To many in this community, the position of superintendent of Prince Edward’s public schools — which is being vacated by Dr. David Smith — has been in a vacuum for years now and has lacked the leadership that is expected by parents, taxpaying citizens and others who live in the county for various reasons.

In order for the public school system to better serve the community through offering a quality educational experience and ready students for college and the workforce in a more substantial way, there must be a substantial community investment and buy-in into the process for which the county’s school board selects Prince Edward’s next school chief.

Community investment into the search and selection of a new school superintendent doesn’t mean simply having one formal public hearing on the matter and letting the Virginia School Boards Association find and ask candidates to apply and have school board members vet them on standards the VSBA has come up with.

The board has to go well beyond that in selecting the next person who will lead our public schools.

We encourage the school board to make it a priority to involve the community in a major way when creating a search plan, a candidate profile, expectations and the selection of the next superintendent.

Longwood University and Hampden-Sydney College are on the schools’ doorsteps. There are many parents, teachers, civic leaders and others who know the education profession on various levels who should be involved.

Constant communication between the board and the general public is also essential in having a quality leader as superintendent. It’s a must that the school board regularly communicate to the public during the search and selection process. This means not just simply sending out a survey to parents via students, but engaging the community in a proactive dialoge with tangible results, or, in this case, expectations.

Our community has every right to expect this from the school board.