The Fountain Hills Unified School District Governing Board offered a contract to Dr. Cain Jagodzinski to serve as superintendent for next school year at a special meeting held Wednesday, April 20. Jagodzinski was a finalist for the position in 2020, is a former teacher and principal at Fountain Hills High School. For the past two years, he has served as principal at a Valley high school with as many students as all FHUSD sites combined.

The Board addressed several concerns in the special meeting involving the hiring process, saying that, while the search only lasted 13 days, corners were not cut.

Jagodzinski applied for the position of superintendent and went through several interviews with FHUSD stakeholders in 2020, and he had lengthy discussions with the Board about the current opening.

The Board initially planned to form separate committees with parents and staff to interview candidates this year. The Board confirmed with legal counsel that they are not required by law to have those committees, so the decision was made to move forward without having Jagodzinski go through that process a second time. The Board also said that Jagodzinski will have more time to smoothly transition into his role with the quick hire.

Jagodzinski’s effective start date is July 1.

Many teachers and staff currently at FHUSD were not in the district when Jagodzinski was interviewed by a panel in 2020, and those new teachers were left out of the process this year. The Board said during the meeting that Jagodzinski will be a great fit at FHUSD and, after the meeting, Board member Jill Reed further elaborated on why the Board is confident Jagodzinski will excel.

“Because Cain is a team player,” Reed said. “He built a team at the high school when he was there. He listens to his staff, he listened to the kids, he is open to collaboration and, most importantly, he built a relationship with this community, so while some of those teachers are not here, the community is still here.

“Cain learned every single student’s name, he addressed them by name, he had an open-door policy, and the kids felt they could go to him with anything; suggestions, complaints, ideas, whatever it was, and Cain always listened to that,” Reed continued. “He’s very methodical in his thinking, he is careful with his decisions, he was financially prudent with his budget at the high school and he’s going to be an amazing asset to the district.”

Jagodzinski lives in Fountain Hills and his children attend district schools. Jagodzinski was a former social studies teacher and high school basketball coach in town, and he last worked for the district as the high school principal from 2016 to 2020. Jagodzinski has worked as the principal of Arcadia High School since 2020.