CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The new MeckEd president said stability is important for the district in 2016.
"I think the school district has a lot of opportunities to do really good work," said MeckEd President Ross Danis.
He came to Charlotte from New Jersey where he led the Newark Trust for Education.
He said the education advocacy organization is ready to educate and engage the community in the two big issues facing Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools -- one being the superintendent search.
"Nationally, the life, the tenure, of an urban superintendent is about 1.9 years," Danis said.
The CMS Board of Education said Superintendent Ann Clark would be in place through this July, allowing time to search for a new one, but board members now say she could stay in place beyond that date.
"Stability would be important and that churn over time doesn't bode well for anyone," Danis said.
The other major issue for the school system is student assignment.
"We have the issue of, not just here, but across the country of this re-segregation," Danis said. "If you don't have integrated neighborhoods, it's really hard to have integrated neighborhood schools."
He said this is something he worked on in Newark and one of the most complicated aspects the district will have to address in this debate is transportation.
"Not only is it expensive, it's also fraught with memory," he said.
He's referring to the history transportation has with school desegregation.
As MeckEd leads these conversations going into a new year, he said they always have one thing in mind for parents.
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