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In bitter superintendent search, calls for Springfield school committee to restart process

Edward Nuñez, a member of the Springfield Public Schools superintendent search screening committee, went before the Ad Hoc committee during a public input meeting on Tuesday, April 30, at the Fredrick Harris School.
Focus Springfield
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Community Meeting (AHSSAC) @ Harris School Library 4/30/2024
Edward Nuñez, a member of the superintendent search screening committee, appeared and spoke during a public input meeting on Tuesday, April 30, at the Fredrick Harris School.

A legal organization dedicated to fighting discrimination is weighing in on the tense superintendent search in Springfield, Massachusetts. The group says it’s concerned about the search process – and it’s letter arrived just as the first interviews with candidates get underway.

In a letter emailed to the Springfield School Committee, members of Lawyers for Civil Rights Boston expressed “grave concern” over the way the committee’s gone about selecting a new superintendent.

The search to replace current superintendent Daniel Warwick has been going on for the past few months, ahead of his retirement at the end of the school year.

But during that time, several school committee members, as well as members of the public, have voiced concern over how the search has gone, including students such as Davian Pagan.

“You guys want what’s best for us - everybody wants what's best for us and so, what four out of three people think what's best for us is to restart this process to get the best superintendent for our city, for the next generation of students,” Pagan said Tuesday, referencing how four of the Springfield School Committee members have been calling for the search to start over again.

The student and member of the group, Pioneer Valley Project, spoke during the last of a series of public input meetings, designed to let residents voice what they would like to see in a new superintendent.

However, the past few meetings have morphed into airings of grievances about the search process itself, with residents, students and PVP members, such as Naomi Edwards, directly addressing the subcommittee running the events.

Legal group geared toward fighting discrimination sends letter

The superintendent search debate now has the attention of at least two members of Lawyers for Civil Rights Boston – the group’s executive director, Ivan Espinoza-Madrigal, and Tasheena Davis, a litigation fellow.

The letter claims “the superintendent selection process has veered off from the fair and equitable process it is supposed to be.”

It adds the search process is compromised, both due to a lack of “robust community and student representation” on the part of the committee overseeing part of the search, as well as by “allowing one firm to screen all of the candidates without benchmarks to objectively guide the screening process.”

The search process has involved creating a special screening committee made up of members of the public, including parents and teachers.

The body would review applications put forward by an outside law firm, Bulkley Richardson. They would then interview candidates and pass up their recommended candidates to the school committee itself.

The screening committee was designed to have at least one student on it, but since no applications were received, school officials gave the seat to another parent.

The lack of student representation has since led to backlash, voiced by many attending the input meetings as well as committee members.

A screener appears

Another matter – allowing the screening committee to look at applications that did not meet the stated minimum requirements for the superintendent role.

At Tuesday’s meeting, one of the screeners, Edward Nuñez, explained how by April, the committee learned 11 applications had been submitted, but six were rejected.

He described how a member of the firm guiding the committee said the most common reason for rejection was not meeting the requirement of having a minimum of ten years in education, including teaching, school building and central office administrative experience.

Nuñez said he later voiced his concern about the ambiguity of the requirement, describing how teaching experiences can take many forms, even outside of a classroom setting.

He called for allowing the screening committee to do some of the vetting Bulkley Richardson was initially tasked with.

“I made the ask - to allow the screening committee the opportunity to screen these individuals, not reduce the qualifications - that was never the ask,” he told those attending the input meeting at the Fredrick Harris School library. “No one's ever asking, disputing that these qualifications should be reduced. The qualifications are there for a reason - if you don't meet the qualifications that the school committee’s set forth, you shouldn't be interviewed.”

“But all I asked for was ‘Hey, can we have a second set of eyes,’ the screening committee, that consists of thirteen, well-respected members in this community, give them the opportunity to screen, let them vet," he continued.

Nuñez said he felt compelled to speak because an email he sent to school committee members ended up becoming an exhibit in a legal opinion on the matter.

Both Nuñez and another screener, Gary Bernice, reached out to school committee members in early April about the idea of viewing the six applications.

Vice Chair Joesiah Gonzalez said he attempted to submit agenda items to both allow for the consideration as well as the addition of a student to the screening committee, but was met with rejection by leadership.

Legal ramifications, legal opinions, legalese

The attempts became the subject of legal opinions from Bulkley Richardson. The firm was tasked by committee leadership with, among other questions, finding whether altering the search process late in the game would lead to any legal ramifications.

In addition to other issues, the law firm found that “retroactively changing the position requirements could invite litigation,” potentially from those who chose not to apply for the superintendent job because they thought they did not meet the minimum requirements.

The firm also found even restarting the search process “might not avoid all legal ramifications.”

The Ad Hoc committee later attempted to vote on an item allowing two students on the screening committee, but the item never got a vote, with Gonzalez motioning to table it late last month, citing ongoing concerns over the search process as a whole.

In its letter, LCR Boston says “there are no legal impediments to restarting the selection process.” It also stated that restarting the process will also be beneficial because “it will allow re-evaluation of vague and ambiguous criteria.”

In the event of a restart, LCR also says some of the criteria's wording should be revisited, particularly a requirement about demonstrating "senior management administrative success in a district-wide position in an urban setting."

The organization says the term “urban setting” needs to be more “clearly defined with parameters to “objectively compare the relevant background and experience of each candidate vis-a-vis the demographics of Springfield Public Schools.”

In a district of nearly 24,000 enrolled students, just over 69 percent are Hispanic and 17.5 percent are Black, according to the state.

“The next Springfield superintendent will also have the responsibility of managing a school district with a highly diverse student population,” the letter continued. “This means that inquiries into candidates’ experiences working with highly diverse populations are rightfully a part of the selection process. To pretend otherwise, either explicitly or implied through a culture that overlooks students of color, contributes to a discriminatory and toxic environment. This opens the City of Springfield and the Springfield School Committee to liability under federal and state laws, including Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C § 2000d et. seq.”

Speaking with WAMC, Gonzalez called the letter a rebuttal to the previous legal opinions.

“I think (the letter), certainly, calls out and is a direct rebuttal to a legal opinion and legal advice that we've been given as a body that, oftentimes, only serves to advance the positionality of the mayor and his allies on the school committee,” the vice chair said.

Meanwhile, the screening committee is slated to have its first interviews Thursday.

While speaking at the input meeting, Nuñez says he is prepared to move forward with the interviews, and that stopping the process altogether was never a goal.

“At the end of the day, I'm prepared to move forward, no matter what the outcome is - you know, my request was just to have the screening committee screen the applicants, never stop the process,” he said. “I'm prepared to interview two candidates on Thursday because that's what the screening committee has been tasked to do, right? I know this is beyond my purview - I don't make these decisions. I’m prepared to do that.”

UPDATE: In the time since this story has aired, the LCR letter came up at a school committee meeting on Thursday, May 2.

During the meeting, which focused on the FY’25 budget, Gonzalez brought the letter up to Mayor Domenic Sarno, the committee chair.

Gonzalez proposed a special meeting to, in-part, address the letter’s subject matter, saying it had called for a halt to the search and that the committee may be opening itself up to a lawsuit.

“Our legal counsel has indicated to us - if we move away from this process - which the school committee approved and voted upon, we’re going to face litigation,” the mayor responded. “Our own, your own legal counsel – it’s a process that, again, was voted upon and approved by the school committee, a process that we have followed, that we’re going to continue follow moving forward - we’re talking about the budget right now."

The committee later voted to pass the budget.

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