagement process um whatsoever which we know you you value greatly um so John um in addition we provide um a confidential uh School Board portal uh that really only you as five board members have access to and it's a place we um include key Milestone documents like a leadership profile report um and U and then other simple things like um our

030letter of agreement with you uh and it's also the place where we'll post the confidential applicant information so that's where you'll be able able to access that and review that before we meet with you to discuss who it is you would like to invite for interviews um that's available 247 through a very easy web link that we provide to you um and I get to be The Tech Guy uh monitoring that for you so you'd call me if you had any troubles we all work toward our strengths right um on our feed we do uh show our $31,000 base fee um in the chart below you'll see on the left side those are the things that are included the four on-site associate days are really focused on any on-site or inperson type of Engagement and

031we can assure you that we have never needed to go beyond that much time to support you in fact we try to maximize the days that we're here so there might be some Daytime sessions but we're happy to stay and make it a marathon day and go into the evening whatever it takes because we also want to min minimize our travel costs for you in that way uh the other engagement options include some remote options and we've certainly done that in a number of districts since the pandemic that has become a little more common but again it really depends on you and what your preferences are um we also um help with the advertising with our website uh was and was are the two most common job boards in Washington state anyway but again nationally

032you'll see it in education week um and then a number of social media sites as Associates we will um engage with candidates not only during the recruiting phase but there's a vetting process that we go through as we gather as much information about the candidates as we can to inform your decision regarding who you'd like to select for interviews and ultimately select for the job uh the optional Services you'll see um the additional days are noted there but typically that's not necessary we do offer a research-based survey that does have an additional fee attached to it um what we consider with you in that regard is whether or not you already have some survey information or similar information about your District that may or may not warrant consideration of this um and so um that

033really varies across districts in terms of who Ops in uh we do include in the fee a Google survey that's an open-ended um survey of your stakeholders including students to find out what the greatest strengths are of not sure what the greatest challenges are that people perceive you face into the future and what the qualities and characteristics folks want most in your next leader uh finally you'll see the executive due diligence report uh some boards want to go an extra step with the person they select and make as a condition of employment um a an independent third party background check which goes into degree verification a deeper criminal history than you might otherwise see um a news and social media Deep dive um that can go further than we're able to but we'll be doing

034some of that as your Associates so that's an option and if you opt into that it's typically part of the motion that the board makes when they make their selection decision that the selections contingent on negotiation of a contract and the board's acceptance of a report like this yeah YH ya so um what got me into this was I was actually a recipient on the transitioning out end of hya services and did research um for our school board and Riverview on search firms and just compiling data for them and they make the decision right because I'm the person trans transitioning out but hu is just so great to uh work for and I appreciated that our district was their priority that was their number one go-to for their their their employment and what they're passionate

035about in their lives um and yeah it gets rid of all the conflict of interest stuff um and then uh the focus on equity and belonging is really important to me with anything I'm going to do in my life so so I don't have to work but I I like I have to engage and so this has been a wonderful experience jumping on board with Hy and helping them with searches and syvia yes and our firm offers three guarantees the first one being client satisfaction it's very important to us that you as our client are satisfied with our services so we need your specific needs we offer customization that align to your priorities and we're available throughout the process to answer any question and be very transparent with the process in addition we also offer

036price matching to any competitor with comparable services and lastly our goal is to help you find the best leader to lead your District therefore once you hire your superintendent hiyi will not engage in canidate solicitation on the contrary we will support superintendent through the transition base I know why you're not appreciate it just go without saying for for new board members what that mean to translate what that means is once we get the new superintendent they won't be calling them six months later and saying would you like another job in a different District no uh we're committed to their long-term success here in norshore so so thank you all we I think we went 17.5 minutes so we wanted to obviously leave time for questions and conversation well and yeah so I'll Dive Right In

037so like you mentioned Chris you know engaging with our diverse Community is something that we're very passionate about and we think is really foundational to the success of norshore so what techniques have y all found both in the creation of the leadership profile phase as well as selection of the the ultimate you know selected candidate have you found that really helps engage diverse communities yes we H it right on um um such an important question and we um are going to do whatever it takes to to reach out and um provide an opportunity for all of your um community and all of your constituents we're going to need to learn from you how best to do that though every Community is so different um but we'll tell you um that we have held these engagement

038focus groups for instance in community halls and neighborhoods and restaurants and we don't expect the community we understand especially our marginalized communities um don't feel comfortable often coming into our schools and and administration centers so we go to them and in any way uh shape or form uh and then of course translation services um interpretation provided you know anything that uh we can do to work with your team but like I said we also have resources on our own team as well as our main office Qui followup on translation is it um do you have individuals people who can do the Translating do you rely on certain systems it systems to do the Translating we we prefer individuals we know we've run into trouble with just relying on Google translate or what have you so

039um we have we have support in that area but again you may also be able to provide um some direction there so yes we'll do that for the engagement phase as well as the um ction phase where we re-engage everyone right um to make sure they have a chance to meet the finalists provide their feedback and whatever multiple platforms that takes it's not unusual for a couple of us or three of us to be going in different directions on the same day uh meeting with you know the priorities getting to as many groups as possible and then those that are most marginalized and F furthest from educational Justice yeah I'd also add on the strategy part of your question um different mugs seem to work with different groups and so we often will lean on

040the board Andor your executive team to give us some feedback on what they found to be most effective in terms of el listing maximum participation um and then we adapt to that it's not the other way around so we want to make sure we're responsive that way and then I want to mention with students we found that uh in some districts for example with Highline when we did that search they found that um they got a lot of response if they involved their teachers in a survey model that was unique and specific to students and that was part of the leadership profile report then the results of that work and that was truly a partnership during the search with staff that helped develop that and then roll it out um with other groups uh especially

041student groups we found that for example you have the student Justice Collective and there might be other similar groups in norshore that already exist well when do they meet well that group meets at least your website suggests who wins days a month so can we coordinate our effort to leverage existing meeting structures that sort of thing so we're not asking people to schedule more often than is absolutely necessary so we like R said we want to hear from you but we also want to capitalize on the effective things that are already happening to reach the audiences that you want us to hear from thank you um and you referenced it earlier yeah yeah yeah you referenced earlier kind of how you're planning to um gather input from board members individually have an interview with everyone

042and then collectively as the process moves forward um is there anything else that you found really successful around or in that or uh anything difficult in terms of board engagement yeah yeah I mean I just you know we coming from all very different areas and places in experience levels um and you know how are you going to support us newbies through the process great question well again all being superintendents we've we've worked with um onboarding and supporting new board members throughout our careers so we we certainly empathize and and will be very supportive we want to hear each of your voices and we're also um uh we welcome the opportunity to work with boards in terms of um shared understandings or setting Mutual goals and or conflict resolution we certainly have found ourselves with that

043hat on as well so we're comfortable with all of that we've been working with boards for 30 years and um and would welcome that so we were we're here to support you and make sure that it's a successful outcome thank you cool uh I'll ask the next one I'm going to skip to the conversation around cost CU for hiya I noticed there's a lot of flexibility in it um which also means a potential for added costs here um so I saw that Spanish is included in the uh interviews and the surveys uh we have an ask around Portuguese because that's our second large you know largest language that's spoken here what would be the additional cost there um so that's question part one on the cost um the second question is um can you tell

044me a little bit more about that research search based survey cost um and what actually is meant by research based survey CU I feel like a lot of surveys are that but I could be wrong um and then the extended services for transition um what the cost there looks like as well um and then the oh I Mis wrote confidential School Board photo that's I don't know what I was thinking that was me that someone probably said photo and I wrote photo uh well let's back up um and jump in John I think maybe starting with uh the addition of Portuguese for instance um what our firm says is Spanish included in any additional languages for instance on the survey translation um that would it's $415 per additional language now again um whether you have

045some in house folks who are used to reaching out to these communities we would just learn that from you and find the best route um yeah let me jump in there if for example let's say we scheduled a community Forum as part of the engagement work and you wanted the announcement to go out in Portuguese we really don't charge extra for that what we do instead is work with you and your team to uh work up a translation occasionally we will draft one and then if if there's a uh somebody who's fluent and Portuguese here that we could run it by that they could do a quick edit for us that we don't charge extra for those things we just want to make sure that we're hitting as many of the languages as necessary so

046whatever your stakeholders are used to we mirror that we try to match that and then on the research-based survey the comprehensive the reason we choose to do it as an option rather than included is as John mentioned I mean many districts are all over the place in their uh strategic planning efforts for instance and many do very comprehensive annual surveys and this would be maybe a burden um so we just want to make sure we're meeting you where you are and what your needs are the the survey itself is gosh a decade or more um been used and has been proven based on um leadership standards for superintendence so it's grounded in research on efficacy of superintendent um and it is $2,000 and I don't have it really handy to pull out uh for the

047base and then there are additional um questions you can add on to customize it for norshore if you want it to so you know probably around 3,000 if you really wanted to go down that path otherwise as John mentioned we just use the Google survey use the same three questions and incorporate uh that in our work yeah then there was a third part to your question or maybe a fourth so yeah there's a transition yes yes the additional fees for transitions do you yeah so there's not a fixed rate it really depends on uh the range of services that are needed so um if it's associate time mentoring the new superintendent or meeting with them once a month then that would be time based and we'd figure out okay how much time do we want

048to start with and for how long come up with a rate that's mutually agreeable and develop a separate agreement for that uh we also have a u a model where uh with the goals that you've already established in your strategic plan for example if you want um a monitoring approach to the leaders responsibilities associated with your strategic goals uh we have a program for that and we can share those details with you but we normally explore that with you once we um have already passed the select ction decision because the person you select often drives out what you determine might be needed or might not be needed and we want to be customized uh with the approach there as well what we can do and I'm sorry we don't have that easy to flip right

049here in the moment but we can follow up and provide you some example costs depending on those services and we're happy to and we have a parent company ecra uh and they are the analytics backbone it's one wonderful to be partners with them because again they provide all of the detailed analysis of the surveys we use and um any other analytics that are needed for the search so just so you know that's a sidebar thank you and then because we we are getting close to our 30 minutes so director Hayes do you want to wrap us up I will wrap us up so um the you're all lovely people who would be our point of contact that we'd be working with most closely and then um I just want to kind of come back to

050that Community engagement piece there's two parts to this process in terms of community engagement first is the Gathering of input for creating the superintendent profile and then the second is the U engagement around the finalists right so the a little more spe specificity of what those two parts would look like but but first who who is our person well I am the lead as associate um for this project but we do work very closely as a team EB and Flo but I would be the main point of contact okay um and regarding engagement we do um as we mentioned a little bit earlier that uh we're fully committed to making sure that everybody's voice is heard on the front end of developing the leadership profile report and we'll do whatever that takes and then on

051the selection phase um that again uh we will work with you in fact we ask that you appoint two board members as liaison for the process and we work weekly with those folks we have a standing check-in how's it going here's some updates you know Etc uh and we would be planning those finalist days in the district um taking care of all the logistics are we touching all of the you know constituents where do they have opportunity to be heard We Gather feedback throughout those long days in the district for the finalists we do a Google form live you know feedback so the board can monitor that throughout those days okay um and then we debrief with you uh at the end yeah that online form we also drop into that board portal I mentioned

052so that again 24/7 if you want to see as the responses are coming in uh and monitor that out outside of a scheduled meeting you have access to that and and then we fold that into our planning for you all as well to say okay how much time do you think you need to fully digest all of what you're hearing about the finalists so you feel like you're well informed going into that big decision and the boards we've worked with have really appreciated that it's um really streamlined the process and and everyone feels honored that that their voice was heard and and they really do do know that the board is reading every single comment so we thank you well and thank you for your efficiency much appreciate it bre it's going to be couple

053months like this I feel yes so thank you so much really appreciate your time thank you this is the extra for than so much oh don't about the thank you hey good luck with traffic a yeah thank you thank you take care thank you have a great see you thank you going to go8 I'm going to back all right so then we're just going to transition right to do we director Hayes do we care for or having use a transition Plan before I don't help yeah I mean bye Anthony see you later um it would you know in the best of times we would have budget for transition meetings I don't know I don't know if within this budget environment it would be something we yeah but that's just my opinion like we've been able

054to certify without one yeah yeah um I don't think we have one for Michelle I know we didn't have one for Michelle she she overlapped a little bit with Larry although not much and yeah it's usually the superintendent working with each other the hand off and then we did because Michael was brand new to superintendent and kind of made some recommendations of who he should look to for a mentor got it okay um and that we can certainly do again so um research based survey really quick before the Folk Center did do we have experience with that it's we we it was more detailed than the three questions so I think it'll be interesting what other people how other people approach them the different firms that might be a differentiator between the firms hello connect

055hi there hi there make yourself comfortable thank you so much just come on in thank you this is a live stream space just so you know have a camera there hi I'm Elizabeth Elizabeth nice to meet you Michelle nice to see you to see you and as you get set up I just want to acknowledge the tight time frame we're sorry about that we have a joint city council meeting and so yes you guys are committed to be like back to back to back we it's just how it rolls sometimes so um we'll go as soon as you're ready we'll pretty much dive in since we're we're tight would you pass I'm happy to do and there's that's mine actually we have our third person on zo so we were G to log her I've

056got to go so I've got to go to zoom okay and get on there you want me to take F pile right there you're welcome is that her well that her well she was abent oh they have names on them I wanding around okay I guess y there we go [Music] go that wasn't on our Matrix sugar all right yep yep yep [Applause] okay all right we are teeing up we have a partner also on Zoom so we sure we um have her logging in also are you on our public Wi-Fi so you can connect yeah and where did you I'm sorry saying your screen yes I can hear you but I'm not sure they can hear you yet hang ony try again Mary Alice can you say something Mary Alice I we can't hear

057her that's why is that I don't believe that there's sound oh you don't have sound that that comes from here it would have to okay okay well not sure why oh I know what's going on here it's Bluetooth here that's what's on I apologize for the technical difficulties we're going to get it always happens I'm going to turn off that makesense and go over here try again Mary Alice can you hear me now there it goes there it goes got well done do a repeat of now I just have to and I think we can yeah okay we here play excellent that long but she's not showing up so that's okay that's okay okay okay we here yeah we'll just know you right she can you can hear her and we're good to go well

058welcome so um we're so delighted to be here and be able to present to you um and we love to have the opportunity of course to help you with your surch because that's what we do and we've all been in education a long time in fact this team has 80 years of Washington experience on it so um a lot of people here with a lot of knowledge I'm just going to stop you because I I know that President Castle would want to you to know that you are being live streamed and that's the camera there and if you could say your name so Folks at home we're going to do yeah that' be great we're going to do that right here okay so I'm I'm Steven louder I was a superintendent for more than 30

059years 40 years in education um and retired about 10 years ago so I've been doing this search process ever since I started out in teeny tiny school districts Cades of 130 where I was teacher principal coach everything learn to drive a bus um and then I ended my career in a prek 12 of 39,000 so I've had a interesting and very career um anyway been helping people uh doing this for the last 10 years in Washington Vancouver isqua Kent um wache a few others around so anyway that's me good evening I'm Dr Michelle price Superintendent at North Central Educational Service District currently in Wane I've got 36 years of experience in the state of Washington I've been a special education teacher in the Tacoma School District principal Soap Lake Moses Lake uh assistant superintendent superintendent

060and then ended up at the estd so uh it's been a wonderful ride and I'm excited to help you find your best candidate Mary Alice thank you so I'm Mary Alice huel I am a lifetime educator a lifelong learner uh I have also been in the classroom 12 13 years followed by teaching K12 special education um taught at West Point Military Academy for a number of years in math and science got my admin credentials became a principal of a Middle School uh in he Washington from there went to um OSI and I was the deputy State superintendent back in the Years with Terry bergerson and from there had the opportunity to become a superintendent in Renton and that's where I have huge connections with Northshore with your previous superintendent um of course Dolores Gibbons uh

061when she came in to try to help Northshore uh in your in your difficult time uh she had just retired from Renton and that's when I became superintendent and so all of us were colleagues in that time period of course um I I'm connected with so many of them Beyond those years because of my work at the state level um so I was in Renton for eight years and intended to go back to the superintendent position but a call to be the chief of staff for governor Insley to to launch his administration agreed to do that for 2 years and again was going back to the superintendency because that was the highlight of my um time in education for sure uh but then got called to serve at the bill Melinda Gates Foundation so I

062spent eight years as the deputy for strategy in K12 education investments in philanthropy so again a huge honor and opportunity and the last few years years I've been doing this work am thrilled to be connected with M ferson and Jacobson um and I also do work helping to support new superintendents in their role work with school boards strategic planning Etc so a high level that's me thrilled to be here I know I'm connected with a number of people still in your District um and so I look forward to hopefully the opportunity to work with all of you thank you Mary Ellis so so what we believe that every student is entitled to high quality education I know you guys are very involved in EI in equity as well we do this because it's important to

063us personally and we think it's important to the future of our communities and the future of the children and the the Democracy so we believe in this process we believe in high quality education and that's dependent upon the best leader if you don't have a good leader you're not going to get a high quality lead leadership or you're going to have churn in the district if you have to keep changing people so that's important to us and we provide that our missions to ensure the search process is your process we have a protocol we have whatever um it and works really well we have extremely high retention rates of the thousand people we've done are place over the last 30 years 80% of the people are still in the chair after 5 years and 60%

064are in the chair after 10 so we have retention we have get the right fit for you and that's what it's all about we want to make sure that the person we get is not just credential it's not experience it's the person that has the skill set that you need to come and fill your needs that to us is extremely important all right what we bring fison Jacobson we bring you wealth of experience uh we are an established firm nationally 31 years of experience um we bring Washington State experience so the three of us will be your team and we have like you said over 80 years of experience between the three of us um we have a nationwide network of over 130 um Consultants that help with searches Across the Nation so we can

065tap them for resources and for getting the message out uh to other uh states of the search and then also we um just have this uh opportunity for Consultants uh all over to bring help to us here all right what else do we bring all right transparency with you our clients um we want to make sure that everything is what your needs are not what our needs are so this is customized search for your needs um authentic engagement with your stakeholders we know that to really have a good search process you have to engage the people that are going to be served by this leadership while they're in your district and then a track record of successful placements as Steve shared over 80% of our candidates stay in their district and so that's really great

066news that it's a a match for the board and for the candidate all right you're you're the lead we're your partners nickf and Jacobson we really believe to following a structured process that is above board transparent um and that we can go with you from the beginning to the end um we'll make sure that you have the best person in place um we we uh again you're in charge this is about you finding your best person and we're just facilitating the process for you next slide please all right we'll stick to details we have timelines that we'll share U have presented that's in the packet I guess um and that is a suggestion for a timeline but it's flexible so if you want to make modifications to it want to see some changes we'll stick

067to those and based on what your needs are um and then really digging in with the stakeholders whoever it is is that you say is most important for us to be meeting with so it's board members individually it's your admin team it's your leadership of your associations it's your community members your business partners um whoever you think are most important for us to be meeting with to gather information is who we will spend time with to make sure you have the right person and lastly it's customized all of your applications the Flyers everything the interview questions are all customized for your District we're not do replicating what's been done down the road or in another District it's customized for you and then we provide support and will help bring information to you to evaluate the

068appropriate salary and benefits of what like-sized districts across the region would be generating uh helping with recruitment what does it look like if you have to pay moving expenses what could you anticipate um and helping you with contract terms so as you're getting ready to offer the position and lastly you know there's all those open meeting rules and making sure that we follow each step along the way of when can be executive session when can it be when does it have to be open session what are all those requirements and advertising we can make sure that we just are on track with everything that Washington State requires there for keeping us above board and transparent with your community okay so now I get to jump in and first one want to just acknowledge the amazing

069colleagues in all of the search firms there are wonderful people who do this work and so what sets us apart what's the mcferson Jacobson uh piece and so first it's Pride uh pride in the data pride in the work and again uh the three of us stepping forward to do this search for Northshore um pride in our work uh will not be compromised in any way uh The Firm has over a th000 successful superintendent search searches in 45 States and the retention of candidates you can see the data there is very impressive um 40% of the candidates have been in the the positions over 15 years so longevity matters uh that's what we want to find is the perfect fit for Northshore and hopefully the support um for the the goals that you have for

070the district next uh Mick ferson uh it's all about integrity and courage uh ability to have the courageous conversations uh will do whatever it takes to get the job done and to do it well um my colleagues talked about the flexible customization of the search uh protocols we really focus on meeting the individual needs of Northshore and the board uh requests and priorities uh our team is very skilled we have the ability uh to have the courageous conversations when we have to dig deep into applicants and their backgrounds so that we can make sure we know um everything there is to know about them for the board to make an informed decision uh attention to detail next slide we really identify uh how do you eat an elephant one one bite at a time it's

071critically important tasks um we partner with uh the board with leadership of the district uh to execute on the plan that we develop together and we pay attention to every detail that makes the search Unique for you and finally uh commitment the commitment we have um mcferson and Jacobson stands on the strengths of the references that are available for um any and all of you for previous searches uh everything we do we are representing you as the board of directors uh of Northshore School District um mcferson offers a guarantee that um I believe Steve will be talking about at the end with um a 2-year search again uh if something doesn't happen but we don't expect that we expect this to work well uh we offer also an optional um very intensive first year Support

072Program uh for your new superintendent and for the board um bottom line is mcferson and Jacobson is with you every step of the way and so the timeline um of course the search timeline is carefully established it's specifically tailored there is a draft for you but it is 100% um flexible and typically it's 8 to 12 weeks from the first official meeting with the board until the final candidate is selected so I will turn it back to Steve he'll go quickly through the five phases and then we'll have um time for questions thanks Steve thanks Mar appreciate that so the phase first phase is getting to know you you get to know us we get to know what your needs are identify the characteristics because this is all again about finding the right fit for

073you so that means what kinds of experiences what kinds of skill sets um what kind of training does this person have um we'll find that from you and from your stakeholder group we'll determine the venues we'll determine salary ranges and then we'll post uh specific job posting just for you phase two we'll meet with those stakeholder groups to find out we'll ask some the same four questions that we will post online in multiple languages um that you could choose and you'll receive all of that feedback from us you'll get the raw data from from the online surveys the only thing we take out will be any profanity or anybody's name but you get all the it's a data dump so you'll get all of that and then you'll get from us a summary executive summary

074of what we found from our meetings whether they be in person or online um we send out and receive of course the applications and we actively recruit it's not a passive thing with 13 people across the nation um and people in the state of course know El candidates they'll see those openings and they'll suggest to that person hey this is a good position you should take a look at it moreover we send out um electronic notifications to people who are in the database who have filed uh their resumés with us and usually it's about 200 every time we do that although we have a lot more people in the system than that um so we'll read once it closes we'll evaluate all the applications we'll show you all the applicants but we'll bring you a

075short list of those people who best fit the characteristics and qualities that you've Set uh we do a reference check of course we do what we call 3D we don't do just their references we have people in the area we have people that know their work we will call them we'll talk to them to be sure they are who they say they are in the skill sets and they of course do that social media backgrounding as well that's all part of it as well in phase four um there there's your short list we assist you in identifying the candidates you want to interview help you with the interview process help you develop questions we have a large Bank of questions you can write your own you can use some of ours or modify ours if

076you wish we'll uh cordinate schedule the interviews and we keep all the candidates informed of where they are in the process and then there is Phase five um phase five actually is after you select your next superintendent so we'll establish performance objectives and this is how you get the two-year guarantee we want to be sure that that first year is successful and that means that people are very clear about what the goals are and what success looks like for those goals everybody is going to have agreement on that so you don't get to the end of the year and people have different ideas of what success was going to look like so that's how you trigger the 2-year guarantee for us um then beyond that we actually can provide um superintendent monitoring mentoring rather and

077board support after that but that's an optional piece that is not part of this current contract not to exceed $ 31,300 that means all in all expenses everything not to exceed if we go over that that's our problem not yours that includes phases 1 through 5 30 days advertising on aasa 30 days on top job or top schools 30 days on the National Alliance of black school Educators six weeks on Association of Latino administrators and superintendents a posting in was Washington State School director's Association one on the administrator website two days of online meetings but we're willing to come in and do onsite if you need that as well um video interviews of candidates which you will provide you'll be provided with a short list videos so you'll see these people you'll see the paperwork

078and then you'll have a chance to decide who you want to interview um we'll do criminal financial and degree background verifications on those chosen for interviews travel expenses are included in this office expenses are also included in this questions yeah so thank you I'll kick us off so we you know with our joint meeting we have about so we started a little late so we have about 10 minutes yes for questions but I'll I'll kick this off so um within norshore we have a a wonderful Rich um diverse community and it's really a core pillar of ours to make sure we authentically engage with everyone and so I'm I'm wondering first of all what your strategies are in terms of engaging with diverse communities to make sure that um input not just to the superintendent

079profile but also to the selection of the final yeah how well and follow up with that really quick is also I noticed on your schedule that between phase one and phase two it looked like the job post happens before the first stakeholder engagement in phase two because it's just basically saying we have an opening more information to come so we want to get that information out there so people are oh look here it is let's start getting ready let's find out what's going on because all that other information is added later on the profile and Etc and so the characteristics and stuff will be provided on later but we wanted to get maximum Expos oh okay all right yeah so yeah so um the other thing is it's partly what would you like how would

080you like it done I've been in situations where we've had three simultaneous translations going on at the same time so it had big public meeting and we had you know the headsets and the the translators going at the same time so that's one way of doing it that we can also post the questions um in multiple languages and then get those translated get back to you one of the things that we did I did when I did the Vancouver search was the board identified specific groups the tribal organization um NAACP and other groups the Hispanic groups and so we had special meetings with just those groups that just those individuals or the leadership of those teams uh or those organizations so it's kind of your choice what you decide to do we can do it

081we have a protocol to do it but if you want to do something different or you know the needs of individuals are different then we're happy to do that sorry about the longwinded answer no no no that's it's helpful and um just really quick followup before I let my colleagues have a turn um the translation so is that included in your fee and do you have a a pool of translators that you work with we have Spanish okay and we can conduct uh meetings in Spanish but um we we don't have others usually the districts have people that we rely on okay helpful to know we have a large port speaking no follow portuges there you go okay thank you um questions see yes yeah so you you mentioned the with the finding of candidates

082you do like a save to date and then are you creating sort of like a district profile when you're posting um for the recruit process okay yeah for the engagements with the community stakeholders and with the board created okay okay you're done okay um so can you tell me a little bit more about your survey uh what it would look like translations the contents of the surve yeah it's U it actually our survey is designed to help us with the vetting process and in the selection process of your uh short list so we asked four questions but we can modify it and we can uh again if you want to ask different questions we're more than willing to do that too but the four that we use to help us what's good about the community

083that helps again about the recruitment what's good about the district again a recruitment piece what are the issues the new superintendent is going to face upon entry and that helps us with the ranking sorting and short listing and the fourth one is what are the characteristics qualities and experiences that this new superintendent will need to have to be successful in this district and so those four are the standard four that we ask have said that if you want to add modify or change we're more than willing to do that but those are the four we ask so that we can vet the people thank you okay um so um this is a short question um to start with but who will be our point of contacts that we're working with okay um just we want

084to make sure 24 seven I used to be a superintendent so you'll have my cell phone number you'll have uh and I take calls in Portugal where I'm going here in few hence Portuguese the Portuguese should not be yeah excent excellent that's great um just yeah we just want to make sure that because this kind of like a dating site right so um that it's someone that understands the qualities of norshore and where we're at and what we're needing as we go forward um it's kind of czy that excitement out there of there's a lot of excitement already yeah good um okay so um we've talked some a little bit about Community engagement and and mostly we've addressed the first part of community engagement that creation of the superintendent profile for the advertisement but then

085there's also Community engagement around the finalists and um and so could you talk a little bit more what that looks like and I haven't heard much about students engag students yeah when we always engage students in I think it should have been on the the calendar that was in there the draft calendar but if if it's not I apologize we engage teachers we engage students we engage parents we engage elected officials again whatever that group that you want but always students just because we find that they're such an important part of the process and you want them to feel like they're engaged you want to hear their voice um but as far as the public viewing the candidate that again is your choice some District want it completely inhouse and announce later if we don't

086like that we like much better to have that person in a full day for each of your finalists and it turns out to be 14 hours right you start meeting with your Association people early in the morning you can meet with your district office staff a little later on there's usually a lunch in for somebody and then there's going to be a time when they're going to present to a community and then you're going to we we recommend that you guys individually meet and have a meal an evening meal with that person and their significant other totally Off Script if you will because again it's about dating it's about fit and we want you to get to know this these people bless you want to get to know these people outside of their performance right

087and so that's why we think find that to be very important you get to know them on a different level hey do you like baseball do you like whatever you like do you like ski what do you like to do and so so you do that and we want their significant other to be here as well because it's got to be a fit for them otherwise it'll be a short term and that's not what we're here for so the process is really up to you you get to decide the venues but we have a script of extremely busy day so while the the candidates doing that the significant other tends to go on a tour and so you have somebody that does that for them so that they know the community great all right do

088we have any other followup questions I think I'm good I'm good all right well thank you for your time really appreciate it so let me just tell you this in closing we're here for the long run if we're selected we don't go away at the end of the contract we're here you can call us you'll be able will come and do work for you um it's it's a commitment about making a difference right I don't know why I'm doing this at 73 I'm doing it because I'm doing it because I continue to want to make a difference in the lives of children in community and that's why we do this it's very very important and whatever it takes the job whatever it takes to get it done we're going to do if it's not on

089the list we're going to come and get it done and we're not going to charge any more than we said Dr thank you all very much for your time this afternoon thank you very much look forward to the opportunity to work with the team great thank you and we are the a team so [Laughter] you it was fun coming in today because we know all the other Consultants also work with all of them in some way shape or form over the last 10 years and it's like oh my gosh we're huging on each other was just fun to be in the lobby today so thank you thank you so much I hope I think we're on time we did yeah that was that was 30 minutes thank you thank you to work with Youk you

090so thank you so we did work in time for a break before our last one at 5:30 that was Peggy's idea again Peggy wise Peggy is Wise Wise Wise she is because it's it's a fire hose so yeah it it's been a lot to transition between yeah that was a quick transition right there it was a quick transition so this way we can take a little break we can just let the live stream go and okay um if I am going to walk to a lady's room but I will we'll be right back yes okay all right we'll be starting back up at well we'll bring the next group in at 5:30 how's that s or do we want to bring them in a few minutes early so they can get set up set up

091yeah that's a good idea yes we will have time all right so 525 we'll bring them in I'll just do a quick bi we're going to do a quick bio break oh quick for [Music] sorry what's up I need a snack oh you're fine eat you're good you want you want the mic I can put it up next to your mouth for for for [Music] so we got out the door on time to the bus oh see that the magic of cadberry eggs the magic catberry really he didn't want the Reese's ones or the Hershey ones he wanted to that bag that's quality chocolate right there yeah yeah I mean like he knows CAD berries is superior to hery it isal those little the little eggs when when I you know was Easter egg hunting

092as a child those cadburry eggs were like like the ones with the stuff in them the marshmallow melted marshmallow yeah the ones that looks like an egg inside that is quality cadburry Factory in Birmingham England fresh hi there hi everyone hi thanks for joining us up come say hi first hi Amy hi yeah I'm Amy nice to meet you hi I'm H H nice to meet you Elizabeth hi Elizabeth meet you and I'm Sandy sand me oh thank you Elizabeth it's a pleasure to meet you how are you I'm good doing okay today huh made it this far so you guys are put in a long day it's a Monday it's a Monday good to see you it's good to see you as well thank you pleasure thank you for the absolutely yeah so they

093did not I don't know what they were thinking like every and you the same home for each person onone ex live um tour and so I had like all my kids with four little box bu candy I had this wait did you have to did you then have to buy that candy that was just that was just all the samples all the samples sorry I was oh the The cadburry Factory Birmingham I'm pretty sure that somebody in their marketing department was like okay stop giving all the free candy away the purpose of all tours ending in the gift shop is for them to buy it they give them a small piece to eat right now right right one and then they want it crazy oh man that sounds delicious yeah it was amazing a little

094prote y that's that's how you make yourself not like that TR you big so can can you see the name of the searer they started I felt bad because they never sign Fon and Jacobson until like oh that's what I was yes that's I was trying to prompt the and the name of the search firm is so when you guys start your presentation make sure you say the name of here for our friends of home yeah yeah so yeah one thing um so I was a board member absolutely not been a board chair so we'll make sure we do the official wonderful oh wonderful well and thank you you know we we want to recognize that the 30 minutes is a tight time frame but we have a city council meeting to go to after

095this we do a joint meeting once a year yeah so that hence the tight time frame so thank you for understanding that so um we definitely do have some questions that we'll want to work in you know at least 10 minutes for at the end yeah um but as part of that 30 minutes just to be clear but yeah if um if you want to you know we just said hello informally but we are the NorthShore School Board minus one we're missing um Dr mccordi Who's traveling but watching the live stream right now excellent yes hello yes yeah she is she is going through a little fomo she wishes she was here I heard about it this weekend so family plans happen but um yeah so if you if you want to introduce yourself and

096go ahead and kick us off do that well hello everyone um in present and also online thank you for having us we are Ray and Associates my name is Libra Ford and we've got some formal introductions but we'll do quick ones yeah absolutely and Dr Rich McBride as well nice to meet you all nice to meet you too um so first and foremost we are excited to be here because we know that one of the major roles of being a a school board member is hiring and so here we are and so you've reached this Milestone which can be dating daunting but we're here to make it fun and absolutely successful so our team is led by Dr Steve Chestnut who unfortunately could not be here he had family obligations but he is always by

097our side and he is a deep root in Washington being from here his mother is still here and he has deep uh history in the education world my name is uh Libra Ford and my education advocacy began in Hawaii I started the first hybrid School in Hawaii moved to Oregon and then I was a school board member for two terms one of them being a chair during the pandemic welcome little bit of new over the crow but the fun part that I also like to share with people besides my um the fact that I love working for R Associates we when I was chair hired R Associates and so I was so um compelled by the experience that I decided to become one of the Associates and then I will pass it off to nice

098nice well again thank you for the gracious invite tonight again I am Dr Rich McBride it's a pleasure to be with you tonight um and I want to again thank thank Liber for inviting me along tonight you get you get the school board member and you get the superintendent along along with the team tonight uh by Bo background I'm a former uh local school district superintendent for 20 years uh I finished my career last 15 years as an ESD superintendent I was a regional superintendent out of the wachi out of the wachi area uh I am a past a Wasa State president uh I am past National president of the ESD Association and so um among our team we bring some really deep roots and connections both here in state as well as across the

099country yeah excited to have our team we're nice triangulation of many things in addition to the two of us we also have Richard lasso who is also our bilingual associate he speaks Spanish and he is local here p p paa Pala there it is I never say it correctly thank you um and he is a part of the cabinet there so has some other um experience there and he's been with our team for now almost a year and then David Dr David is also someone that we bring in when we can't have three at a time we always try to have three members at a time and so he'll step in um when we need him to uh at any time so your highlights it is very clear you guys are student centered and that

100is very important it is also very clear that having a board that looks like you guys is very different and unique and Powerful so I first just want to say I want to commend you for bringing the strength of community and who you are and the strength of being student centered together to really hit these five points I think it's a brilliant connection and it is always nice to see a strong board so thank you and we're excited to work through this Mission and this goal with you um in addition to that I will also let um Rich chime in on the mission yeah absolutely yeah so as we were looking at at the mission and especially the outcomes that were on the previous slide especially one of the things we feel is really really

101important in this search process is to make sure that the the mission that the outcomes the expectations that all that you all have for your school district right and by association with your superintendent those values should permeate this entire search process from the very beginning when we start the marketing for the right candidate all the way through the screening process all the way through the public input process all the way through the final selection the values that you've established through your mission statement and those expectations become become critically important and I think one of the things that sets sets our process aside maybe from others in this particular case is that we think that uh we want to bring you finalists bring to for for candidates in this work that not only can articulate your

102values articulate your mission right but that they can actually do it it's one thing to articulate the work and say yep I believe in it we want to bring you candidates who actually have demonstrated that they have the ability to do so right and the analogy I use often is like when you're you have a you have a great blueprint for a beautiful home that you want to build the real trick is to get the right Builder to come along and build that home for you and so we want to go out and help you have a beautiful plan we just want to help you identify the right Builder as we go forward I like that it just works it just works so who are we Ray Associates um there's a couple things that I

103just want to bring home because we watched your video when you evaluated our proposal um and and the first thing that I really want to bring in the fact that we are a very diverse group of Associates over 40% of us are um from uh are women um and over 45% of us are minorities and so that is a very important fact of who we are in addition to that we have extreme diverse backgrounds like I said I'm a Schoolboard member we have C and superintendence and so it brings in a lot of different experiences and allows you as a board to really experience us um in a way that you need for right now we are committed to bringing you the best candidates as Rich was bringing um up to you and how we

104do that is really unique and we're pretty excited about it um one thing that rich and I was talking about is uh we look different than maybe the the rain Associates that was here in 2016 but we have the same type of structure we bring in our current expertise and our current experiences our lived experience to make that structure work but it is a it is a long lived structure that works and we're pretty proud of that and how we do it um our process is of course diverse we want to do this with you we are we are your extension we are not you but we want to make sure that you feel confident and empowered in this process every step of the way and me personally as a former Schoolboard member that's gone

105through this it is very important to me that we hear where you're at not just in terms of transactional but also transformational wise in terms of where you're how you're feeling about it and even now we still have contact with some local um Washington School boards that still have questions after the search is over and we still answer them so we want to make sure we walk through that with you so we have a five-stage process it begins with the board input and in that um we're going to talk about in our proposal there's a timeline that we proposed to you on page 21 in that original proposal and that of course can be adjusted but we're talking to the board about that timeline in this stage one we're also developing an ideal candidate we

106do one-on-one interviews with every board memb to make sure that we know what you're looking for who you're looking for what matters to you as a board member cuz each one of you represent different constituents what does that look like we pull all that together and we make sure that we talk about the compensation and that is where stage one we put that board input together and we move into stage two which is where we develop a profile this profile is how we all stay on the sage page it's we say okay this is what we agreed upon this is what everyone had input on this is where we're at and um from that we also include and this was one thing that you brought up in your meeting how do they include students how

107do they include input from the community community and so we have a very robust way of including students by doing um oneon-one sessions where we come here physically and we have a student session we have a parent session we have a community stakeholder session we have cabinet sessions we have very specific teachers we have classified and non-classified and each group gets to sit with us and do the same thing that you did with us and give us the input and then we give you that feedback to help build this profile we also use a 31 quality assessment which is online and that allows community members that can't physically be here to answer the questions and give feedback and we allow you to see everything in the entire process Kathy who is always working behind the

108scenes we send her everything and they get she gathers it so we're really quick at making sure that what is being inputed is getting outputed to you immediately then stage through is stage three is where we take that profile and we begin to recruit so we take our robust list of people from our database WE Post wherever we agree that you want to see these postings and then we begin to take that profile that's designed is also a sample of the profile in your proposal also that becomes how we advertise this position we don't just do passive advertising though we're aggressive and looking for people that we know will fit well in this candidate pool from the fact that Rich has connections here in Washington Steve has Connections in Washington Richard has Connections in Washington

109I'm in Oregon but I've done a lot of searches here so I I know know a few now um so we'll call people that we know are really good candidates for that job and that's stage three stage four is where the candidate pool comes in and this is exciting for us because this is when we get to introduce to you who has bubbled up to the top now one another thing that you said in your um discussions was do we get to see everything yes what we do is a interview process where you'll see a video we do in um impromptu questions they have a certain amount of time to answer you're going to get access to all of the candidates information but we will give you the top 10 you can see everyone like

110we're currently in a search over 34 but we will say to you here's the top 10 that we believe best fit this profile that you designed based on all of the input these are the top 10 but you're welcome to see them all from the interview um the video to their paperwork to the references we have packets on each one and we'll give them to you throughout the process um and then what I love is the board selection process which is really unique to Ray and Associates um we reviewed a top candidates with you and we have a consensus building Matrix that we use that is very accurate um this process can be daunting when you're having discussions about different people everybody has something unique about them and Brilliant about them and so it's very

111difficult to kind of match them up sometimes and so our consensus building Matrix helps you kind of take take the emotions out of it and you got we guide you in having deeper discussion in a way that's guided and effective um so that's the gist of our fstep process again I want to get through it fast because I know you guys have questions rich and I will answer your questions as best as we can and then before we leave I just want to touch on some things that I that I overheard you guys say in the meeting about our proposal that I want to make sure I clarify so that you have those answers also so we're open to questions all right great I'll go ahead and dive in so um like like you already

112mentioned and picked up in our discussion before we have very um dedicated commitments to community engagement with all aspects of our community and we we love it and it's a core value of ours and so I would love to hear your thoughts in terms of both the creation of the candidate profile as well as the finalist process selection and and choice of the the ultimate candidate um you know how how you see that those processes being successful especially as we really want to make sure we engage people um from all our diverse communities yeah um so I'll first dive into how do we engage your stakeholders successfully U we use multiple languages based on our interview our discussions with you what languages does this need to be in I mean we currently have a district

113where one of the languages ver and so we engage in that way right so we understood that this can't be a written survey we have to show up with the proper people and make sure that the translators are there but that process is very engaging we sit with them we're asking them the questions we're listening a lot of just kind of discussion and then we're reporting on that um from their perspective to you and it's not just what's in the room it's also that online one so they can walk away and even though the online one is for folks that maybe room they can also walk away and do that also so maybe it was a room that they felt there were people that they didn't want to say everything then the online process helps

114them engage in that way so how do we then keep this uh selection how does that go from the selection all of that input is shared with you and where you find um points of importance we will include in the profile we design a profile with you and so if there's things that the stakeholders say that you're like we need to put that in there that's going to do and then how does that translate into a diverse pool of um candidates that profile will be 10 to 15 things that we all agree upon that we've heard from stakeholders that we've heard from you that we've heard from community and and also staff classified and non-classified and we will make sure that when we have the candidates that we bring to you that they are a

115diverse pool I will tell you personally uh my team knows this I am um the first to uh make sure that we have a nice spread in terms of who's on the list um it's very important to me my day job is I work for women's Foundation of Oregon I fight for women and girls every day I also fight for uh mostly uh unfortunately the most marginalized um which can be people of color and so that is usually my uh core value because it is the Cornerstone of who I am but between our structure between our experience with with the community and then between our lived experience on our team we then present you what we feel is going to um operationalize what you said to us what the community said to us what the

116stakeholders have said to us is that yeah it it's helpful just really quick kind of logistical follow-up question for so for the translation do you CH do you tend to use a pool of translators do you have some digital tools that you use just um thinking about the logistical side of that as we so for Spanish we have someone obviously in our team um if you guys have people then we're open to using your staff it's normally a district like in my school district we have translators there and so we were able to use our own um but we're open to whatever your community is going to answer well to we're not going to create it in a way that's like well this is what we always do nope we have all of those options

117that you said but we're open to whatever you know is best for your community and if that means we need to bring someone new in then we'll find that person and bring them in okay thank you y anybody has questions before I get my organized yeah we can um can pop around I can I can ask a couple questions um so I curious specific to Ray and Associates um why the change in the the people working for the organization so we're all Consultants um um uh when I started Kathy was the through line and um she's been there for a very long time but Consultants come and go like I don't always take every job because I also have a day job and we all have different responsibilities we also have a um a required

118minimum and a required maximum so sometimes faces will change because a person has more than two searches and so they won't send them to another search because that's not appropriate so they'll find another associate to come in we want to dedicate our time completely and fully and so a lot of times I will also change it so between the fact that it's it's a consultant gig it's not there's no insurance there's those things so people come and go and the fact that we do have a a maximum you're going to see different faces um as we go okay so a followup question to that are we going to be working specifically with the two of you or other parts of the team so when they send us out out we are the core group so

119once we are here presenting this is who you work with um but that maximum is that's when they pick it so when they say who can go if you say yes and you're over they're like no thanks we need someone else um so we are the group we are your core group okay right um oh it's it likes to go sleep we we'll wake it upy um uh uh because you all are um you know uh doing this partially part-time um sort of what is the access to you going to be like and you know when you have those full days like if we have a finalist and we're interviewing them and it's kind of a a roll around the district and that whole whole thing U what does what does that look like yeah

120you know so the schedule that we agree upon with you is a schedule that Consultants commit to okay um so if you say these are the days and those are the days that the Consultants commit to now out of our Core Group Richard um and myself and also Rich we are uh we have employment other other places but your lead person Steve is retired and so he is fully committed he meets with the board chair every week um and then he creates a recap for everyone where we engage that way um but the the schedule that you see us all is based on what we agree upon and that is our commitment as consultants to say once that schedule set we're here barring sickness or you know some emergency but that we're committed to that

121that is our part-time schedule which is why there's a maximum because that's how we're able to do it okay well you all asked my questions already I'm going take that as a compliment that you liked what I asked um so I'll just ask um what what does the field look like um are we late or um right on time what are people excited what are you hearing about um so I'll answer from an Associates but you're in the field so I'm going to let you also answer so from Associates you're right on time you're doing really good with timing um we did one in December that was weird CU it was vacation