Superintendent

Howard County school board member Allen Dyer had four of his fellow board members served with a legal complaint moments before the panel recessed during Tuesday night's meeting. Dyer, who is currently battling the school board's request that the state board of education oust him from the panel, filed the lawsuit May 4 in Howard County Circuit Court against fellow members Janet Siddiqui, Ellen Flynn Giles, Sandra French and Frank Aquino. The four voted in favor of a June 9 resolution requesting his ouster.

New Howard County schools Superintendent Renee Foose recently inked a four-year, $250,000 deal that includes a provision that allows her to be reimbursed for up to $25,000 in relocation costs. Foose will be moving from the neighboring Frederick County to Howard, where she must reside as superintendent. According to the state's Department of Assessments and Taxation website, she currently lives in a 1,531-square-foot, single-family home on .27 acres in New Market . The house is two stories and has a basement, according to the site.

Dallas Dance, Baltimore County's soon-to-be superintendent of schools, won't officially take the job until July 1, but the school board approved a contract Tuesday night that will allow him to begin working as a consultant for the month of June. The school board will pay Dance a salary of $21,250 for the month, or one-twelfth of his annual salary, as well as some relocation costs and health insurance. School board chair Lawrence Schmidt said the board wanted Dance to have a month to get to know the people in the county, visit some schools and work for a week with Superintendent Joe Hairston, whose contract expires at the end of June.

Three Maryland superintendents whose school systems stand to take the biggest hit from Maryland's 'Doomsday' budget pleaded with state legislators Monday to reverse an estimated $129 million cut to public education that they said would have devastating effects on their districts. In an open letter to the state's top leadership, Baltimore city schools CEO Andres Alonso, Prince George's County Schools Superintendent William R. Hite, and Montgomery County Superintendent Joshua P. Starr asked state lawmakers to make it a priority to restore funding to schools as legislators prepare to head back into a special session of the Maryland General Assembly on May 14. The letter, which you can read here, i s addressed to Gov. Martin O'Malley, Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. and House Speaker Michael E. Busch.  The three superintendents write from the largest school systems in the state.

Newly appointed Baltimore County school Superintendent Dallas Dance has picked a transition team that includes two former state superintendents and a college president among the 21 individuals who will guide him in the first three months of his job. Beginning in June, the team will meet to review the school system and give Dance its thoughts on the strengths of the system as well as areas that may need to be improved. Dance drew his team from several states, picking Nancy S. Grasmick, the former Maryland school superintendent, and William Bosher, the former Virginia superintendent, to lead the team.

The Annapolis Area Christian School announced on Tuesday that it has chosen a California school leader to replace its superintendent, who stepped down this year amid accusations of sexual harassment and retaliation. Rick Kempton, the superintendent at Friends Christian School in Yorba Linda, Calif., will take over in July, the AACS board of directors said Tuesday. He will fill the post vacated by George J.W. Lawrence Jr., who was accused by three employees in December of improper conduct in a suit against the school's association.

By all accounts Lillian Lowery, the Delaware educator who was named Maryland's state superintendent of schools Friday, comes to the job with an impressive resume and a reputation as a consensus builder who can work with teachers, principals and local school districts to get things done. She'll need all those skills and more to implement the kinds of reforms Maryland needs, and she'll have to hit the ground running if she is to make progress on the array of thorny issues that require her immediate attention.

An outsider with experience in leading a neighboring state through sometimes-unpopular reforms will become the next Maryland superintendent of schools, the state school board announced Friday. Delaware Secretary of Education Lillian M. Lowery, a 57-year-old with more than 35 years of teaching and administrative experience in several states, will take over July 1 as Maryland's schools enter a year of transition. "We think we have gotten the best person that could have taken this job. She has a long track record of success on all the important education issues," said school board President James DeGraffenreidt.

S. Dallas Dance is young. He will be just 31 when he takes the helm of Baltimore County's school system. And he has not stayed in any one place for long - a couple of years teaching, a couple as a principal, a couple each in administrative posts in Virginia and Texas. He had to get a waiver from the state because he lacks the minimum three years of teaching experience required to be a superintendent in Maryland. Moreover, he was selected through a completely closed process; the only inkling most Maryland parents had of his existence came when he appeared at a public meeting in Howard County, where he was also up for the top schools job. His hiring in Baltimore County was announced less than 12 hours later, and at that point, he was already on a flight back to Houston.

The Baltimore County school board voted unanimously Tuesday night to approve S. Dallas Dance, a Houston school administrator, as the next superintendent of its 105,000-student system. During a brief news conference after the vote, Dance said he had had "frank and honest" meetings Tuesday with elected leaders, including legislators in Annapolis, the County Council and the county executive. Because the school board held a closed search, Tuesday was the first time Dance was in town and available to meet the public.