ELKINS – The Randolph County Board of Education approved a pair of items this week regarding its search for a new superintendent of schools.

The items of the minutes/agreements/contracts section of the meeting were approved unanimously by BOE members Rachel Anger, Phil Chua, Janie Newlon, Sherri Collett and Ed Daniels, and included the BOE’s approval of a contract with the West Virginia School Board Association.

The contract will allow the WVSBA to conduct a structured, customized search for the school system’s next superintendent, and for the organization to also handle the advertising campaign for the search.

Dr. Shawn Dilly unexpectedly resigned as the superintendent of Randolph County Schools on March 20. Terry George was hired as the interim superintendent the next day, and will remain in that position through June 30.

During a special work session last week, the BOE met with state School Board Association Executive Director Howard O’Cull, and the two sides unofficially agreed that the WVSBA would conduct the search for a superintendent and handle advertising for the position. Both items, however, had to be placed on a meeting agenda and approved by the board in order to be official.

Part of this week’s approval states that the state School Board Association’s fees for the search do not exceed $750, unless otherwise determined by mutual agreement of the Randolph County BOE and the Association.

“I think you have a good plan here for the search for a superintendent. You have a timeline where you are going to be able to offer a contract prior to the June 1 deadline,” George said at this week’s meeting. “(O’Cull) has also asked if anyone has any specific questions about the county, to get in contact with me. If they have any additional questions I’ll try and tell them who to talk to next.”

Also as part of the approval, the Board of Education agreed that the budget for notification of the position/advertising and related considerations is not to exceed $2,000.

“The prices came in very good, so he (O’Cull) is probably going to expand the ad a little bit,” George said. “Because the original estimate he gave you came in much lower than that. It will give you the opportunity to spread the word throughout the state… I think you have a good plan here and hopefully you’ll find somebody that’s going to come in and work with you and lead the county for the next several years. I’m really looking forward to seeing who shows up.”

The next regular Randolph County Board of Education meeting will be May 5 at 5:30 p.m.