The Wake County school board will hold tonight its first superintendent search committee meeting since interim Superintendent Stephen Gainey announced he's leaving to lead Randolph County schools.

The board will find out how many people have applied for the job since today is the deadline for candidates. Board members say they still expect to get good candidates.

“Our superintendent job is a great job; it’s one of the top superintendent jobs in the country,” said school board Vice Chairwoman Christine Kushner. “We are a great school system. We have challenges that I think will attract someone focused on student achievement.”

The board will also hear about the feedback that was received by the search firm at the public forums held two weeks ago.

Interim Wake County Schools Superintendent Stephen Gainey was effusive in his praise Tuesday of the school board even as he explained why he was leaving to become superintendent of Randolph County schools.

As noted in today's article, Gainey said he has "all the respect in the world for the Wake County school system," He also said the school board has been "tremendous" to him as "they have let an inexperienced superintendent learn his way the last six months, and it’s been a great experience."

“I have the utmost respect for the Wake County board and I want to make sure that goes on record," Gainey said. "They have worked hard and they are continuing to work hard. They’ve come together as a group."

interim Wake County Schools Superintendent Stephen Gainey has accepted the position of Randolph County superintendent.

This comes after the Randolph County school board held a specially called meeting this afternoon. Gainey is holding a 6 p.m. press briefing.

"It's certainly a loss to Wake County, but certainly a gain for Randolph County," said Wake school board chairman Keith Sutton.

UPDATE

More to come later, but Gainey said today he applied for the Randolph County job because he had "fallen in love" with that part of the state when he had worked there earlier in his career.

Gainey said he hadn't applied for the permanent job in Wake because it would have put the school board in an unfair position. He repeatedly said he had enjoyed being interim superintendent as he praised the school board for trusting him with the job.

One thing that became clear on Tuesday is that Wake County families really like 8:30 a.m. start times, especially those whose kids go to elementary schools that start at 9:15 a.m.

As noted in today's article, the school board approved Tuesday this revised 2013-14 school bell schedules for each school. A common theme voiced by board members and the public is the concerns families have with continuing to start most elementary schools after 9 a.m.

Wake operates a two- and three-tier bus system in different parts of the district. This means the majority of buses run two or three routes in the morning and afternoon to save money.

Should the Wake County school system spend as much as $90 million in the next school construction bond issue on technology?

At Wednesday's school board facilities committee meeting, staff outlined proposals for $54 million to establish a "classroom baseline" and $36 million in network systems. Click h here for the network needs.

A lot of the discussion was around the classroom technology piece, where the goal in the next bond is to reach a ratio of one device (laptop, iPad or tablet) for every three students. This would involve 50,000 devices for $25 million.

The Wake County school board is supposed to set the ground rules tonight for the superintendent search.

At this evening's meeting, the board will establish the calendar for the search, establish selection criteria, discuss how the position will be advertised and discuss the compensation parameters for the new superintendent.

The board will also identify which groups and individuals will reeve personal invitations to meet with McPherson & Jacobson, the search firm, to discuss what they want in the next superintendent.

As for interim Superintendent Stephen Gainey, he declined comment Tuesday on whether he will apply for the permanent position. He said that doing so would negatively impact the search at this early stage.

Here are some of the quick highlights from the $1.3 billion operating budget that interim Wake County Schools Superintendent Stephen Gainey presented today.

Gainey is asking county commissioners for an $8.3 million increase. Gainey is also proposing that the school board waive policy to allow the district to use $28.7 million of the $32.7 million in the fund balance to balance the budget.

School staff say they can use the $8.3 million in additional county dollars for things such as:

UPDATE

Click here to view the budget proposal.

The revolving door from the Wake County school system to the state Department of Transportation continues.

Mike Charbonneau, currently Wake's director of public affairs, will be leaving to become director of communications at DOT. The school system has hired Renee McCoy, a former WRAL news anchor and more recently chief spokeswoman for the state Department of Health and Human Resources, to replace Charbonneau.

Charbonneau is one of a growing number of Wake school employees who are rejoining Tony Tata, the former Wake superintendent and now state Transportation Secretary.

UPDATE

Ann Dishong is interim director of the DOT governance office. This makes at least five former Wake school employees who've joined Tata at DOT.

The school budget, student assignment and bell schedules are among the items that the Wake County school board will deal with today.

During the work session, school transportation staff will present this list of 15 schools whose bell schedules are proposed for changes in the 2013-14 school year. The wild card is whether Deputy Superintendent Cathy Moore tells the board that any other schools need changes to meet the new state requirement of 1,025 instructional hours.

The board is then slotting more than an hour to discuss factors and goals to use in the new comprehensive 2014-15 plan. This handout is the result of the wide-ranging discussion held Feb. 7.

During the regular meeting, interim Superintendent Stephen Gainey will present his 2013-14 fiscal year budget proposal. We'll see how much of an increase he wants to request from county commissioners.

Wake County school administrators say they're trying to address concerns of Brier Creek Elementary School parents who are worried about being forced to change year-round tracks or have children on different tracks.

Brier Creek's PTA has set up this online petition asking the school board to waive policy to reduce the minimum class sizes in fourth- and fifth-grades. The petition says that the school can't fund a 4th-grade teacher for the rising 3rd grade class on a given track, resulting in a track change or siblings on different tracks.

School administrators said last week that they're working on addressing the issue in the upcoming budget that will be presented March 5. They also say that the Brier Creek petition contains some errors.