by Claire McGuire

Mr. Carlson has been in the Capital High system for a long time and now that he is leaving there is a huge process to replace him taking place. The many candidates have been pared down to five prospects. And these five were put to some serious tests. They all had outstanding qualifications and would make a great addition to the Capital High administration family. All of the candidates but one are from out of State and the fifth is our current vice-principal Mr. Chancey. Some came from as far away as Georgia and others were simply returning home after growing up in Helena and moving away. The five candidates were, Rebecca (Becky) Hamm, Mohan(Mo) Vaswani, Walt Chancy, Craig Crawford, and Elisabeth(Lisa) Hudnutt. All the Candidates had a chance to introduce themselves at a reception given at Capital High on March 18th for students, teachers and parents. Anyone with a vested interest in the new principal had an opportunity to grill the candidates at the end of an already rough process.

The process itself was incredibly thorough the candidates had to go through first a written portion with a prompt, next a long extensive interview in from of a panel of 16 and then were paraded around Helena and the school, all the while being watched very closely. All of the candidates were very different and had many things to offer. They were very good with public   and easily won over the crowd at the reception with jokes and personal tidbits. The teachers and parents seemed generally impressed, Jamruska-Wilson, a   teacher in the building commented that, “It looks like we have five very strong candidates.”

Mr. Carlson will be retiring at the end of this year having served 40 years in our building, and he was certainly enjoying the reception. When asked Carlson said that he “enjoyed meeting the candidates, its a great process.” Assuming nothing goes horribly wrong the decision will be made some time in April. The purpose of the board is to provide a very well informed and differing recommendation for Dr. Messenger to help him make the difficult decision between the perspective administrators. There were many rounds of cuts simply to get to the final five position and it seems as if every candidate has a real hunger for the position. All of the perspective administrators talked about how great the community was and how much they enjoyed how successful the school already was. Mohan Vaswani one of the younger prospects was delighted with the atmosphere saying that the school was great and that must be behind “the incredible longevity.”

The reasons for wanting to come to Montana may have differed slightly. Some wanted more responsibility, some wanted a place to raise a family and still others simply wanted to return to their original home. Although many are sad about the departure of a great leader with Randy Carlson it seems as if the future is bright no matter the choice. After a few days of very rigorous interviewing all that was truly revealed was that there seems to be no bad choice for the future of Capital High.