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Superintendent finalists Maurice Green and Shirley Prince have 11 hours today to win over the community before the Board of Education possibly wraps up its search this evening.

Board members differ on how vital the daylong meet-and-greet sessions will be toward hiring a successor for Terry Grier, who left for San Diego in March.

Chairman Alan Duncan said he would watch how the candidates handled the pressures of a long day; Anita Sharpe said public comments could set one contender apart.

Margaret Arbuckle, director of the Guilford Education Alliance, said the back-to-back public meetings and subsequent closed board meeting led some people to believe the board doesn't care what they think.

She hopes board members will wait at least one day before deciding.

"It's a delicate balance as to how much public input they take," Arbuckle said.

Both Green and Prince acknowledged the concerns parents and educators might have about their experience. Green, a former practicing attorney, has no teaching experience and was only hired recently as deputy superintendent with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. But Green manages the daily operations of CMS, which has 135,000 students and 18,000 employees.

Green said he wants teachers to know they have his full support.

"When I first took the job as chief operations officer here (in 2006) one of the things that I said is that I revere educators," Green, 41, said Tuesday. "That is the word I will use tomorrow as well."

Prince oversees Scotland County Schools, a district with similar demographics but a student population 10 times smaller than Guilford. Prince, who was a teacher and school administrator in New Hanover and Gaston counties, said her experience covers various areas, from transportation to construction management to teacher training and curriculum.

"I just feel like it's something that I'm very well prepared for," said Prince, 56. "I know all the questions to ask because I've worked in every facet of it at an in-depth level, up to my elbows."

Green and Prince made the final cut because of their intelligence, care for children and support of teachers and principals, Duncan said. Duncan, also an attorney, and Green worked at the same law firm for several years before it split in 2002.

"There's an easily recognizable contrast in the backgrounds and experiences of these two folks," Duncan said. "They come to a common point but they obviously got there in two different ways."

School board members in both Mecklenburg and Scotland counties praised the finalists' work.

Darwin Williams, a Scotland school board member, lauded Prince's efforts to reform high school instruction. The district includes an early college, freshman and career academies at Scotland High School. Guilford has similar programs.

"Everything she's earned she deserves," Williams said. "She's worked hard for it."

Joe White, chairman of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, said he considers Green a friend and wrote a letter of recommendation on his behalf to the Guilford school board. White, a former CMS teacher and coach, said he is not worried about Green's lack of teaching experience.

"Mo Green can run any school system in this country and even ours if it were available," White said.

Garth Hébert, a Guilford school board member, said he was displeased with the work done by the search firm Ray and Associates. Hébert said that although Prince's résumé was impressive, she ranked third on his list. Green lacks managerial experience, Hébert said.

"I'd rather go back to the drawing board," he said. "I think the search firm did us a terrible disservice."

Hébert also worried that the board would have to hire Green's wife, a former school psychologist with CMS, as a package deal.

Green said his wife, Stephanie, currently a stay-at-home mother, was not discussed during the interview process.

"In my estimation, and I'm biased, she is a tremendous individual and she would be a tremendous school psychologist," Green said.

Contact Morgan Josey Glover at 373-7078 or morgan.josey@news-record.com