OAKWOOD — Oakwood school board members could vote on whether to appoint the district's next superintendent this week.

The board already had scheduled a special meeting to work on rewriting district policy at 5 p.m. Wednesday at the Oakwood Grade School, 408 S. Scott St. Afterward, it will go into closed session to discuss personnel.

"The plan is to make an announcement," board President Greg Wolfe said Friday. "But I don't know whether we're going to be ready to do that.

"We haven't all been together yet," Wolfe said, adding two members were absent at the Oct. 19 meeting when the board discussed the matter in closed session for more than two hours. "We are moving forward with the top candidate though. What I do believe will happen is the board will review the remainder of the reference checks and have a final discussion."

In May, the board launched a search for a replacement for Keven Forney, who is retiring on June 30 after 35 years in education, the last eight as district chief.

The Illinois Association of School Board's executive search firm, which the board hired to post the position and screen applications, narrowed the 21 applicants to six candidates. The board then interviewed those candidates, then selected three finalists.

Wolfe said the board's top candidate is Crystal Johnson, Rossville-Alvin schools' superintendent and grade school principal. Johnson taught third-, fourth- and fifth-grade special education in the East Peoria school district from 2006 to 2008. She then taught English for special education 11th-graders at Pekin High School for a year before going to the Rossville-Alvin district.

"After the first and second rounds, Crystal was the top candidate," Wolfe said, adding she met all of the criteria that members were looking for. "The board just felt she was the best fit for the position and person who could move our district ahead."

However, the board and its top candidate has drawn criticism from some local teachers and community members, who have voiced concerns that they were left out of the selection process and about Johnson's level of experience.

Members of the Oakwood Unit 76 Education Association said they didn't get a chance to meet and talk with Johnson and the other finalists and then offer input to the board.

"They're violating their own mission statement," Kelly Ferdinand, the association's co-chief negotiator, said, adding the board's mission is "to educate each student in a safe learning environment, working in partnership with students, teachers, staff, parents, & community. ..."

And in a prepared statement read at the Oct. 19 meeting, members pointed out that Johnson has less than seven years of experience in education, which is less experience than 70 percent of Oakwood's teaching staff.

"We are wary that someone with such little experience has the knowledge and ability to lead our ever-evolving staff," they said. "The candidate's qualifications, at least on paper, don't seem to put them in the front running for this position."

Wolfe said that the board has used the same search process that it has used since at least 1981 and has ended up with some "outstanding" administrators.

"It's the same process we used to find Dr. Forney, and it's worked out very well," he said, adding that Forney had been a longtime principal but had no experience as a superintendent.

Wolfe said the board also addressed concerns that the education association raised in a statement it read at an Oct. 17 special meeting. Its responses are included in the Oct. 17 meeting minutes on the district's website at http://www.oakwood.k12.il.us.