At last, a finalist has been chosen for the Prince Georges County Public Schools CEO position! Based on this Gazette article, the finalist, Dr. John Deasy, was introduced as an emergency measure during the school board’s last meeting. To me, that would indicate that they were pretty serious about Dr. Deasy.

Dr. Deasy is currently the Superintendent of the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School, which has about 12,000 students in total, not much compared to the 134,000 or so students in Prince Georges County Public Schools, but that shouldn’t mean too much. Not too long ago, Fairfax County Public Schools pulled similar move when their former Superintendent, Dr. Daniel Domenech was replaced by the former Superintendent of the Frederick County Public Schools, Dr. Jack Dale (Fairfax County has one of the largest school systems in our area, with approximately 165,000 students).

The final choice will be announced after a “due diligence” period, but based on the way the Santa Monica school board members feel about Dr. Deasy, the “due diligence” should confirm that he’s the man for the job. Personally, I think innovation and attitude are more important than school district size credentials (perhaps size really doesn’t matter here…), and I wish Dr. Deasy the best of luck and hope that he’s able to achieve great things here in Prince Georges County.

Of course, I do wonder why Prince Georges County Public Schools get a CEO instead of a Superintendent…