Albert Lea school board picks 4 finalists

Members initially sought 3 picks

Published Friday, February 6, 2009

The Albert Lea school board on Thursday winnowed the six superintendent finalists to four.

After hearing from administrators and after board dialogue, board members voted on scratch paper for three finalists. They found disagreement on who should be the third choice. A discussion pursued on whether to add a fourth finalist. Three of the six board members favored bringing four candidates back to Albert Lea for further interviews.

In order of the backing they had from board members, the four finalists are:

Cathy Bettino

Mike Funk

John Chalstrom

Joe Brown

• Cathy Bettino, superintendent of the Pine River-Backus School District.

• Mike Funk, superintendent of the Bird Island, Olivia, Lake Lillian School District, often termed BOLD.

• John Chalstrom, superintendent, Cherokee (Iowa) Community School District.

• Joe Brown, superintendent, Grand Meadow School District.

Superintendent Dave Prescott retires June 30. He does not participate in the selection process.

In discussion about the final three, former board chairman Ken Petersen listed Bettino, Funk and Chalstrom as his favorites. He said he looked at four key areas: personnel management, student achievement, approaches to diversity and personality fit.

Board members generally agreed that Bettino and Funk made the cut but Sally Ehrhardt was the first to mention she was unsure about Chalstrom, noting he was intelligent but dry. Linda Laurie agreed and said he didn’t relate well in his interview.

Then Jolinda Schreiber cited Chalstrom for failing to say much about goals. She suggested going with Brown. The board members called the candidates by numbers, not names, during the deliberations.

Schreiber said Brown was the only one who dealt with hard-to-answer questions to losing enrollment. Grand Meadow is growing in enrollment.

“In hard times, you have to have somebody who is different,” Schreiber said.

The knock on Brown was that he gave long, political-type answers that didn’t exactly give answers to the questions, and Chalstrom was said to look good on paper though his interview was lacking in appeal.

Villarreal said he is not a fan of interviews. He said he worried Brown will “either be very good or he’s going to be very bad.” He said Bettino, who went first on the first day of interviewing, set the bar high “but after all six I wanted to go back to Dave’s room and ask if he’ll stay a little longer.”

Two consultants from Mankato-based BKB Associates shared the board’s scratch paper findings of support and gave direction.

Ehrhardt proposed bringing back only the top two. Villarreal said it would be better to bring back the top four. The debate then turned on whether to invite three or four candidates — basically, whether to invite Brown back.

Board Chairman Bill Leland said he feels Chalstrom did not interview well but does have concrete answers in his application. Leland said he worries about Brown polarizing the district’s voters.

“We don’t need somebody who is going to bring this type of change to the district,” he said.

Brown is a former Iowa state senator whose wife is a Minnesota state representative.

Petersen noted the board will get to know the candidates better in coming rounds.

Villarreal said he likes that many candidates said they wanted to come to Albert Lea because their own children can receive a better education here than at their present districts. Other board members agreed they were impressed by the same comments.

The pay range for superintendents in the Big Nine Conference is $120,000 to $160,000. The Albert Lea superintendent position will pay somewhere in that ballpark.

Prior to the board’s talk, three administrators commented on the six finalists. Find out what they said in Sunday’s edition.

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