NORWALK, Conn. — Four months after then-Superintendent Alexandra Estrella announced her departure from Norwalk Public Schools, the Board of Education has secured a search firm to lead the search for her replacement.

NPS will utilize Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates (HYA), which the district also turned to in 2019 to find Estrella. Board Chair Howard White is scheduled to meet with the firm next week to schedule the rest of the process, he told NancyOnNorwalk.

“I’m excited about the new direction that we’re headed in,” White said. “One of the main things I wanted to make sure is that we do not rush this process. It’s not a process that needs to be rushed. Our interim superintendent is going to be working” throughout the 2026-27 school year.

The district will soon notify people on how they can get involved in the search, the board chair noted.

“They’re going to play an integral part in this as well,” White said.

NancyOnNorwalk spoke with White about how the district will be engaging with the community, what he’s looking for in a superintendent and the board’s relationship with interim Superintendent Sandra Faioes.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What should people expect out of the process? I understand maybe not everything is perfectly nailed down at this point, but what’s a general ballpark?

The first month is for the firm to really work with the board, to work with the community, to engage in a community process.

They’re really good at what they did, and to be able to come back and work with the Norwalk community again is a good thing. My biggest piece is to not forget anyone in the process, is to bring the community together as well. The community will be truly involved, the teachers will be involved, the administrators will be involved, the leaders will be involved.

As far as surveys, that’s something that’s very important.

It’s very important to add those other members inside the community as well, as far as the mayor is concerned, the president of the NAACP, the executive director of the housing authority, the Haitian community. 

You mentioned surveys. Any other ways that you’re looking to engage the community in this process? I understand that in the past there’s been public forums.

Well, definitely, the public forums are always good, but the surveys are a piece that does a lot for you as well. For those who are not able to attend the public forums, it’s always best to have surveys go out to the community as well to get the feedback and the input. So that’s going to play a significant part as well.

A lot of this is going to be going into what the community is looking for in a new superintendent. What are you looking for in a superintendent?

The main thing is to make sure that the new superintendent, him or her, stays within the vision of the district. It’s very important to have that open dialogue and that working relationship to be able to work with our district. It’s very important that the new superintendent comes in with the understanding of his or her expectations.

All superintendents come in with their ideas as well, and you got to take that in consideration, but you cannot forget about what we implemented and what’s in place — to step in and improve those areas that need to be improved. 

A superintendent that’s going to come in and also communicate and be very truthfully involved with the community as well, I just think that’s something that we got to also keep open when it comes to the superintendent role.

Not only is the superintendent working with and responsible for the Norwalk Public Schools, but is to have that open dialogue — relationship — with the community, with the leaders. And that’s something that Dr. Estrella did.

How have the conversations with the board gone over the past couple of months?

One of the main things that the board talked about was to get this process going. There was one board member that was there when the process started six years ago, so we understand that there’s a lot of work ahead of us.

We want to make sure that we’re doing the right things and we’re going to do the right things for the community.

As the chair, this is definitely my first time being involved in the process of hiring a new superintendent.

How has the board’s relationship with interim Superintendent Sandra Faioes been?

Sandra has been in the district for 14 years, and Sandra started in the district and moved up. So having someone of her magnitude — and she was the deputy superintendent — she’s very familiar with the NPS process. We felt very comfortable in our decision.

She felt very comfortable being able to step in as well to lead us to the next direction until a new superintendent steps forward. We’re very excited about Sandra.