{"id":332909,"date":"2026-07-08T10:35:06","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T10:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/332909\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T10:35:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T10:35:06","slug":"miami-dade-superintendent-semifinalists-see-who-made-cut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/332909\/","title":{"rendered":"Miami-Dade superintendent semifinalists: see who made cut"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Dr.<\/p>\n

Dr. Jose L. Dotres, superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools, speaks at Brownsville Middle School on Thursday, April 10, 2025. Community leaders gathered to discuss events and community impact initiatives at a kickoff news conference as Miami looks forward to hosting the College Football Playoff National Championship at Hard Rock Stadium in 2026.<\/p>\n

PHOTO BY AL DIAZ<\/p>\n

adiaz@miamiherald.com<\/p>\n

Miami-Dade County\u2019s school board now has six semifinalists in the running to replace Superintendent Jose Dotres.<\/p>\n

Down from a pool of 21 applicants, the list includes any applicant who was selected by at least one member of the school board to be advanced in the process. Members were able to select up to three candidates.<\/p>\n

The list of six semifinalists, provided by district staff to the Miami Herald, includes familiar names in South Florida as well as some candidates from out of state.<\/p>\n

The list includes:<\/p>\n

District staff did not provide records showing which school board members selected which semifinalists as of Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n

Dotres was hired to lead the district Jan. 2022<\/a>, replacing Alberto Carvalho. Dotres\u2019 contract is scheduled to end Feb. 14, 2027.<\/p>\n

The Herald previously published the full application materials for all 21 applicants for the role<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Some high-profile applicants did not make the list of semifinalists. Denver Public Schools Superintendent Alex Marrero,<\/a> did not appear to meet the board\u2019s requirement of \u201cpublic school classroom teaching experience or equivalent instructional experience.\u201d Chief Schools Officer<\/a> for Chicago Public Schools Jeffrey Mosley was also not picked as a semifinalist.<\/p>\n

Five of the six semifinalists were found to have initially met all the board\u2019s minimum requirements,<\/a> based on a district analysis. Ruszkowski was deemed to not have met the board\u2019s requirement of \u201cexperience as a school principal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Discussion at the board\u2019s last special meeting, held in late June for the sole purpose of discussing the superintendent search<\/a>, centered around whether the board might seriously consider someone who was short a requirement or two.<\/p>\n

Board Chair Mari Tere Rojas said at the meeting she felt \u201cvery strongly against\u201d offering leeway on the minimum qualifications. Other members, like District 4\u2019s Roberto Alonso, said they wouldn\u2019t be opposed to considering someone in \u201cbucket two,\u201d the group of 10 candidates who were initially found to lack a requirement or two.<\/p>\n

A member of Rojas\u2019 staff did not immediately respond to a question Tuesday on whether the board would consider hiring someone who was not one of the six semifinalists.<\/p>\n

According to a plan finalized at last month\u2019s meeting, background checks on the remaining candidates will be completed by July 17 and finalists will be selected by end of special board meeting held July 21.<\/p>\n

Members did not address at that meeting the exact date they plan to name the new superintendent, but a presentation from the search firm assisting the board listed Aug. 13 as the date by which they would be named.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dr. Jose L. Dotres, superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools, speaks at Brownsville Middle School on Thursday, April…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":332910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124],"class_list":["post-332909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/332910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}