The Australian Rugby Union is hoping to formally announce the appointment of former Super 12-winning coach David Nucifora as the new head of their high-performance unit early next month.

ARU boss John O'Neill on Wednesday confirmed he had reached an agreement with Nucifora and was now merely in the process of working through "schooling issues" before making an official announcement.

Nucifora, a former Queensland and Australian representative hooker who guided the Brumbies to the 2004 Super 12 title before spending the past four seasons with the Auckland-based Blues, had been keen to take up his post in Brisbane.

But O'Neill said he would be based at ARU headquarters in Sydney.

"David will take up his position in June," O'Neill said.

"He will be in Sydney. His plans had been to go back to Brisbane, where the kids had been booked into school.

"He's got three kids - two girls and a son - and we're just subject to finalising the schooling.

"We're now finding out how difficult it is to get kids into Sydney schools midway through the year, but we're confident we'll get them placed and that's the only hurdle.

"There's no other hurdles and, if that's resolved this week, we will able to formally announce he's joining the ARU at the beginning of June."

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