Photo by Erin Nelson
School busses parked in front of Cahaba Elementary School in Trussville on Tuesday, April 14, 2020.
The City of Trussville is expected to select its next member for the city’s Board of Education this month.
The city interviewed candidates last month for the opening.
“We just have one (opening) right now. And so every year we take applications through the end of January. It kind of gets lost during the year, then we promote it, you know, for the last couple of months. So I think we have seven applicants right now, one of them being the incumbent that was on the school board,” Mayor Buddy Choat said.
The selection process is led by a five-member panel consisting of the mayor, city council president, a school board member, a representative from the city’s human resources department, and a liaison to the school board.
Current school board members must reapply if they want to continue serving. The seat to be filled is currently held by Kathy Brown, who has served on the board since December 2014.
After the interview process is completed, the panel makes a recommendation to the city council, which ultimately votes on the candidate. While some Alabama school boards are elected by the public, Trussville has maintained an appointed system.
“Some school boards are elected, and we prefer not to do that. I think if you look around the state, the most successful school systems have appointed boards or appointed superintendents. You know, we try to keep the politics out of it,” Choat said.
Choat said the panel generally looks for candidates who have been involved in the community.
“One thing we look for is, obviously, we’d like it to be somebody that we’re familiar with, that has been involved in the city in some way — whether they have served voluntarily on boards or in the schools or been involved in something like that — where we have a little bit of knowledge of them personally,” he said. “Because we know how important it is. It’s a tough job, and I think people sometimes have put applications in not realizing how important and how — I will say — in the spotlight you will be when you’re dealing with school boards.”
The Trussville Board of Education operates on a five-year term system, with one position rotating off each year.
The member selected will likely be appointed this month, Choat said, allowing time to attend school board meetings before officially assuming the role in May. Though board members are not term-limited, most serve for two terms, he said.
Choat added that the process is also a good way to identify talented candidates for other roles in the community. Candidates who are not selected for the school board are often encouraged to apply for other boards.
“We’ve had so many new people move out here in the last 20 years, and there’s a lot of skill, a lot of knowledge, a lot of great people here that you don’t get to meet a lot of times unless you go through this process,” he said.
