The Cascade Consulting Group collected applications locally and from around the country. With a screening committee made up of various "stakeholders" the nominations were narrowed to five. The process was not public and the reason given was that many of the applicants wanted to maintain relationships with persons on their existing job. The five candidates to be interviewed by the school board, however, would definitely be public.
On June 15, 2001 Four candidates arrived in Nashville to prepare for the interviews. A reception was held the night before involving all interested citizens. Each candidate said a few words with Dr. Carol Johnson appearing to be the most pleasing or the least offensive of the speakers. At the time Pedro Garcia was thought not to be present, but the end he came from the back of the room to say a few words.
The next day was an eight hour session of interviewing four candidates. One had already dropped out. Two others would also drop out shortly after the interviews, which brings up conflicting theories about Lee Pasquarella's role. Conspiracy theorists believe the outcome was pre-ordained. Others believe Garcia had such outstanding interview skills that he was hard to resist.
Dr Carol Johnson was a Fisk graduate and potentially the first African-American Director of Schools. As an experienced Superintendent of Minneapolis Public Schools, she knew the right things to say, but she did not move beyond generalities. A number of answers were preceded by the qualifier, "After I have studied your system . . . ." This gave the impression that she had done little or no "homework" on the likely challenges of the Metropolitan Public Schools. She knew how not to offend the group, however, and she appeared to be safely on the way to a positive outcome.
Dr Pedro Garcia, from Corona-Norco district in California showed an amazing performance in the interview. Using a tactic that later became a trademark, he used the language opposite of his real beliefs. Apparently, he has learned from past criticisms of himself to pre-empt the language by using choice words before his critics have a chance. He told a story of dogs trying to find survivors, or bodies, in the Oklahoma bombing disaster. He told of how the dogs became discouraged and despondent and could not be made to work. But then the dog handlers came upon the idea of hiding living people in the rubble. The dogs could find people alive, and their enthusiasm was restored. "People have to have hope!" he exclaimed, "just like dogs." At that point the audience, mostly central office personnel, stood up and cheered. This looked like the man who could convince our citizens to believe in education again. It was an amazing performance.
Five days later the board effectively voted by 5 - 4 to offer the job to Carol Johnson of Minneapolis. A few days passed in which behind-the-scenes political moves were made and she declined the job. Now Garcia was the only candidate left. Mayor Bill Purcell suggested that the board reopen the search, but at that point Vern Denney, a member who originally supported Johnson, changed his vote to Garcia and the board decided to approve his employment at a salary of about $200,000 per year. This was far higher than Bill Wise, but a general consensus had developed that Metro needed to pay more for high quality. That proved to be an error.
So what happened? One African-American member of the board said that the board minority said things to Carol Johnson which led her to believe she would see a lot of conflict in Nashville. She, reportedly telling this board member, that she would have liked to come to Nashville, but not under those circumstances. Another theory was that she was not interested in the first place. Unless she was mightily discouraged before the public interview, she did not arrive looking like a candidate who was eager to make a move to Nashville. Another theory, the only evidence of which is the Mayor's opinion, was that it was a Republican plot. Garcia admits to being a Republican and to some extent the new education act (ESEA renewal) resembled his test-scores-are-everything approach to education. Finally, and this is present in politics more than people like to admit, was the pure exhaustion of the board members themselves. They had been through a six-month process. To think of starting over, or at least starting over at a half-way point seemed so burdensome. Without the benefit of hindsight, some of them just wanted to get on with their lives, and with opening of school with an administrative team in place.
In the next few weeks, change was in the air. Some educators were excited and filled with hope. Others made a decision to retire immediately. The inherent optimism of educators, the hopeful words of Garcia, the passage of an 88 cent property tax, much of which was for schools, caused most people to look to the future with high hopes.