Ex-Teaneck schools chief Pinsak will return temporarily as district seeks a new leader
TEANECK — Former schools chief Barbara Pinsak is returning to the office on an interim basis as of June 30 to succeed Superintendent Christopher Irving.
Board of Education President Sebastian Rodriguez announced Pinsak's appointment in a letter Friday, as the preschool-to-grade-12 district closed for the three-day Memorial Day weekend.
Irving, Bergen County's only Black superintendent, announced his resignation without explanation April 7 as the district closed for spring break. That followed months of pressure from some school trustees, who said they had "lost faith" in his work.
Rodriguez's letter, posted on the district's website, also announced that the search for a permanent replacement to lead the 3,800-student district would be conducted by the New Jersey School Boards Association.
"It is our hope that this endeavor will result in a new leader in place by the end of this calendar year, hopefully even sooner," Rodriguez wrote.
Pinsak, 76, retired from the Teaneck school district in September 2016 after more than 40 years service, her last five as superintendent. Most recently, she served as interim superintendent for the Montclair School District from March 2017 to April 2018.
Irving, 39, was considered an unconventional choice when he was hired with a three-year contract in July 2018. He had never taught in a classroom or served in a school administrative position.
He was serving as head of the Passaic County Workforce Development Board and director of the nonprofit Ceceilyn Miller Institute for Leadership and Diversity in America when he was tapped to serve as interim superintendent of the Passaic County schools in January 2018.
The Teaneck board was happy enough with Irving's performance to offer him a second five-year contract in October 2020.
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But in November of that year, the school board underwent a major transformation when six candidates ran for three of the board's nine seats.
Two incumbents who had approved Irving's new contract, then-board President Ardie Walser and Howard Rose, announced they would not seek reelection. A third trustee, Vice President Clara Williams, placed fourth in a race that elected three new board members: Danielle Gee, Damen Cooper and Harold Clark Sr.
While Irving's performance was not an issue in the campaign, Gee and Cooper ran on return-to-the-classroom messages amid the coronavirus pandemic. The district had been conducting classes remotely since September 2020, over parent protests, and reopened under a hybrid model in January 2021.
By June 2021, a year into Irving's second contract, a memo was circulated to trustees by board attorney Philip Stern that "the board has irredeemably lost trust in the Superintendent of Schools and seeks to make a change in that position as quickly as possible," according to trustee Gerald Reiner.
In a July 1 letter to Bergen County Superintendent Louis DeLisio, Reiner countered that the issue was not Irving's performance but the board's insistence "on being involved in the process" beyond its statutory duties.
Still, board members weighed a public motion to suspend Irving at its July 14 meeting last year, only to table the motion after a two-hour closed session, and announced that they were "looking forward to working with Dr. Irving."
It is unclear if the board tabled the suspension motion in exchange for Irving's agreement to resign.
Teaneck's student body is 33.2% Black, 12.7% white, 10.9% Asian or Asian/Pacific Islander and 0.8% American Indian, according to state Department of Education data. About 40% of students are Hispanic and Latino.
Marsha Stoltz is a local reporter for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news from your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.
Email: stoltz@northjersey.com
Twitter: @marsha_stoltz
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Teaneck NJ brings back schools superintendent Pinsak on interim basis
