On May 1, the Boston School Committee voted 5-2 to offer the position of superintendent of the Boston Public Schools to Brenda Cassellius, who most recently stepped down as commissioner of education for the state of Minnesota.
The vote was taken during a meeting where School Committee members publicly debated the qualifications of the three finalists for the superintendent position, which also included Oscar Santos, head of school for Cathedral 7-12 High School in Boston, and Marie Izquierdo, chief academic officer for Miami-Dade County Public Schools in Florida.
Numerous public interviews with the three candidates were held with various stakeholder groups last week. Each candidate participated in a day-long round of four public interviews, totaling nearly 20 hours, which were grouped with community partners, parents, educators, and students. Video footage of the interviews is available at https://bostonpublicschools.org/superintendentsearch.
Elvis Rodriguez, a junior at Snowden International High School, is the first student in recent memory to participate on the Superintendent Search Committee and have a vote during the process of finalizing the selection of candidates; and the committee used 12 parents across various panels. The co-chairs of the Superintendent Search Committee were Alexandra Oliver-Davila, vice chairperson of the Boston School Committee and executive director of Sociedad Latina, and J. Keith Motley, former chancellor of the UMass Boston.
Cassellius must formally accept the offer for the BPS position and would need to finalize conditions of her employment, including a salary and a starting date, through negotiations with the School Committee.