Former high ranking education officials in Kansas and Missouri are the two finalists to become the next state education commissioner, it was announced Friday.
The two are Alexa Posny, currently with the U.S. Department of Education and a former deputy education commissioner in Kansas, and Marilou Joyner, an education consultant and former assistant education commissioner in Missouri.
State Board of Education Chairman Bill Wagnon said the two candidates will be interviewed again May 7. They were selected from a field of five candidates who were interviewed by the board on Thursday.
"They have impressive resumes and gave impressive interviews," Wagnon said of the two remaining candidates.
Posny is director of the office of special education programs with the federal education agency. In 2005, when she was with the Kansas Department of Education, she was passed over for the education commissioner job when the conservative majority on the board selected Bob Corkins, who had no background in education. Shortly afterward, Posny took her current position with the U.S. education department.
Corkins resigned last year after moderates took back control of the board.
Wagnon said Joyner currently is working as a consultant with the Kansas City, Missouri school district.
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SettingTheRecordStraight (anonymous) says…
I miss Corkins.
prioress (anonymous) says…
I was hoping Alexa would stay out of this mess, but I hear she hates Washington D.C. and wants to come home. I hope the next election doesn't turn the board back to the middle ages and dump the applecart again. The gal from Missouri is good too.
Agnostick (anonymous) says…
Alexa is the obvious choice--except, of course, for extremists.
My wife attended a number of teacher conferences during Corkins' "reign." The teachers often snickered when Corkins was addressing the crowd, and it only took a couple of simple questions to exploit his obvious lack of experience and credentials.
Connie Morris, thankfully, is also gone. I don't understand how religious extremists reconcile her "Christianity" while she violates the 7th commandment over and over and over and over and over again.
Agnostick
agnostick@excite.com
http://www.uscentrist.org