Wilson Wants Hire By End of February

RISON - Cleveland County School Board President Harrell Wilson said last week that he hopes to have a new superintendent selected by the end of February. Wilson revealed the timeline following last Thursday's regular monthly school board meeting at the administration office in Rison. He said the district had been advertising for the position for more than a month. Current Superintendent Jerrod Williams will be leaving once he completes his one-year contract on June 30. The new superintendent will officially begin on July 1. Wilson said the deadline has closed for those applying for the superintendent's position, and while he could not recall the exact number of candidates, he said it was more than 10. Wilson said he felt good about the pool of applicants. "I'm very optimistic," he said. The next step, Wilson said, is for the school board to narrow the pool down to three or four finalists, and then conduct interviews with those candidates. While he did not have an exact time as to when that would happen, he said he "definitely" wanted to have a new superintendent hired by end of February to give that person time to work with Williams on the transition. Prior to deciding to hire Williams last March, Wilson said the school board was looking for an experienced administrator who could develop a sound fiscal policy for the district moving forward. Williams has that experience after previously serving as superintendent at Sheridan, Bauxite and Pangburn. The Sheridan School Board terminated its contract with Williams in February 2022 but with some pushback from former Sheridan board members. There was also a community-driven petition to keep him on as well. The Cleveland County superintendent's job came open when former superintendent Craig Dupuy announced last February that he was resigning at the end of his contract to take an assistant superintendent's job with the Benton School District. ...