Elchanan Poupko
Still of Charlie Rich from Westville altercation video.
(Updated) A group of Hopkins alums are calling on the Forest Road private school to reinstate an employee who was put on paid leave five months ago following a verbal altercation between his wife and a neighbor over the war in Gaza.
The call came in the form of a petition spearheaded by Suthi Navaratnam-Tomayko and Ayelet Kaminski.
Both graduated from Hopkins in 2022, and both live in Westville.
They are two of the writers of a letter that calls on Hopkins to reinstate Charlie Rich, the school’s associate director of annual and reunion giving, and grant both him and his wife Thabisa Rich access to campus, especially given that their child attends Hopkins.
Since the letter began to be circulated around a month ago, at the start of June, it has been signed by 127 alums, all of whom have pledged to withhold donations to Hopkins until Rich is reinstated.
Hopkins put Rich on paid leave in February after his wife, Thabisa, a city arts employee and local musician, got into a video-recorded verbal dispute with a neighbor, Elchanan Poupko, about Israel’s war in Gaza. Charlie was present during that altercation, though he was not chanting or protesting. He engaged in a debate on camera with Poupko.
“We, alumni of Hopkins School, are deeply concerned by the administration’s retaliation against Charlie Rich in response to an off-campus verbal altercation between Rich’s spouse Thabisa and one of their neighbors back in February,” the alums’ letter begins.
The authors continue by stating that, in an email to Hopkins faculty, staff and parents regarding the incident, “Head of School Matt Glendinning failed to identify any wrongdoing by Charlie Rich.” They accuse Glendinning of instead opting to make “defamatory” remarks about Thabisa Rich, who they believe, as an employee of the city, was disciplined in a “measured and appropriate” way.
At Hopkins, Navaratnam-Tomayko and Kaminski were active members of the school community. Kaminski was in the fine arts track and participated in theatre productions, while Navaratnam-Tomayko co-chaired the student diversity board and was co-captain of the track and cross country teams.
For both alums, who continue to feel close to the school, their aim is to “get Rich re-instated,” reconnect the family to the Hopkins community, and help them move on. In a joint interview with the Independent, they expressed their fear that current students and faculty might be scared to speak out against the administration, and their belief that they are protected as alumni.
“Even though this is a controversial issue, the actions that the school took against the family are extreme and not really conducive with an environment that’s supposed to promote learning and mutual understanding and talking through differences,” Navaratnam-Tomayko said.
Kaminski, who emphasized that she is Jewish and second-generation Israeli, agreed. She said that Hopkins instills “encouragement of spirited debate, but you’re not making attacks on someone’s character. … Even if you disagreed on something at lunch time, that’s still your friend later.”
Navaratnam-Tomayko agreed: “That was definitely a cornerstone of my education … I’m glad I didn’t grow up in a total echo chamber.” She wants current students to have that same experience.
In a situation where someone was disciplined for their connection to someone who spoke out about a controversial issue, Kaminski said, “I think that makes people scared to speak up, especially when you’re in this culture of ‘no one else is talking about it.’ ”
The crux of the issue is “how isolating it is, and the emotional burden the school placed on the family. When you’re at Hopkins, and you’re also working there, that’s everything,” she said, describing how tight-knit the community is. She couldn’t think of a similar situation happening during her time at Hopkins, what she described as a “singling out.”
Both said that while most signatories are recent alums, they appreciate the handful who graduated in the 2000s and early 2010s. They have sent the letter to Glendinning, but they haven’t received a response.
In a response to the Independent’s request for comment, Glendinning stated that he was not able to provide one due to the situation being a current personnel matter.
Charlie Rich did not respond to the Independent’s request for comment.
The full letter can be read here.
Update: In a Thursday response to the Independent, Poupko disputed the letter’s account of that February altercation and rejected the letter as “defamatory and slanderous.”
“I respect the right of students and alumni to advocate for Mr. Rich,” Poupko stated. “There must be a way to do that without maligning, gaslighting, diminishing the danger of antisemitism, and spreading outright falsehoods.”