Dubois School Board approves employment contract with interim superintendent for 2026-2027

(Dubois, WY) – The Dubois School Board approved an interim superintendent employment contract with Dan Schmidt this week for the 2026-2027 school year.

“On behalf of the board I would like to extend a warm congratulations to Dan,” Board Chair Tracey Nguyen said during a regular meeting Tuesday. “We appreciate your willingness to serve in this role, and we look forward to working with you.”

Schmidt’s one-year interim agreement commences July 1, 2026, and ends June 30, 2027, Nguyen said, noting that the school board intends to conduct a “full” superintendent search this fall.

Community engagement

Nguyen took a moment earlier in the meeting to thank “everybody who was involved” in this month’s superintendent search, “specifically the candidates who visited our district.”

“We were fortunate … to have four strong candidates,” she said. “We appreciate the time that they took to come visit.”

She also expressed gratitude for staff members, teachers, students, and community members who participated in the community forums with each of the candidates this month.

“Your engagement and your input was very important,” she said. “We took all of the feedback that we received into consideration, (and) it did help shape our decision-making.”

Schmidt

During his community forum April 14, Schmidt introduced himself as a “music teacher by trade” who has been working in education since 1990.

He shifted to school administration around 2006, he said, serving as a principal of a small school with a large virtual education program.

From there, Schmidt said he stayed in smaller districts, spending the majority of his career in Montana before becoming the superintendent at Niobrara County School District 1 in Lusk about two years ago.

“I was not the right fit for that district,” he said, explaining his decision to apply for the position in Dubois. “But I wanted to just make a difference in a small school district again – like this – and not be so far away from students.”

In Lusk, Schmidt said, there is “a little bit of distance” between the administrative offices and the school buildings, making it difficult for him to spend time among students – who he referred to as his “heartbeat.”

“I really feed off of students a lot more, and that happens when I can be out near them, you know, going out for bus duty, being around for lunches, talking to kids,” he said. “You have to go and show that you’re there (to) support them. … I want to get back to that.”

He shared a similar method for engaging with stakeholders, outlining a strategy he’s used in the past in which he brings community members together over shared meals to discuss school-related issues.

“We really want our parents, grandparents (and) other family members to feel like they are involved in the school district,” he said. “And really the only way to do that (is by) building that trust with your community – inviting them in, making sure they are here, and listening to them along the way.”

It will be important for him to build trust among his staff as well in order to develop the “very collaborative” work environment that aligns with his leadership style, Schmidt said – though he noted that “there’s always that point in time as the superintendent where you have to be willing to say … this is how it’s going to be.”

“It’s not always a collaborative decision,” he said. “It’s collaborative in the process – getting there – but you do have to provide that leadership to make those decisions.”

Asked how he would inspire his staff to work as a team, Schmidt said he would define a clear vision of “where we’re going.”

“You have to be on a mission,” he said. “You have to provide that impetus, (and) you have to preach that the value of every individual is there – everyone has a say. … And then from there we move forward and hopefully just put kids at the forefront and say that, ‘Hey, this is our inspiration; this is where we’re going.’”

Schmidt plans to move to Dubois with his wife and granddaughter, who is a junior in high school.

“This is a wonderful community,” he said. “There’s a lot of positive here, and anything that I can bring to the table will be just to help to focus all those positives and move forward in a way that we all agree is going to be the best.”