I think the jury might still be out on this one. What's your opinion on his affinity for tax payer funded travel?

What affinity for taxpayer funded travel?

Congratulations and Best wishes to Dr. Dance. He seems very much qualified for the position and up to the many challenges. I believe young people are the future and they sometimes bring very fresh, new, innovative ideas. God Bless him for wanting to undertake such a large school system.

Power hungry is a very interesting synopsis. If it means getting the work that needs to be done, done by all means we all should be power hungry. What a silly thing to say. It's comments like this that make bad school systems continue to be bad school systems. The education of young minds are all of our responsibilities and I say go for it. Who better to deal with young people than a young person with some old school back up.

Very refreshing!

The board offered the job. Obviously the public has no comment. This is not good for Baltimore county. This is someone coming here to get paid a large salary and leave in a few years. It would of been nice to be presented with a local candidate and have public hearings to see who they were before a final decision. Again, an inept board failed the county taxpayers.

I sincerely hope you are wrong about his intent to leave in a few years. I would hope that that was one of the questions they asked of candidates. According to a online biography I read, Dance was an English teacher, an assistant principal, a principal and a summer school principal in Virginia (Henrico County), then an assistant superintendent in Virginia (Louisa County) and then Executive Director of School Improvement in Virginia (Chesterfield). Then he went to Houston. A superintendent's job is what I assume he has been aspiring to. Now that he has one, I wouldnt necessarily assume that he intends to cut and run in a few years. I agree with you that public imput before final selection would have been ideal. Perhaps an open forum before the final vote will take place.

Thank you! His age does give a more likelihood of longevity to envision and accomplish some long-term change.

Wow. He really enjoys a travel budget doesn't he?

Except why hire the wrong person in the first place? If you have to fire him he'll have contract provisions that will end up costing taxpayers additional funds just to get rid of him.

They are rushing to fill this position in light of possible school board changes being debated by the county's delegation. It's a mistake and everyone can see it coming.

Yes, we are judging him. That is what a company does before it hires an employee, it judges them. He will be working for us so we have evry right to look at his history and make judgements. Seems to be the search firm got off easy by having candidates for both school systems it was working for. They collect double the fee for providing the same candidates. And the fact that he held so many positions by the age of 30 is suspicious in and of itself. Did his previous employers give hm glowing recomendations in order to be rid of him? Why does he need to travel so much? The school board is a joke.

That's kind of the point they're making. The hiring process wasn't transparent at all, and there are plenty of good reasons why interested persons don't put a lot of faith and trust in the Baltimore Co. Board of Ed.

So you are more comfortable with placing your blind trust and faith in the same outside firm and organization that hired the last superintendent.

His record is on display as part of the process. You are free to read his dissertation, PDF's of reports he authored or contributed, statistics and grades of schools he was associated with, travel expenses. All available on the internet.

But what shouldn't be overlooked is he is given points for his political acumen. There is a fight coming. The board knows it current structure is unsustainable. This hire has more to do with that than education. His classroom experience is so limited he scrapped by the three year teaching requirement on a technicality.

What have you read about him that makes him such perfect fit for the position other than press releases? If you have something share it.

JD - what I am saying is - people already have this guy labled a failure and I think we should give him a chance. Neither you or anyone else blogging here were apart of the decision process. Were the same people on the search committee from 10 yrs ago present on this panel? Probably not - but you don't know for sure - I don't know for sure. You and everyone else could be very well correct and if so I would be the first one to say your gut instincts were right. But my point is more of - stop rushing to judge already - and give the guy a shot. Let's hope it works out. You never know. Everyone had Obama as a one term president and not to do down that road - but it looks like he will be in there a 2nd term based on the Republican Candidates I see and read about.

I think what we really need to focus on here is the rampant crime in Perry Hall! This is getting ridiculous.

Thirty years old and he doesn't even have three years of classroom teaching experience. What do you think they'll say.

Have you ever been to Houston?

If anything the school board probably just sealed the deal for an elected or hybird school board.

You can't operate in a vacuum and say "trust us." Plus Schmidt can't even form a decent comparison. Zuckerberg is an entrepreneur, not a taxpayer funded decision maker. Tartikoff programmed entertainment to sell advertising for a corporation with three other competitors. Schmoke defeated Swisher after the latter defeated the first elected black state's attorney in the previous election.

This p.r. from the board is smelling more and more desperate. With all the problems they have with parents regarding their management philosophy one would think they have been a little more self aware of openness and collaboration than top down hierarchy. What a mess.

The Sun ran a front-page story about Hairston's problems at his previous job -- before the vote to hire him -- and they hired him anyway.

"... Dance has only two years' teaching experience, which required the Baltimore County school board to seek a waiver from interim state Superintendent Bernard Sadusky before hiring him; the state requires three."

It seems weird that the State Superintendent has the power to change state law at will.

I figure that this entire blog is based upon race. This country and it's race relations is about as bad as its ever been. I am also very sure if it was thought that black people could be put back in chains and sent to the cotton fields that would be done. You talk about afraid,the behavior based on race in this country is disgraceful, outrageous, embarrassing and down right wrong. The way our President of the United States is treated totally based on race is outrageous and its a sad day to be African American in this country. When a young 17 year old can be gunned down for just being black, when young black men are pulled over just for being black, when I am followed in a department store just for being black its a very sad day.

Honest question - have you read his "Virginia School Superintendents' Perceptions Regarding Their Superintendent Preparation Program?" It is only 162 pages and available from Google books but any university library should be able to access it for you quicker.

What from that demonstrates he is a the rising star in the pedology field?

To your point - why are clueless people making this important decision?

As a educator and as someone with a brain, I know that you don't accomplish any significant change and gains in one to two years. The gentlemen speaks well interviews well and that is why he is where he is. All his accolades can be attributed to those he stepped on along the way and left in the dust while he took the credit. With age comes wisdom, especially when it comes to education. As a thirty something old bcps employee I would like a leader that had the experience and knowledge to lead me. It is hard to respect a thirty year old principal, let alone a superintendent. I hope the county council questions this hire before it is finalized.

JD: I'm not well read on the guy, primarily because it's not my job to be so. If it were, I would be. If I did take the time to read this document, I wouldn't be adequately prepared to make a macro-view decision on his capabilities based on it.
The individuals who are paid to make this decision, and given the funding to do so, have made their decision. They are far better equipped then you or I to do so - perhaps not through their own personal experience, but they sure had the funding available to do the due dilligence required. Something we just don't have.

I'm not saying the guy's going to walk on water. I am all for making him accountable and not assured employment for a decade. I just find the blanket criticism based on irrelelvant factors (age, race, or an hour of internet research) tragically ignorant.

Buzz below (5:06) gets across my sentiments on this hire. A lot of work was done to pick this candidate, with far more funding and, as such, knowledge, then any of us.

Jesse Jackson is mostly boosted by white people, the black community is well aware of his past actions and jump on the bandwagon behavior. He is not leading us, he is but a very, very small piece we cannot get rid of. As for Farrakhan he speaks a lot of truth in my opinion when you pair it with some of the comments on this blog. One thing about Farrakhan he's not hiding what he is, can most of the people on this blog say the same thing. When he denounces Caucasians he denounces them he doesn't hid it behind "he's only 30 years old with no more than 2 years of teaching experience"

Bryan just broke that the decision was based on his ability to deal with elected boards. Looks like what most of us were arguing the hire wasn't based on his stellar vision and ability but politics.

If there were any leaders this candidate's consideration would be stopped right here instead of floating an expensive trial period.

This is like giving your life savings to a freshly minted Series 7 grad based on the opinion of a Lehman Brothers exec.

It's the poison pill strategy - take on a purposefully weak asset to diminish the rationale of the advocated alternative.

You want an elected board? Here's is the weak ineffective leader you have to deal with and the resultant drop off.

Want to remain the current the standard or improve? Scrap the elected board idea and stick with the status quo.

And in the meantime, our children suffer. That is unacceptable to this parent.

Oh, right. I forgot that this position requires no communication or politicking skills at all.

Silly me. I'm a network engineer and I've got to have good communication skills to talk to all sorts of people. It's one of my strong suits, actually (the ability to talk in non-technical terms to the average user)

George W. was governor of Texas.
See how well that worked out for our country...

I had the pleasure of participating in a Superintendent's Academy with Dr. Dance for a few months last year. I was able to predict that he was going to become a Superintendent by July 1, 2012. I was right! I have a very strong background in education---teacher, elementary, middle and high school principal and District Administrator. Your District should be proud of the keen decision-making skills of the selection committee members in your community.
Congratulations Dr. Dance---Dr. Debra Feemster