Executive search consultants from 12 organizations across the country will use the 2018 AASA national conference to drum up interest in superintendent vacancies and to conduct preliminary candidate interviews.

The Superintendent Job Fair, staged annually during the National Conference on Education, will run from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 16, at the Music City Center.

The search consultants, employees of private firms and state school boards associations, will use their time at the conference to solicit interest in dozens of current and expected vacancies in the superintendent ranks in a range of school systems.

The participating firms are Alabama Association of School Boards, BWP & Associates, ECRA Group/Hazard Young Attea, Illinois Association of School Boards, J.G. Consulting, Kentucky Association of School Administrators, McPherson and Jacobson, National School Boards Association, North Carolina School Boards Association, Oklahoma State School Boards Association, Ray and Associates and Virginia School Boards Association. Six are joining the fair for the first time.

The firm with the largest number of vacancies to fill is Hazard Young Attea, a firm based in suburban Chicago, which is in the midst of conducting about 18 superintendent searches as of mid-January and seven other searches for central-office posts or principalships.

The search firms see continuing importance in the AASA job fair both for job seekers and those hired by school boards to fill a school district’s top leadership vacancy.

The job fair at this conference continue to play an important role for both the firms hired to fill vacancies and those considering changing jobs in the year ahead.

“It's an opportunity for the candidates to meet the consultants from the search firms,” says Lora Wolff, a professor at Western Illinois University who serves as job fair coordinator. “It allows the firms to put a face to the resumes often submitted online and allows the candidates to introduce themselves. The job fair is particularly helpful to those seeking to move to another state.”

The job fair is part of Job Central, a program strand with one-hour sessions addressing career planning, interview skills and contract negotiations.

(Jay P. Goldman is editor of Conference Daily Online.)