Board chairman T. Willard Fair said he found Smith to be no-nonsense leader who consistently has shown that “the buck stops with him.”

“I think his experiences are of such a nature that it’s easier for him to make the transition to something as complex as the state of Florida,” Fair said.

Smith supports vouchers, charter schools and other conservative educational policies. He pushed for accountability based on test scores in the districts he ran even before the federal No Child Left Behind initiative.

During the interview with board members, Smith said his top goals for Florida would include better aligning K-12 curriculum with the demands of community colleges and universities, increasing achievement at the middle and high school levels, and working on developing talented teachers.