SIOUX CITY, Iowa (KCAU) — The Sioux City Community School District Board of Education has voted to select interim Superintendent Dr. Rod Earleywine.

The board held a special meeting Thursday and went into a closed session after starting the meeting at 3 p.m. After the closed session, there was a motion to select Earleywine as the finalist and to enter “into contract negotiations to facilitate the hiring of the individual named.”

If Earleywine accepts the position, he will start the position for the 2023-2024 school year. The board voted 6-1 on the motion with Perla Alarcon-Flory as the dissenting vote.

SCCSD began searching for a superintendent after former superintendent Paul Gausman was chosen to become the superintendent of Lincoln Public Schools. Earleywine and Dr. Geovanny Ponce were named as the two finalists on Jan. 19.

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Who is Dr. Rod Earleywine

Earleywine currently serves as the interim superintendent of the Sioux City school district. He took the role in July 2022 after former Superintendent Paul Gausman went to work at Lincoln, Nebraska’s school district.

Before being interim superintendent at Sioux City, Earleywine was the superintendent for the Sergeant Bluff-Luton Community School District. The Sergeant Bluff-Luton school district was one of two schools in the state of Iowa to receive a 2018 National Blue Ribbon High School of Excellence. The release also states that Earleywine helped students earn college credits and increase the number of career options.

Earleywine served as the Sergeant Bluff-Luton school district’s middle school principal before he was superintendent. He also has experience teaching high school social studies and elementary physical education and coaching at the high school level.

Earleywine earned a doctorate in educational administration from the University of South Dakota in Vermillion, South Dakota. He also has a specialist degree in educational administration and a bachelor’s degree in education from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, and a master’s degree in educational administration from the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, Iowa.