The Rome City Board of Education is one step closer to finding a new superintendent before the end of this calendar year.

During a called meeting the board narrowed the pool of applicants for the position of superintendent down to 30 people, said Chairwoman Judy Sims on Thursday.

Jim Puckett, coordinator of professional development and superintendent search legislative support with the Georgia School Board Association, was present at meeting and informed board members of the number of applicants that met the necessary criteria set by the board.

“The board has used the Georgia School Boards Association to assist us in this process, and Dr. Puckett has been our main liaison,” Sims said. “The Georgia School Board sent out about 1,400 brochures (advertising the position) and they advertised on their website as well as our website. They composed and submitted to us the community survey. All that’s been done. From that pool, we have 30 applicants and information about their degrees and so forth.”

Of the 30, 17 have Doctor of Education degrees (Ed.D.), five have Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), seven have Education Specialist degrees (Ed.S.) and one has a Juris Doctor degree (J.D.). Twenty-three of the applicants live in Georgia. There were two from North Carolina, and the remaining five applicants reside in Virginia, West Virginia, Florida, Indiana and Alaska.

There are seven current superintendents in the pool, as well as nine principals. Two are consultants, two are assistant superintendents or athletic directors, two are chiefs of academics or academics officers and two are former superintendents. The remaining six each currently hold positions of retired superintendent, executive director, deputy superintendent, assistant superintendent, director of federal programs and adjunct instructor.

Sims said the next step is setting up an interview date, which has yet to be determined, but should be established within a week.

“We heard the report from Dr. Puckett and from that discussion we asked the GBSA to arrange for interviews with some of those candidates, but the interview date has not been set at this point,” Sims said. “But we are mindful of what our projected deadline of Dec. 1.”