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High-profile Hillhouse High Principal Kermit Carolina has a new position promoting youth development citywide, while a change to one of the school’s academies was formally announced just two weeks before the academic year starts.
Those were among a slew of last-minute changes that Board of Education members voted not-quite-unanimously to approve in one of the last hiring rounds before the first day of school an Aug. 31. Board members also approved three new administrative hires and three other administrative transfers, along with 33 teaching hires.approved at a special meeting held at John Martinez School Tuesday night on barely 24 hours notice.
One board member, Alicia Caraballo, opposed the Hillhouse changes and transfer of Carolina (pictured).
Superintendent Garth Harries asked the board to approve a transfer for Carolina from principal of Hillhouse’s College Career Readiness Academy to the district’s interim supervisor of youth, family and community engagement. Harries said he will work on a permanent hire for the position for the following academic year. Carolina’s transfer is effective as of Wednesday. His $143,000 annual salary will remain the same.
In the new position, Carolina will expand YouthStat, a city and district-led initiative that pulls together community leaders to ensure disengaged youth stay in schools and out of violence. The program was piloted at Hillhouse this academic year. He will work with Gemma Joseph Lumpkin, newly promoted director of youth, family and community engagement, and Adriana Joseph, the deputy director.
The board is not creating a new position for Carolina. It is redefining one from which Steve Pynn retired.
Harries called Carolina’s new position a logical procession from the work he has done at Hillhouse.
“Through the course of this year Kermit has been a real leader in the implementation of YouthStat. Hillhouse is the school hat stepped forward most aggressively to take advantage of the mayor’s initiative. The chief of police deserves a lot of credit for keeping crime under control in new Haven while it’s bubbling up in other jurisdictions. We also think YouthStat deserves some credit for that,” Harries said.
After an internal audit April 2014, the district divided Hillhouse into three separate academies, each with its own theme and set of administrators. Carolina, previously principal for the whole school, assumed the prinicipalship of one of the three academies, called College Career Readiness. Fallon Daniels is the principal of the IDEA Academy and Zakkiyah Baker heads the Law, Public Safety, & Health Academy. Critics have called the school’s structure bloated and ineffective.
Harries said the academies were created to help keep students from “falling between the cracks” at one of the city’s largest high schools. He pointed to statistics including the increase in the school’s four-year graduation rate from 41 to 69 percent as an indication that the structure is working.
“I know there have been concerns about the change process at Hillhouse,” he said. “I’m sensitive to that.”
Starting Aug. 31, the College Career Readiness Academy will be phased out in favor of “SMART,” a new arts-focused academy. Harries proposed former Hillhouse art teacher and Co-op High School Assistant Principal Val Jean Belton (pictured) as SMART’s principal — a decision the board also approved Tuesday night.
Harries said teachers and students have known of the academy’s change in theme since the spring.
Board member Caraballo (pictured) opposed the superintendent’s decision to add a new position to central office and to hire a new principal at Hillhouse without restructuring the school.
Central office is now composed of “a lot of chiefs and supervisors,” she said. She called the decision to create a new supervisory position “irresponsible”: “It’s another example of where what we need to do is ensure resources are getting to the students.”
Harries said the changes to central office do not reflect an increase in the number of positions, but rather a restructuring of existing ones.
Carolina has had a high-profile tenure at Hillhouse. Graduation rates rose 66 percent, from 41.8 to 69.1 percent, while he served as principal, while the “college persistence rate” (students making it to the second year) also rose, from 67 to 81 percent. A grade-tampering scandal put him in the spotlight, too, as did a 2013 run for mayor. He both worked with student athletes to up their academic games and strove to give standout academics in general the same kind of recognition given to star athletes.
New Assistant Principals
The board approved other administrative shifts. John Nguyen, former assistant principal at Hillhouse, will be Co-op High School’s assistant principal. Nicholas Perrone will replace Nguyen at Hillhouse, just after finishing the residency program at Career High School. Kristina Denegre, former assistant principal at Wexler Grant Magnet School, will replace Heriberto Cordero as assistant principal of Clinton Avenue School. Tina Mitchell, former assistant principal at Hill Central Music Academy, will join new Principal Cordero as assistant principal of Fair Haven Middle School.
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Tianko Ellison will become the new assistant principal at Wexler/Grant School. She was the only hire present at Tuesday night’s special meeting. A former administrative intern at Conte/West School, Ellison said she is “looking forward to implementing all the ideas, strategies and knowledge I received in my trainings at various emerging leaders programs.”