MONROE — The search for a new school superintendent has kicked off in earnest with the district on Sunday hosting the first of several “listening” sessions designed to gauge what the community wants in a new school leader.

Leading the effort is Mike Richie, a former school superintendent with the firm Hazard, Young and Attea, which has been contracted by the School District of Monroe to help it find a replacement for District Administrator Risk Waski, a fixture in Monroe Schools for more than a decade who earlier this year decided to leave his post, citing medical reasons.

Waski, who assumed the office of district administrator in 2017, was principal of Monroe High School from 2010 to 2013 before serving as district administrator for the Adams-Friendship school district between 2013-17.

Richie said the board’s search thus far is going extremely well with lots of very qualified candidates.

“The good news is the applications are coming in and going to have a very strong slate of candidates,” Richie told the roughly 15 participants in a virtual Zoom meeting Sunday night. “Our search is a really good road map for a good hire.”

That was one of the first in a series of focus groups the firm is planning to schedule with students, staff and community members in the weeks ahead. He began by asking participants what they are most proud of about the Monroe district and what they would like to change.

Kyle Baker, a parent of two middle school-aged students, was vocal in describing the changes he’d like to see in the future.

“We think it’s going to be really, really important moving forward to pick the right superintendent (to take the district) in a different direction than it’s been going so far,” he said, noting that the district seems to be doing well at the lower-level grades.

But as for middle and high school, he said, much more attention needs to be paid to improving academic performance as reflected in the state report card for high school and middle school.

“We are really disappointed in those numbers,” he said, adding that communication among parents, staff and students also needs to vastly improve.

Richie, the search facilitator, said there needs to be a concerted effort to define the “root cause” of academic issues with data-driven solutions. 

“My assumption is there isn’t any one answer to that (problem),” he said. “Monroe is looking for an instructional leader, and I am aware the (achievement) scores are low.” 

Baker agreed, and said he hopes the superintendent search will add a strong sense of urgency to address academic performance, especially when it comes to the bottom 25th percentile of student performers. Towards that end, the district should look to more continuity between high school, middle school and elementary school curriculum. 

“It needs to be viewed as (one) kindergarten through 12th (grade) curriculum,” he said, noting that it seems that, currently, instruction is confined to individual silos among the three levels of students.

The next listening session was scheduled for Tuesday, March 15.