A screening committee of 20 narrowed a field of 76 applicants to 12 semifinalists. Next week, it will turn over its top six choices to the school’s board of trustees, which will choose the next president.

“We feel the weight; it is a big responsibility,” said Lin Austin, chair of the board of trustees. “It is foremost in our mind that we get a strong leader who will fit into this county and understand what is going on here.”

The selection committee is a cross-section of businesspeople and citizens from across the county.

“We’re unique, I think, because we still have rural areas in the county, high-tech areas and everything in between,” Austin said. “It takes a very special person to lead such a diverse group, and we wanted all those voices to have some input.”

Of the 76, applicants, 64 were men and 12 were women.

Applicants came from more than half the states, said Dale O'Neill, vice president of institutional advancement and effectiveness at the college. There were candidates from each Southern state, but they also came from places as far as Texas, South Dakota, California and the Marshall Islands.

As its Web site notes, the college has had just two leaders in 40 years. It hopes to name its next president by June, but current chief Don Reichard has said he will stay a little past his August retirement date if need be.

Austin said the new president will have a unique challenge. “The community college, if you get right down to it, is the higher education that belongs to the people,” she said.

Each college, she said, is different and has its own issues to deal with. “The president of a community college is somewhat different than the president of a university,” she said. “They do intertwine so much with the community; we are hand in glove with every piece of this county.”

The new president will have a wide spread to oversee, including continuing education, middle college, early college, workforce-training programs and three off-site centers. But most of all, he or she will have to take up the mantle of a well-loved leader.

When Johnston Community College held forums to hear what the community wanted from a new president, they heard one thing above all.

“Those groups kept saying over and over, ‘Well, we want somebody like Don,’” Austin said, referring to Reichard. “And that’s got to be the best compliment you can have.”