Instead of a puff of white smoke, announce the superintendent finalists.

The Montgomery County Board of Education could demonstrate that it does give "a rat's patootie about what we think" if instead of a puff of white smoke, it announced the superintendent finalists and even provided a public forum for all the stakeholders to hear the finalists.

Hazard, Young and Attea (the no bid search firm selected by BOE President Patricia O'Neill) used such a process for selecting the new superintendent for Boston Public Schools and described that process at the public hearing last week at Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda.

I encourage everyone to attend the Tuesday March 10, 2015 Public Forum, to ask about hearing from the superintendent finalists before the final selection - and to advocate for Gifted and Talented education in the local schools.

For your convenience, here is a link to a recent Boston Globe story describing that Hazard-Boston Public Schools superintendent search:
http://www.bostonglobe.com/ metro/2015/03/01/boston-final- candidates-for-superintendent/ KMSVLigUArPkTeIt5TUqgO/story. html

While there are very good reasons for a confidential (secret) selection process, I think the following considerations carry the day to choose to reveal the finalists and perhaps even invite them to a public forum: 
1. The selected superintendent will start day one building on unfiltered, transparent access from everyone. 
2. The Board of Education will demonstrate transparency and cooperation based on genuine trust of the stakeholders 
3. MCPS will avoid the Hazard-Board of Education mistake of 1999 (where the BOE's first announcement was the selection of Dr. Massie who then was forced to withdraw within days of that announcement) 
4. The BOE will be transparent like the Montgomery County Council selection process was  following a recent resignation.
 
Sheldon Fishman
Founding Member of Parents' Coalition of Montgomery County, MD
Parent of 4 MCPS Graduates