What is going on at the NYC Department of Education?
On March 4, 2023 the NY POST did a story on District 31 Superintendent Dr. Marion Wilson who allegedly sent out racist text messages to Chancellor Banks and others, vowing to "get rid of white principals" and “clean up this island”
See: City probing anti-white texts linked to black superintendent
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| Dr. Marion Wilson [photo: Jason Paderon] |
And the current news from District 31 (Staten Island) is that there is chaos going on. PS 46 Principal Heather Jansen (who is white) was removed on May 1, 2023. MUCH more about that in a future post.
Never a dull moment, folks.
Betsy Combier
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
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| Jennifer Carreon has filed a $20 million discrimination lawsuit against the city Department of Education.Helayne Seidman |
By Susan Edelman, NY POST, May 6, 2023
A Filipino-American woman replaced as a Queens superintendent by her black male deputy has filed a $20 million race and gender discrimination suit against the city Department of Education, The Post has learned.
Jennifer Carreón, 45, contends Chancellor David Banks demoted her to install her less-experienced No. 2, David Norment, out of desire to elevate black males.
The Manhattan Supreme Court suit, filed this week, is the first to legally challenge Banks’ choice of superintendents since he made all 45 reapply for their jobs last year in what he called “a shakeup.”
One of 12 removed, Carreón was assigned a lesser bureaucratic role.
The Asian-American Pacific Islander attended NYC public schools from K to 12, growing up in subsidized housing in Lower Manhattan. She started working for the DOE as a teacher in 2002, rising to principal, assistant superintendent, and acting superintendent. She was appointed District 27 superintendent in 2019 by then-Chancellor Richard Carranza.
Carreón told The Post that she hired Norment as her deputy, and took him under her wing. “I was fostering and nurturing his leadership,” she said.
She even encouraged him to become a superintendent.
“When the process opened, he did tell me that he wanted to apply for the Bronx, because that’s where he lives. I said, ‘Oh, good luck, Let me know what I can do to support you.’”
To her surprise, the DOE invited Norment to a District 27 town hall to compete with his boss for her job.
Norment, an ex-principal at PS 140 in Jamaica, told the Community Education Council that he’d be the best leader to “turn around” schools with low test scores.
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“I have been a good fit,” Carreón argued at the town hall, saying she connected with immigrant parents and upheld high expectations for students.
In a final blow, Banks introduced the winners at a City Hall press conference.
“I didn’t have any clue,” Carreón said. “Everyone was texting me, “Why aren’t you here? Why is your deputy here?’
“It was a huge shock. I was devastated, because I was succeeding. I was highly effective. That was my last evaluation.”
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Desmond Blackburn, Bank’s since-departed deputy chancellor for leadership, had previously praised her 20-minute PowerPoint pitch — in which she described her accomplishments and plans — to remain in the post.
After her ouster, she said, Blackburn gave no explanation except, “The chancellor decided to go in a different direction.”
“It’s not a different direction because they hired my deputy,” Carreón said. “I taught him how to do things, and he needed some work. He needed more growth and was not as experienced, or ready to take on the largest district in Queens and one of the largest in the city.
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Banks bowed “to the discriminatory push by certain members of the community to select Norment solely because of his race,” the suit charges.
Lisa Johnson Cooper, president of District 27’s Community Education Council, a panel of parents who interviewed the candidates, told The Post she got personal Facebook messages from residents urging support for “the brother,” referring to Norment.
Cooper, who is black, wrote back: “Y’all vote by party line and by color. That’s crazy to me and no, I’m not getting ‘the brother’ in.”
In an orientation for the newly-installed superintendents last July, Carreón heard from colleagues that a member of the chancellor’s team commented openly, “Look around the room – what do you notice? There’s a black male at every table,” the suit says.
Carreón, like several other displaced superintendents, accepted a newly created title, executive director of School Support and Operations, in Lower Manhattan’s District 1, at the same salary, $187,400. The appointed superintendents got raises to $215,000 or $230,000.
“I feel degraded,” she said. “I’ve worked so hard my entire career, did everything you’re supposed to do, and exceeded expectations. Everything was always pointing upwards.”
Carreón’s lawyers, Davida Perry and Brian Heller, also have pending race-discrimination suits against the DOE on behalf of four white women and a white male who all claim that ex-Chancellor Carranza demoted and replaced them with less-qualified people of color.
DOE and city Law Department officials would not comment.
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