The Riverside Community School District has a new superintendent.

Timothy Mitchell accepted the position after an offer was made Monday at a special school board meeting. He replaces Jim Sutton, who will be leaving after 12 years leading the district serving Oakland, Carson and Macedonia.

Mitchell has spent the past six years as superintendent of the Rapid City Area Schools in Rapid City, South Dakota. He announced last May he would step down this summer from that job, according to the Rapid City Journal, so he could look for employment closer to his family.

Prior to Rapid City, Mitchell was superintendent of the Chamberlain School District in Chamberlain, South Dakota, which Riverside described in a statement posted on the district’s website as a similar size to the Pottawattamie County school district. Mitchell began his career as a seventh-grade science teacher and middle school principal.

Riverside said Mitchell “has engaged multiple roles of leadership and school improvement in his tenure as superintendent and looks forward to bringing those strengths to the Riverside district.”

“I believe our work as educators is to embrace student learning rather than teaching,” Mitchell said in the statement on Riverside’s website.

Mitchell has an education doctorate in school superintendency from the University of South Dakota, as well as an education specialist degree and master’s in education administration from the same university.

The Riverside school board hired search firm Ray and Associates of Cedar Rapids to assist in advertising and interviewing candidates.

A total of 289 surveys were submitted by community members to identify qualities for the board to look for in a candidate, and 44 applications were received by March 23. From those names, 12 were selected who best matched the desired qualities, which were winnowed to five semifinalists who interviews with the board.

Two finalists were given a second interview with the school board. The other finalist was Christopher Anderson, superintendent of the Monticello Community School District in Jones County. Community members, teachers, students, and parents were also given the chance to meet with the two finalists prior to Monday’s decision by the school board.

The outgoing superintendent, Sutton, is leaving Riverside end of June to become superintendent of Belle Plaine Unified School District 357 outside Wichita, Kansas, where he will be closer to his grandchildren.