Superintendent finalists converge on school district

Three finalists for the Wrangell Public School District superintendent position made a joint visit to the island earlier this week.

Patricia Hutcherson, Debbe Lancaster and Bill Schildbach were the top three of eight candidates submitted for consideration by the Association of Alaska School Boards. AASB had been contracted by the Wrangell School Board to help hire a replacement to current superintendent, Patrick Mayer, who will conclude his time in the position at the end of the school year.

Arriving over the weekend for a series of tours and meetings Monday, the three candidates mixed with teachers and parents that evening at a catered gathering. Participants were invited to jot down questions to be asked of all three, in a Q&A format moderated by AASB facilitator Lon Garrison.

To start with, the candidates were asked to introduce themselves and explain why Wrangell had appealed to them.

Schildbach lives in the Anchorage area, serving as principal of Mount Spur Elementary on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson since 2010.

"It's a great place to work, except when they're doing vertical takeoffs," he joked. Previously he had worked as director of assessment at Northwest Arctic Borough School District in Kotzebue for three years, and was principal at Emmonak School in the Lower Yukon district for five years.

On wanting to move to Wrangell, he explained one of his children would be living nearby, while his daughter is homeschooled as she pursues studies in dancing.

Hutcherson hails from Washington and has been in and out of Alaska since 1989, working at junctures as an educator and grant writer in Colorado, Hawaii, Oklahoma and even Africa.

"Once you get in Alaska, it's hard to get Alaska out of your system," she said. She currently works as a curriculum consultant for NWABSD in Kotzebue.

Before becoming an educator in 2000, Lancaster was a chiropractor in Temple, Texas.

"I fell in love with kids. Middle school kids, kids with a lot of hardship," she recalled. She and her husband eventually left positions in Texas to teach, considering Turkey or China before coming to Alaska. She has taught in the North Slope Borough School District since 2010, becoming principal of Trapper and Meade River Schools in 2014. Since 2017 she has been the district's certified program manager.

Other questions probed candidates on their particular management styles.

"I believe my management is transformational," Hutcherson responded. "I don't like controlling folk, I don't like standing over their shoulder." She preferred instead to be more in a mentoring or supporting role.

"I would consider myself collaborative," Schildbach said. "I know that staff and community members have a good idea of what works for their kids." His intent would be to figure out with them what those ideas are.

"I'm a hands-on, collaborative leader. I like to be very visible," said Lancaster. "I want to hear and see what's going on." Seeing the educative process as a team effort, she thought it would be useful for students to see and perhaps emulate those partnerships. "The kids are going to do what they see, and not what they hear."

On cultivating class cultures and a school climate, Hutcherson thought the building block of that is in the classroom. If teachers are organized, students can work together as a team and grow together.

Schildbach felt a key component of that cultivation is communication, making sure everyone understands and has a hand in setting expectations.

Lancaster agreed having students invested in the process is helpful, as is getting them excited. When students are excited their parents often are too, she said, which affects the whole climate.

On working with faculty, Lancaster went on to affirm the job of the superintendent is to support their endeavors. "What are you doing that's working?" she might ask them. "Then I'd want to know, 'What do you want to do?'"

Hutcherson felt that while experience among faculty is important, experienced people can also make mistakes. If hired, she would want to become more familiar with staff and open up dialogue opportunities. "We are all here to learn," she said.

Schildbach noted the tour of facilities he had taken earlier with the district's maintenance head, Fred Angerman. He knew every infrastructural need of the facilities, Schildbach said, but what about when he retires? Part of making the use of staff's experience is preserving and passing on that expertise, which is part of an acculturation process.

The question session hit on other topics as well, and candidates were given the opportunity to briskly cover other areas of their experience in a "speed round" session. Monday's meet and greet was followed up by a recital by the high school music program, before it heads to compete in Juneau this weekend.