The Jefferson County Board of Education has selected a search firm to help find a new superintendent for the state’s largest school district. A final effort to keep the current superintendent in place never materialized during Monday’s meeting.The school board voted 5-2 in November to replace Dr. Sheldon Berman, whose four-year contract expires at the end of June.Since then, the teachers union and other groups have asked the board to reconsider, but four of those five members said they would definitely not change their minds.Nevertheless, board member Linda Duncan asked that a contract extension for Berman be put on Monday’s agenda, but Berman requested at the start of the meeting that it be withdrawn."At this point, though I very much appreciate that the board was willing to reconsider and put this on the agenda, I think it’s time for all of us to move on," he said.The board later voted to hire the Omaha-based firm of McPherson and Jacobson to lead the search for Berman’s successor. It was one of three firms interviewed by the board last week.
Rick Howlett was midday host and the host of LPM's weekly talk show, "In Conversation." He was with LPM from 2001-2023 and held many different titles, including Morning Edition host, Assignment Editor and Interim News Director. He died in August 2023. Read a remembrance of Rick here.