Spring-Ford: "Final decision" on superintendent "within next week or two"

Spring-Ford Area School District board president Joseph Ciresi said Monday night that the district's search for a new superintendent is nearing its conclusion.

"The board is still discussing its options. Like we stated, we met with six potential candidates. We brought one to the district. We think within the next week or two, we'll have our final decision about what we're doing and move forward," Ciresi said.

Dr. Joseph Padasak, currently superintendent of the Chambersburg Area School District, is the only candidate to succeed Dr. Marsha Hurda who has been publicly identified. Hurda is retiring after the current school year.

Ciresi's comments came in response to Upper Providence resident Kathleen Bryant, who questioned the board's interest in Padasak during the public comment period of the school board work session. Bryant cited the performance of the Chambersburg Area School District in of 500 Pennsylvania school districts' performance on the PSSA [Pennsylvania System of School Assessment] exams.

"In 2010, [Chambersburg] was rated at 365 out of 500, and in 2011, that district's performance fell 22 points to be rated at 387 out of 500. That is a pretty significant disparity. The one and only candidate who you have introduced saw a 22-point drop in performance [by his school district in the survey]. And Spring-Ford got better by 20 points," Bryant said.

"That's a totally different district in a different part of the state. I have no idea what their circumstances were coming into this," Ciresi said.

Ciresi also defended the district's decision to pay an executive search firm about $19,000 to identify candidates for the superintendent's position.

"The Pennsylvania School Board Association [PSBA] could have done this process for you for free," Bryant said.

"The PSBA would not have been free. We did look at [the] PSBA, and the PSBA was a waste of time," Ciresi said.

Ciresi said the PSBA's candidate search services were not as comprehensive as those offered by professional recruitment firms.

"PSBA, I think, was $13,000. The way PSBA contacted me was through a phone call from some unidentified person who you would have thought was soliciting for a local PAL [police athletic league] to give a donation. The PSBA was not a professional looking organization. They give you the resumes and they throw them on the table and say, 'here's what came in,'" Ciresi said.

"We did do our due diligence in looking for a firm. We did not go outside the realm of what other [school] districts do," Ciresi said.