Last week, the Vashon Island School Board announced its selection of an interim superintendent as the district conducts a search to replace Slade McSheehy, who will depart his post in July to lead the Bremerton School District.

According to the announcement, made in both an email to the community and on social media, the board reached a preliminary agreement with Dr. Josephine (Jo) Moccia to serve in the interim role.

Pending the board’s approval of her contract at a meeting set for 6 p.m. Thursday, June 12, Moccia will officially start work on Vashon on July 1, according to the announcement, signed by board chair Juniper Rogneby.

Moccia, 65, has served for the past 14 years as the superintendent of South Whidbey School District — a post from which she will retire later this month.

“Dr. Moccia is a confident, highly capable and experienced leader,” Rogneby said in the announcement.

The South Whidbey School District, which serves approximately 1,200 students, is “not unlike our own in terms of size, number of schools and demographics,” said Rogneby. (VISD is projected to have about 1,358 full-time students in the 2025-2026 school year.)

Previous to her time in South Whidbey, Moccia held several leadership roles in the Averill Park District, near Albany, New York, including superintendent, assistant superintendent, principal, and director of special education.

Saying Moccia “will provide the district [with] steady leadership and oversight,” Rogneby expressed gratitude for her eagerness to temporarily serve as superintendent.

In a subsequent phone interview, Rogneby said the search for an interim leader was done independently by the board, and was not a part of the pending search for a permanent superintendent being helmed by Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates (HYA), a national educational search firm hired by the board in May.

Rather, she said, that in speaking with Moccia and those who worked with her, board members had found a leader whose values and educational priorities aligned with their own and those of the broader community on Vashon.

With an interim in place, the timeline for the hire of a permanent superintendent, Rogneby said, will be lengthy and thoughtful, and include meeting with constituent groups on the island in the fall. A hire is expected to take place in the spring of 2026.

In a phone interview, Moccia said that she was “all in” to temporarily lead the Vashon school district, and that she and her partner were excited to look for a rental house here — and move closer to their 14-year-old grandchild, who lives in West Seattle. The couple’s move from New York state to Washington, 14 years ago, she said, had been prompted by the birth of this grandchild.

She described her departure from South Whidbey as having been meticulously planned, after she informed the school board three years ago of her plan to retire in 2025. The board then embarked on a careful and lengthy search, completed in January, to hire a superintendent to take over from Moccia this summer in a seamless transition.

The opportunity to take the interim role on Vashon, Moccia said, had “come as a surprise, but a welcome one.” Putting off her retirement for one year to accept the role, she said, “was an adventure we wanted to take.”

“I look forward to helping Vashon have an excellent year while it is looking for its next superintendent, working with the board and educating kids,” Moccia said.

According to Moccia’s curriculum vitae, her accomplishments on South Whidbey included facilitating an update of the district’s strategic plan; implementing equity and superintendent advisory teams; reducing the district’s facilities footprint as needed and creating a self-sustaining community center; increasing graduation and attendance rates; and creating community forums and advisory panels to engage students and families.

In overseeing the district’s finances, she led the work to create an $80 million bond, passed by voters by 60.31% in November 2023, as well as other successful levies throughout her tenure, and maintained a fund balance and excellent financial status despite declining enrollment, according to her CV.

Moccia also helped plan and implement a school garden project that includes agriculture classes for all students in grades K-5 and elective courses for middle and high school students. Notably, the program now provides food for the district’s school lunch program, partners with a local nonprofit to provide no-cost fruits and vegetables to students in need, and sells produce to the community and Chartwells, a major food service company that serves educational institutions.

Moccia’s long tenure as South Whidbey’s superintendent has not been without controversy. In both 2019 and 2024, petitions posted on Change.org, an online petition platform, called for the school board to oust Moccia.

The 2019 petition, written by an unnamed district parent, charged that unspecified actions taken by Moccia had caused harm to local students’ mental health and academic performance, and that Moccia had also mishandled a weather-related school closure which had resulted in distress to students and parents.

According to the website, that petition was signed by 583 persons. At the time, the incident garnered news coverage in the South Whidbey Record, which included a statement of strong support for Moccia by Linda Racicot, the school board chairperson at the time.

The 2024 petition, created by “Concerned Parents” and signed by 214 people, also accused Moccia of unspecified behaviors which had, the petition writers said, “undermined staff morale, damaged the trust of our community, and pose a direct threat to the well-being of our children.”

The Beachcomber could not verify the signatures on either petition, nor confirm if signers were affiliated with the South Whidbey district.

Moccia, in her interview with The Beachcomber, characterized both petitions as being politically motivated.

She and her board, she said, have been adamant in their support of equity and diversity initiatives in the district, including supporting transgender athletes and other LGBTQ+ students, immigrants, those with disabilities, students of color, as well as students who come from historically marginalized communities. A resolution on inclusion, equity and community on the district’s website spells out that commitment.

“As a collective, we support all of our students, and that makes some folks really angry,” she said.

Her own identity and the fact that her partner is a woman, she said, may have also driven some of the complaints against her.

“I’ve been told that I want to run my own ‘agenda,’” she said. However, she said, “My values align with what the board has done. My only agenda is to support the kids.”

She cited her long tenure as superintendent, her good relations with the district’s labor leaders, successful levies and the re-election of the district’s progressive board members as indications that many in the broader school community did not share the views expressed on the petitions.

She said that in general, although she felt very supported in her role on South Whidbey, she wished the petitions hadn’t been written. But, she said, “The superintendent is always the lightning rod.”

In a text exchange, Rogneby said that she and other board members had reached out to members of South Whidbey’s board and administrative team, all of whom had spoken highly of Moccia.

She said that she, too, believed that the petitions had stemmed from “a very vocal minority” of members of the South Whidbey community who had gone to “great lengths to express their distaste for the South Whidbey’s school board and superintendent’s progressive governance.”

“I feel confident that’s what was at the root of the complaints,” she said. “It’s not possible in any district to not create some enemies.”

Prior to the announcement to the general public that Moccia would be named as interim superintendent, school staff were informed of the decision.

Lisa Miller, a longtime Vashon High School teacher and the outgoing vice president of Vashon Education Association, told The Beachcomber that she and other union leaders “are looking forward to building a productive working relationship with Dr. Moccia that will benefit staff and students.”