BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) — A petition is calling for East Baton Rouge interim school superintendent Adam Smith to be the parish’s new school leader. This comes after Smith wasn’t named as one of the three superintendent finalists on June 28.

School board president, Carla Powell-Lewis, supported Smith.

“When do we support our own who have come through the ranks of our district,” said Powell-Lewis.

It wasn’t the first time Smith was passed over for the job and it’s not sitting well with many members of the community.

Another social media post is calling for all nine EBR school board members to be recalled and won’t accept the final three. They call themselves a coalition of community members.

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The three finalists are Kevin George, the director of the University Laboratory School at LSU, Andrea Zayas, a former executive director of a teacher pathway program in Boston and Krish Mohip, chief education officer of the Illinois State Board of Education.

Powell-Lewis says five board members voted for the same three finalists.

“It makes me question if there was a conversation ahead of time,” said Powell-Lewis.

“And that’s illegal right,” asked BRProud investigative reporter John Rupolo.

“It is,” said Powell-Lewis.

Powell-Lewis says the board still has the option to appoint a superintendent if a motion is brought before the board.

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“As of Monday, of this week, we could have appointed a superintendent, that is still a possibility if we have five votes for that,” said Powell-Lewis.

Powell-Lewis says she doesn’t plan on bringing forward that motion because she says she won’t have the five votes.

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