Marblehead School Committee Delays Interim Superintendent Vote

MARBLEHEAD, MA — A scheduled discussion and possible vote on the interim leader of the Marblehead Public Schools was postponed until next week on Thursday to give School Committee members additional time to conduct reference checks on the two finalists.

The School Committee scheduled a 4:30 p.m. meeting at a site to be determined to complete their discussion and likely vote on the superintendent who will likely lead the district for most of the current academic year as a search for a full-time superintendent begins this winter.

"It's a very, very important topic," School Committee Chair Sarah Fox said. "I don't want anybody to look back and say that they were rushed in their decision, or people didn't have enough time to get feedback or anything like that.

"I also see some value in giving (the discussion and vote) its own night — this turned out to be a pretty heavy agenda — so that we don't feel like we were rushing through to get to the other pieces."

Dr. Theresa McGuinness and Dr. Jannell D. Pearson-Campbell took part in public interviews on Monday with each spending about an hour answering the same questions from the School Committee.

McGuinness, who lives in Swampscott, was the principal of the Village School in Marblehead from 2012 through 2016 before leaving for Watertown Public Schools, where she has been the assistant superintendent for the past seven years.

Pearson-Campbell was the assistant director of special education at the Waltham Public Schools from 2015 through 2020 and has since served as the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning at Old Rochester and interim superintendent at Northampton Public Schools.

The candidate will fill the position in which Assistant Superintendent of Operations and Finance Michelle Cresta has served in an acting capacity since the negotiated resignation of John Buckey with two years remaining on his contract earlier this summer.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)