Barb Thompson takes Montgomery (AL) Superintendent Post

Adrienne Nettles via a kind reader’s email:

In a vote preceded by outbursts from board members, the Montgomery County Board of Education on Wednesday selected Barbara Thompson as Montgomery’s new superintendent.



The board voted 4-3 along racial lines to offer the job to Thompson, who currently serves as superintendent of New Glarus Public Schools in Wisconsin.



Black board members Mary Briers, Eleanor Dawkins, Robert Porterfield and Beverly Ross voted for Thompson. Voting against her were white members Charlotte Meadows, Heather Sellers and Melissa Snowden, who all wanted to continue the search process.



Thompson was the lone finalist for the job after Samantha Ingram, superintendent of Fairfield County Schools in South Carolina, withdrew on Monday.



Ross, chairwoman of the school board, said she called Thompson shortly after the vote and Thompson accepted the job.



“I am excited that she’s excited about coming here,” Ross said. “She was already talking about how to get our test scores up.”



Thompson, in a phone interview from her house in Wisconsin, said she and the board in the next few days should begin working out the details of her contract, which include salary negotiations.

Thompson was formerly principal at Lapham Elementary in the Madison School District. The Montgromery School District, with 31,000 students, is nearly 1/3 larger than the Madison Schools.