photo by: Ashley Golledge

Superintendent Anthony Lewis addresses the audience at the Adult Learning Center and Diploma Completion Program ceremony at 2920 Haskell Ave. on Thursday, June 3, 2021.

Story updated at 4:50 p.m. Thursday:

As Lawrence Public Schools work to identify and implement about $6.5 million in budget cuts, the district’s superintendent is a finalist to become the leader of the Montgomery, Alabama, school district.

Superintendent Anthony Lewis is one of five finalists to become the superintendent of Montgomery Public Schools, according to a report from WSFA television in Montgomery. The Alabama Association of School Boards released the names of the finalists last week, according to the station. Lewis confirmed to the Journal-World his status as a finalist on Thursday. After the Journal-World published Lewis’ status as a finalist, the district sent a communication to patrons with the information as well.

Lewis is originally from nearby Talladega, Alabama, and lived for nearly 20 years in Montgomery while attending college and later working as a teacher and principal in the Montgomery school district.

“I’m totally happy here. I love Lawrence,” Lewis told the Journal-World on Thursday. “Montgomery is the only place I would consider. You won’t find my name in any other search.”

The announcement of Lewis’ potential departure comes as the Lawrence school board is set to consider approximately $6.5 million in budget cuts for the next school year, including a reduction in teachers in the district and an increase in the number of students per classroom. The board is set to make decisions on those budget cuts, which have sparked concern from patrons, on Monday.

Lewis said the difficulty of those decisions has not caused him to consider leaving Lawrence. Rather, he said the prospect of leaving while those budget cuts must still be implemented has given him pause on whether he should consider the Montgomery job.

“The timing could not be more horrible, in my opinion,” Lewis said.

But Lewis said if he does get the Montgomery job, he is confident the district will be in a good position to complete the budget-cutting process. He said he has confidence in the board and the team of administrators who have been working on the budget-cutting process for months.

“If a leader leaves, the work continues,” Lewis said. “That’s a hallmark of effective leadership.”

Lewis said he’s been told Montgomery would like to have a new superintendent in place by June 1. Lewis said if he receives the position, he might seek an extension on that start date because “we do have a lot of work to do” in Lawrence.

Lewis said he will participate in a public interview process in Montgomery on March 31. He believes the board there will make a decision on a new superintendent by mid- to late April.

Lewis said he has been asked to apply for multiple superintendent positions ever since the National School Public Relations Association named him as a “2020-2021 Superintendent to Watch.”

He said he did not apply for any of the positions he was contacted about until the Montgomery job came open. Initially, he said, he told the search firm he did not want to be considered for the Montgomery position, but he continued to field calls from people in Montgomery asking him to reconsider.

Lewis said when he left Montgomery in 2011 to take a position with the Kansas City, Missouri, school district, he expected that he someday would return to the area. However, he said, he expected that time would be when his parents were older and he needed to help care for them.

However, he said that several classmates of his have had their parents die, and he began to wonder whether he was waiting too long to make a return to be closer to his family.

Lewis’ family is largely an hour away from Montgomery in Talladega, although he has a son who is in Montgomery and a daughter in Huntsville, Alabama, and he noted he also has an adult daughter who recently moved to Lawrence. The family of Lewis’ wife also is largely located in Montgomery.

Lewis said he did notify the Lawrence school board that he was a finalist for the Montgomery position. He said the board was understanding of his decision to consider the opportunity.

School Board Vice President Shannon Kimball told the Journal-World that she does believe the Montgomery job is a rare opportunity for Lewis, and that he isn’t otherwise seeking to leave Lawrence.

“I appreciate that this is a unique opportunity for him and the family reasons he has for choosing to look into this when he has chosen not to look into other opportunities,” Kimball said.

She also said the school district would be prepared to find a new leader and deal with the process of cutting its budget for the next school year, if needed. While the budget cuts are a strong likelihood, Kimball noted that Lewis is still just a finalist for the position, and “I would hope that our community can give that process a chance to play out before we really have a conversation about what we would do.”

Kimball, though, expressed confidence in existing staff to oversee any budget cuts and reorganizations, if Lewis does leave the district.

“I think the challenges we are facing — the budget, recovering from the pandemic — those are a lot of big challenges, but we have a talented staff in addition to the superintendent, and we have a really committed board,” Kimball said.

Lewis began serving as superintendent of Lawrence Public Schools in July 2018. He previously had been an assistant superintendent in the Kansas City, Missouri, public school district.

Lewis started his education career in Alabama. He worked in the Montgomery school district as a special education teacher and as an assistant principal and then head principal.

The Montgomery school district — located in a community of about 200,000 people — is significantly larger than the Lawrence district. Lewis said the district has about 30,000 students and more than 50 schools.