NJ Education Report

Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson has been selected as one of Time Magazine’s “100 Most Influential People.”

In other Newark school news, the Star-Ledger examines the politics over last Tuesday’s school board race, where a slate sponsored by Mayor Cory Booker and Board member Shavar Jeffries was pitted against a slate backed by South Ward Councilman (and full-time principal ) Ras Baraka and Sharpe James. Three seats were open; as of this moment, the Baraka team has won two seats and the Booker team has won one. So good to know that April school board elections aren’t political.

And this morning Tom Moran deconstructs the politics of Newark’s election results in the context of school reform vs. status quo, and looks at the role of powerbroker Steve Adubato:

Superintendent Cami Anderson, a bulldozer who is pushing reform with the urgency it demands, will still have a working majority on the board, even if it is narrow and fragile. But here’s the rub: She is going to need help from Steve Adubato, the old-school boss who runs the city’s most effective machine for turning out votes. His crew controls the swing votes on the board.

And Adubato is the sort of fellow who will put one arm around your shoulder, whisper sweet words into your ear and use the other arm to sink a shiv into your ribs.

The Associated Press describes Newark Mayor Cory Booker’s housing initiative, Teachers Village: “The hope is that schools will be better with teachers who live in the community, and that it will create a middle-class enclave in a city where nearly one-third of families with children live in poverty. Middle-class residents can bring neighborhoods stability, attract more businesses and ultimately improve tax revenue.”

NJ Spotlight reports on the DOE’s new pilot program to revamp evaluations of school principals.

The Record reports that New Jersey is hiring more public school teachers, probably as a result of the increase in state aid.

Perth Amboy School Superintendent Janine Caffrey cooperated with state investigators of potential school lunch fraud by school board president Samuel Lebreault and resisted patronage. Now the Board is likely to fire her. According to the Star-Ledger,

In the days before she took over last June, Caffrey said Lebreault and fellow board member board Israel Varela called her about giving district jobs to their friends. Both times, the superintendent said, she rebuffed those requests.

“It was crazy,” Caffrey said. “My goal is to get to the point where I can do my job for the children of Perth Amboy.”

Lebreault denies all charges.

Annals of Efficiency: From the Hunterdon County Democrat: “All seven public entities involved think that regionalizing West Amwell, Lambertville, and Stockton schools into one district with the high school is worth further consideration, according to the chairman of the Regionalization Committee.” The proposed study will take “many months” and then must go before the each town for a vote. If one town votes it down the consolidation is off.

Department of TMI: the Manasquan Board of Education’s self-evaluation is online. It shows, according to The Manasquan Patch, that “the board has difficulty achieving its goals, micromanages its policies, lacks focus on student achievement, is disrespectful to each other and the administration, lacks trust and needs to improve its relations with district staff.”