At the Board of Education’s Regular Meeting last week, the Superintendent and board members removed themselves from public scrutiny to conduct the Superintendent’s year-end evaluation, although on the meeting agenda this was stated as a “Personnel Discussion: Dr. Torres-Rodriguez,”  which puts the job evaluation of the person making decisions on your child’s education on par with the job performance evaluation of the person choosing what your child will have for dessert this week.

Not only does this group not want the public to know about the details of the Superintendent’s evaluation, they don’t even want the public to know that they are about to hold that evaluation!  This is pathetic and insulting.  The public, the students of Hartford, deserve so much better than this group.

What are they afraid of?  Are they afraid that the public will witness Board Member Browdy raising some inconvenient truths about the Superintendent’s failed tenure as the head of Hartford Public Schools (while Board Member Rigueur, with the ceremonial title of “Chairman,” rolls his eyes and shakes his head)?  Are they afraid that the public will realize that the Board has been giving the Superintendent a pass on the facts and accepting her rhetoric while drinking her Kool-Aid, relying on, as Board Member Escribano put it last year, “a leap of faith?”  Are they afraid that the public will hear the Superintendent utter falsehoods about her own performance, as she did earlier this month when she stated, “we were seeing gains pre-pandemic.”  Are they afraid that the Superintendent will, with no shame, lean on the COVID crutch and all of the beautiful and capable high needs students in Hartford as an excuse for her inability to successfully lead this district (despite stating 7 years ago that she understood “at a very personal level what our students need to experience in our schools in order to be successful,” Hartford Courant, Dec. 1, 2016, p. B6)?

Seven years at the head of the district with a self-professed “understanding” of what Hartford students need to succeed and there is no academic improvement, no improvement in arresting the chronic absenteeism problem, no improvement in school behavior or school climate and culture, no improvement in teacher relations or teacher climate and culture.  All this done while, according to EdSight, the state’s “official source for education data,” creating the largest administrative team in the state and increasing per pupil spending by 22 percent!

Pathetic.

Are they afraid that the public will witness an evaluation which ignores the following?

• Million Dollar Staffing Firm Fails as School Year Begins

• Superintendent Slights Teachers on First Day of School

• Superintendent Claims Credit for Securing COVID Relief Funds...and Spending Them!

• Superintendent Withholds Report From BOE

• HPS to Start School Year With 64 Teacher Vacancies

• HPS Stops Reaching for Higher Heights

• Facebook Conversation Reveals HPS Disfunction

• Human Resources 101

• HPS' Substitution for an Effective Talent Management Office

• Bulkeley Students to HPS: "We need our high school back!"

• Superintendent's Hand-Picked Mental Health Provider Fails to Provide Basic Student Data

• Superintendent Schedules Four Employee Town Halls - Skips All Four

• The Failure of Mental Health Services in Hartford Schools

• State Withholds Education Funding From Hartford Schools

• Thirty-two Teachers Will Leave Hartford Schools This Month

• The Culture of Fear in Hartford Public Schools

• Superintendent Keeps Public in the Dark About Threats

• "I Don't See That," States Hartford Superintendent

• HPS Central Services Budget with Higher Growth Than School's Budget

• Passed or Pushed Through?

• Superintendent Hit With Special Ed Complaints

• HPS' Chronic Absenteeism Resumes Upward Trend

• HPS Attempts to Recruit Teachers With Low Pay and Sketchy Bonuses

• Hartford Schools Block Education

• Are the Policies of Hartford's School Superintendent Driving Students Away?

• How Equitable is Hartford's Funding of its Schools

• Hartford Students Boiling Over School Lunches

There are folks in Hartford who, rightfully so, seek justice for their neighbors.  There is no justice in private, secret accountability.  It is time to focus that call for justice on Hartford Public Schools because the beautiful and capable children of Hartford are not receiving a just education while this Superintendent and this Board of Education remain in charge.

After 7 years, it is time the Hartford community demands a “NO TO EXTENDING” the contract of Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez and that the new mayor replace the appointed members of the BOE, while the public elects three new faces to the BOE.

If accountability and justice are not demanded and met and HPS remains on this pathetic path, the state will once again come knocking and take over HPS, removing any opportunity for local community input into their schools and forever branding Hartford Public Schools as a pariah district, while Torres-Rodriguez once again moves out of the district and never looks back.