More information continues to trickle out about two major projects at Niles Community Schools: the search for a new superintendent and the possible placement of a bond issue on the spring ballot.

At Monday’s regular meeting, Interim Supt. Michael Lindley presented tentative timelines for each project to members of the Board of Education.

 

Superintendent search

According to the superintendent search timeline, the board plans to advertise the job by the middle of October, while continuing to gain input from staff and the community about the qualities they are looking for in the district’s new leader.

An application deadline is set for Dec. 1, with initial interviews scheduled to begin in January. Follow-up interviews and site visits will take place in January and February. The district plans to select its new superintendent in February or March and have him or her on site by the first of July.

Lindley said the timeline is not set in stone.

“It is a basic guideline to keep us on track and make sure we end up where we want to,” he said. “The most important thing is to find the right candidate. For example, if we take applications for five weeks and we don’t get what we are looking for we might extend it.”

Lindley will meet with the board’s design committee Oct. 1 to discuss results of a community survey and come up with the minimum qualifications, start date, contract length and minimum salary for the superintendent position.

Lindley said they hope to have that information ready to go by the board’s Oct. 6 meeting.

 

Bond issue

For the bond issue, the timeline shows the district’s goal is to have the bond placed on the May 2015 ballot.

The district has hired TMP Architecture to do an assessment of the district’s buildings in order to come up with a list of needs that could be addressed by a bond. TMP is in the process of doing that now.

That list, along with community and staff input, would be used to develop possible projects that would be financed by the bond.

According to the timeline, program options for the bond will be finished sometime in October. Once those are developed, the district will share that information with the community using public forums and other means, also in October. The district hopes to have a consensus on the bond project by November so it can seek formal approval from the state’s Department of Treasury in December.