Top officials at the State Education Department just can’t quit fast enough. The latest to bolt: Interim Commissioner Beth Berlin, who announced her resignation this month after just weeks at the helm.
Berlin, a six-year SED veteran, took the post following Commissioner MaryEllen Elia’s abrupt exit at the end of August — soon after some of Elia’s top deputies had jumped ship.
Besides Berlin and Elia, the fugitives include: Deputy Commissioners Jhone Ebert, John D’Agati and Angelica Infante-Green; Associate Commissioners Renee Rider, Ira Schwartz and Lissette Colon-Collins; and counsel Alison Bianchi. Last one out …
New York State Council of School Superintendents Executive Director Chuck Dedrick calls Berlin’s resignation “very concerning.” Over the past few months, he notes, “so many people have left, and there are so many vacancies.”
Uh, that’s putting it mildly. A former high state education official described the situation at SED as utter “chaos.”
Filling plum spots at SED wouldn’t be a problem if other education pros thought New York was on the right track to boost learning. Alas, the Regents (who oversee the department and pick its boss) were reportedly forced to reach out to one of the deputies who quit, Infante-Green, to ask her to return and take the top job. Infante-Green, now Rhode Island’s education czar, told them (politely, perhaps) to take a hike.
In all, the exodus is a clear sign that New York’s Regents are headed in the wrong direction — and poised to make schools even more of a disaster. No one with integrity (or a reputation to protect) wants to be a part of it.
Under Chancellor Betty Rosa, the Regents have been working overtime to roll back standards, ease pathways to graduation and weaken measures to hold teachers accountable for performance.
Further big moves should be put on ice until the department’s staff, who are supposed to consider the implications of such changes, is more than a hollow shell.
Yet the bigger problem is the Board of Regents itself — and its trajectory.
Let’s face it: More than half of New York’s public-schools students flunk state tests year after year. Far too many graduate unprepared for college or a job.
Yet after Rosa replaced former Chancellor Merryl Tisch, the board became more concerned with getting kids through — and out of — school, regardless of whether they’re ready. And it’s been even more aligned with the teachers unions, which oppose even great charter schools and efforts to weed out ineffective teachers.
The Regents, of course, are chosen, essentially, by Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who owes much to the unions. No one, it seems, owes much to the kids.