WOBURN - The city's School Committee will hire an outside consultant to screen the initial batch of applicants vying to replace Superintendent Dr. Carl Batchelder.

During Wednesday night's regular meeting, the education board voted to expend approximately $8,500 to retain a Mass. Association of School Committees (MASC) representative, who will now assist in the search.

Batchelder, who has served as the school system's top administrator for 15 years, announced early last month that he will retire from the post in June.

Although she later endorsed the hiring of a consultant, School Committee member Patricia Chisholm questioned whether the move would be a waste of time, as she felt the district had a viable replacement for Batchelder in Assistant Superintendent Mark Donovan.

"I don't know if we're wasting our time, if we have someone who's been filling in for Dr. Batchelder and is doing a great job in my opinion," the School Committee member said.

"If he's looking for the position here, he might be looking elsewhere," warned Chisholm, who worried that Donovan might depart Woburn for a superintendency in another municipality.

Donovan has been filling in for Batchelder since Sept. 11, when the superintendent suddenly collapsed in his office and was brought to the Lahey Clinic for treatment. Batchelder has since returned to work, although on a limited basis thus far.

The assistant superintendent, who has not publicly indicated a desire to replace Batchelder when he retires, is a 14-year veteran within the Woburn school system.

Several School Committee members later argued against hiring an internal candidate outright.

According to education board member Dr. John Wells, he wasn't convinced that an assistant superintendent was the best choice for the district's top administrative role. Wells also argued that Woburn could benefit from a fresh perspective on how to run the school system.

"I really think we'd be selling the community short, if we don't look outside. Sometimes, you need new ideas and someone from the outside to come in," Wells said.

"I have some concerns. There's other aspects of a superintendency that an assistant superintendent doesn't deal with. He [Donovan] may be the best candidate, but until we see who applies, we don't know," he School Committee member added.

School Committee member Margarette Masotta agreed with Wells and insisted that competition amongst applicants would provide a forum in which candidates could showcase their strengths.

Masotta also advocated for using an outside consultant to conduct the initial screen process, as she believed a professional would ease the public's potential worries over whether the search was fair and unbiased.

"I would like to see [the search] go outside, because competition is the best answer. You can't compare someone to themselves," said Masotta.

"I don't want it interpreted by anybody that we have something against Mr. Donovan," School Committee Chair Joseph Crowley later commented. "I just think we owe it to this community to go through this process."

The School Committee still has to determine what criteria will be used by the MASC representative to narrow down the applicant pool.

Based upon the guidelines informally outlined by the School Committee last night, the consultant would screen the candidates and recommend several finalists to the School Committee.

The education board would then conduct public interviews of those candidates and ultimately vote on Batchelder's successor.