Quick take:
The Live Oak School District plans to announce a new superintendent at its April 22 or May 6 board meeting following Pat Sánchez’s resignation. Board leaders say they are aiming for a transition by July 1 without the need for an interim leader.
Live Oak School District plans to announce a new superintendent at either their April 22 or May 6 board meeting, after Superintendent Pat Sánchez announced his resignation in February.
School board president Kristin Pfotenhauer said the district recently surveyed schools and families for the qualities they’re looking for in a new leader. She said the results mirror her hopes for the role.
“Someone focused on equity and on student outcomes, and someone who has experience in handling budgets and human resources,” she said. “Someone who’s very collaborative, not top down.”
On Friday, the board interviewed two out-of-district candidates and had a second round of interviews with two internal candidates. The board previously interviewed the two internal candidates before opening up the search to applicants outside the district. They received 15 applications from external candidates and selected two for interviews.
Between mid-February and March 9, Pfotenhauer held a total of nine meetings, including visiting every school and the district office to ask three questions: What do you think is going well? What are the challenges the next superintendent will face? What qualities do you want to see in a superintendent? She also held two meetings for parents and the community: one in-person and one online. Pfotenhauer said three main priorities came up among the qualities they want in a new superintendent.
“People wanted someone who’s intending to be local and was very visible,” she said, adding that a second quality was someone who has teaching and district administrator experience. “The third was someone who was very relational, collaborative.”
Hiring a superintendent is one of the most influential decisions that school boards make. Superintendents implement board-approved policies and their vision for their districts impact everything from staff working conditions to the quality of education for students. How a superintendent engages with staff, students and parents also affects how a community feels a district is performing broadly. This next superintendent will be the fourth that the district’s five-member board has hired since 2018.
During an interview with Lookout last week, Pfotenhauer said that after the Friday interviews, the board would decide whether to have additional follow-up interviews or if they would move forward with a single candidate.
Once someone is selected, the board could potentially visit a candidate’s school district for further background, then negotiate a contract.
Pfotenhauer added the new superintendent would be able to start immediately after Sánchez’s last day on June 30; she said they don’t expect to need an interim superintendent.
Sánchez, who lives in Morgan Hill and commuted to Santa Cruz, told Lookout that he resigned from the position to follow his family, who relocated to Sacramento.
He was hired to replace Daisy Morales, who resigned in the spring of 2024 after months of resignations and chaotic board meetings during a budget crisis. Morales was hired in 2021 to succeed Lorie Chamberland, who stepped into the role in 2018.