As many school officials know, hiring a school superintendent is not a simple task.

Two districts are going through that process now; two others have gone through the process in the recent past.

The Butler School District has begun its search, which is the first time in 20 years officials looked outside the district for a superintendent.

It is made harder because they also are looking to hire an assistant superintendent and a business manager for next school year.

All of the current administrators announced their retirements in November.

In the Slippery Rock School District, the board Monday night appointed a search committee and announced that it would interview a consultant at its Jan. 27 meeting to see if his services will be needed.

Board President Polly Shaw said that the board is not planning on bringing in any other consultants, saying that there is a limited field of consultants.

“This is a strong, experienced person we’re bringing to you,” Shaw said.

She noted that the district, in the 1980s, got help from the Midwestern Intermediate Unit IV to find a superintendent, but she said that the unit is not in a position where it can help.

Shaw told board members to consider what kind of goals they would like to see for the district and what kind of qualities they would like to see in a superintendent, and give that information to the committee.

The board’s search committee is composed of board members Michael Scheer, Matt Pyle and Diana Wolak, with Scheer named as chairman.

Slippery Rock Superintendent Kathy Nogay will leave the district at the end of this school year.

The Mars School District recently went through the superintendent search process. With former Superintendent William Pettigrew serving for many years, it had been a long time since Mars did an outside search.

“We felt like pioneers, because we hadn’t done a search in many years,” said Dayle Ferguson, Mars board president. “It was one of the most labor intensive processes I’ve been part of as a board member, but it was also a very important process.”

She added, “We did not mind putting in the effort for quality results.”

They chose Jim Budzilek, who was the superintendent at the Leechburg School District, as Pettigrew’s successor. Ferguson said the board did a thorough search that lasted about five months before Budzilek was hired in May.

Butler School Board members want to hire a superintendent to replace Michael Strutt by March 17.

Search committee chairman Al Vavro said they want to hire that person soon to give enough time for the new administrative leader to have a say in who is hired as the assistant superintendent and the business manager.

Butler officials also are facing two other major issues: possible school consolidation plans and a new labor contract. The teachers’ contract expires after the 2014-15 school year.

Jim Buckheik, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators, said a superintendent isn’t a one-size-fits-all position.

“Educational programming, it can go all over the map,” Buckheik said.

Community participation, like an advisory board that Butler is considering, should be figured out at the beginning, he said.

During the last Butler superintendent search in the 1994-95 school year, a 20-person community advisory committee played a role in selecting then superintendent Ed Fink.

Mars officials last year had the community involved in another way. They put out a three-question survey in February asking community members what they’d like to see in their next superintendent.

Butler administrative search members discussed putting out a similar community survey.

The Mars survey had the public rank about 20 qualities the new superintendent should have. Qualities included being a public education advocate, having budget expertise, having a commitment to staying in the district and making safety a priority.

They also asked what they thought the greatest challenge the new superintendent will need to address.

Ferguson said, “We had a sense then of what the community’s priorities were. We took those answers to frame interview questions.”

Mars also hired a consultant to assist with promoting the job and organizing the search. Butler is considering hiring a consultant.

The only other area school district to hire a superintendent in the last few years is Allegheny-Clarion Valley. But Superintendent David McDeavitt already was working in the district when he was promoted two years ago.

Before then, it had been almost two decades since Allegheny-Clarion Valley put feelers out for the position, said Bill McGinnis, A-C Valley School Board president. But he remembers the process.

“It’s cumbersome because you don’t want to put just anybody in there,” he said. “I would want to take five or six months trying to find the right person.”

Eagle staff writer John Bojarski contributed to this report.