Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Special to the Signal

What do you think are the skills and abilities the next superintendent of the Lowndes County Public Schools needs? That’s the question being posed in a survey as part of a search for the new leader.

The Alabama Association of School Boards (AASB), at the request of the Lowndes County Board of Education, is urging all county residents and school system employees to take a special survey online before Sunday, July 22.

Survey participants can take the survey at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/Lowndes2018, and the school system will post a link to it on the system’s website as well.

“The goal of the survey is to give parents, guardians, employees, business leaders and local residents the chance to tell the school board what they think the next superintendent needs to know and be able to do in order to be successful as the superintendent,” said Dr. James Wright, who is leading the search on behalf of the school board association.

“It also asks things like whether the superintendent should be hired from within the system and what challenges they think the system is facing that the next superintendent will need to address,” he said.

According to the AASB, the survey is short – less than eight questions. But the results will be extremely helpful in the process of choosing the right leader for the system, Wright said.

All survey responses are anonymous and a report on the results will be delivered at a Lowndes County school board meeting before month’s end.

The AASB is handling the recruiting and application process for the search. It will screen the applicants, and, on Aug. 13, deliver to the board the applications of the top five applicants. The board will then hold public interviews of the five and choose a new superintendent.

Both AASB and the board will use the results of the survey in their selection work.