Colville Gets Ready To Pick Schools Chief

Sat., June 5, 1999

From Staff

Residents of the Colville School District will get a chance next week to help the school board shop for a new superintendent.

The board plans to select three finalists Monday from the 11 candidates to replace outgoing Superintendent Rick Cole. On Tuesday through Thursday, each finalist is to be subjected to a full day of tours and meetings, including an hourlong public forum at 5 p.m. each day at Colville High School.

In addition, community and business leaders will be invited to meet the candidates at noon each day at the district office in Aster Elementary School.

Cole said the schedule will be adjusted if the board comes up with a different number of finalists.

He said about half of the candidates are from Washington, and the out-of-state candidates come from as far away as Minnesota.

Before hiring anyone, the board will visit the top one or two candidates’ districts, Cole said. But the board hopes to make its selection by June 21, so the new superintendent can start work July 1.

Cole will leave June 30 to become superintendent of the Sunnyside (Wash.) School District. His wife, Elaine Porter-Cole, has resigned her position as superintendent-principal of the rural Summit Valley School District in the Addy area. She has taken an elementary principal’s job in the Prosser School District, about 10 miles from Sunnyside.

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