Dixon School Board considers whether to enforce residency requirement during new superintendent search

As the search for a new superintendent at Dixon Public Schools kicks off, the school board is being asked to reconsider its residency requirement.

The board voted to hire the Illinois Association of School Boards in December 2024 to conduct the search in anticipation of current Superintendent Margo Empen’s July 2026 retirement. At a special meeting Aug. 8, an IASB consultant told the board that requiring the new superintendent to live in the district may be making some candidates wary of applying.

[ Dixon School Board OKs agreement to begin the search for a new superintendent in June ]

The job is posted and will be up until Sept. 12. At that point the board will find out how many people applied, consultant Carmen Ayala told the board at the Aug. 8 meeting.

Although it’s still early, Ayala said, there’s not “as robust numbers coming through.”

Candidates are “concerned” about the requirement that the individual, if hired, must live in the district and has up to a year to relocate, Ayala said.

Ayala said she talked about two candidates who were interested in the Dixon position, but didn’t want to, or think they could, move. One of them lives about 20 minutes outside the district, she said.

So the question posed by Ayala is: “Do you want to lose a potential great candidate for 20 minutes living outside of the district?”

The school district reaches beyond Dixon’s city limits. It covers as far south as U.S. Route 30, north past Grand Detour, west covering Palmyra and parts of Nelson and east past Nachusa, according to the district map.

The board wants to have the residency requirement for two reasons: loyalty and involvement in the community, Board President Linda Wegner said.

Although the preference is to have the superintendent live in the district, “20 minutes, I think, it’s worth conversation,” Board Vice President Brandon Rogers said.

“Initially, we were thinking we don’t want to be a stepping-stone community. We don’t want this to be a job as a leadup to moving to the suburbs,” Wegner said.

“I think” living in the district “makes a difference in how many extracurricular activities you’re at, how much you’re seen in the community, and so on,” Wegner said.

It also could make a difference in what community a person is loyal to, Rogers said.

“I think the community lens is going to be put on like, ‘Wait a minute, you guys hired someone and they still live in” another town “and they have no intention of moving. I think the community would be like ‘Why’d you hire this person? They’re going to leave’,” Rogers said.

But for potential candidates, moving might be difficult for two reasons: bad timing and/or a bad housing market, Ayala said.

If everything goes according to plan, the board would like the new superintendent to start in January 2026 to work alongside Empen before she retires. That start date – if a potential candidate has young kids – falls in the middle of a school year and could make it difficult to move, Ayala said.

As for housing, there’s not much available in Dixon - it’s long been a topic of discussion for the Dixon City Council for at least the past year. On a wider scale, home prices are going up across Illinois while sales are down, according to a July 2025 report from Illinois REALTORS.

For now, the residency requirement is still in place, but the board will reconsider if they get a low number of applications by September, Rogers told Shaw Local.

Under the current tentative schedule, the IASB will present the board with an estimated six candidates Oct. 15. The board will interview those individuals in closed session and select finalists.

The finalists will meet with teachers and parents at a special meeting near the end of October before the board makes its decision.