NJ Education Report

Today at its monthly public school board meeting, the Asbury Park Board of Education will approve Dr. LaShawn Gibson as its new Director of Human Resources for $158,000 a year, plus benefits. From tonight’s agenda:

Staff Appointments
Upon the recommendation of the Superintendent, that the Board approves the staff appointments listed below,
pending budget funding, sufficient student participation and contingent upon state mandated COVID-19
guidelines.
a. Dr. LaShawn Gibson
PCR#: 1618-010-003-00001
Assignment: Director of Human Resources
Location: Central Office
Salary: $158,000, Pro-rated, 12-month
Effective: April 1, 2022 through June 30, 2022
Account: 11-000-230-100-070-10
Contingency Satisfactory Criminal History Review

Why should you care?

Because Gibson’s appointment is the perfect example of the nepotism that pervades this tiny district and the continuing influence of former Asbury Park superintendent/Murphy’s Education Commissioner/current Kean University president Lamont Repollet.

Dr. Gibson is a Kean University graduate who, a source tells me, “will move up the ‘Superintendent Ladder,” one of many Kean alumni now working in Asbury Park. Numerous sources report that inside candidates often apply for promotions but are eschewed in favor of Repollet acolytes—like former Asbury Park superintendent Sancha Gray (now an assistant to Repollet at Kean) and current Asbury Park superintendent Rashawn Adams.

You’d think with a state monitor there to oversee Board decisions there would be some accountability. However, for the last ten years the monitor appointed by the State Department of Education, Carole Morris, seems to have little regard for functional governance. Example: this new position of Human Resources Director. Previously Adams led HR, along with his position of “Director of Planning, Research, and Assessment.” In a district that employs a total of 206 people, do you really need a Director who will drain the budget of another $200K (including benefits) when there are already three capable assistants? (For that matter, you don’t need a Director of Planning, Research, and Assessment.)

Yet Asbury Park has a long history of top-heaviness; at one point there were five Directors of Curriculum and Instruction for a district that serves 1,700 students. While there has been a tiny bit of down-sizing, Asbury Park is still #1 in its peer group for the ratio of administrators to faculty and students, and 45th out of 48 in salaries.

But, sure, let’s hire another one, even though the position hasn’t been filled for a year.

Asbury Park doesn’t need a Director of Human Resources, especially one directly descended from what staff members call the “Repollet Tree” or the “Carteret Gang.” It needs intervention from the State DOE or a total state takeover. Otherwise, the district community will continue to suffer, staff from abuse and students from the district’s utter failure to provide them with a safe and academically-sound environment.