Call to action:
On June 27, 5 members of the RIH BOE (Kim Ansh, Marianna Emmolo, Melissa Kiel, Doreen Mariani and Audrey Souders) rescinded the contract of incoming Superintendent Dr. Ronnie Tarchichi.
There are now substantive reports that the RIH BOE is negotiating with a new candidate for permanent Superintendent.
If the reports are true, the new candidate has little to no educational leadership experience.
He has never been a tenured building principal, a tenured curriculum director, or a Superintendent. According to LinkedIn, he was a Business Administrator for five years, and before that a “Director” (unspecified as to Director of what) at a school district for three years. At the time the RIH BOE conducted interviews (April 2024), the candidate had only been an Assistant Superintendent in his current district for FOUR MONTHS! Interestingly, he was given this position in January 2024, on the very same day his Board approved a Separation Agreement with him effective December 1, 2024. (For those unfamiliar with this pattern of a resignation with one year pay, in the world of education it is a bit of a red flag).
We deserve better! Our students, teachers and administrators deserve better. The taxpayers deserve better.
In my opinion, the lack of educational leadership alone should have disqualified him from even an interview for our high achieving district.
The RIH BOE paid approximately $30,000 for Search Firm HYA, the firm desired by the five Board members who rescinded Tarchichi’s contract, to conduct a Superintendent Search and find us qualified candidates. How could they even bring us a candidate with so little experience? How can a candidate with no notable educational leadership experience take our district to the next level?
We deserve better!
It seems clear that the chaos in our district over the past year and a half, driven by Kim Ansh, Judy Sullivan and their majorities, may have deterred more qualified candidates from applying, and it is clear to me that the community must demand better from their elected Board members.
Once again, I strongly, strongly urge the RIH BOE to pivot, and conduct a search for a strong, experienced Interim Superintendent to stabilize the situation in our district, and at the same time conduct a new search for a Permanent Superintendent who is WELL QUALIFIED to lead our educational community.
It will be an EXTREME disservice to our educational community if the RIH BOE appoints someone with so little educational leadership experience as the CEO of our district.
Let your representatives know that you expect better. Email rihboe@rih.org
Update at July 9th at 10:30am:
The RIH BOE has announced a Special Meeting this Thursday July 11 at 7:30pm in the Board of Education Office at Indian Hills. The meeting will open to the public, then go immediately into closed session to discuss Personnel. The Board may then come back into public session to take action.
Link to Announcement: https://cdnsm5-ss11.sharpschool.com/UserFiles/Servers/Server_237981/File/Board%20of%20Ed/Minutes%20-%20Agendas/24-25/Notice/07112024%20Special%20Meeting%20Notice.pdf
Update at July 9th at 11:00am:
THE most important role a Board of Education has is to hire the educational leader for the district. If they do a good job, everything else can fall into place.