Former Stoneman Douglas leader Ty Thompson still a principal — but with no school

Four years after he stopped leading Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Ty Thompson has been a principal without a school.

Thompson was moved out as principal of Stoneman Douglas in June 2019, a year after the mass shooting at the Parkland school that brought his leadership skills into question. Since then, he has kept the title of principal as well as the corresponding salary — currently $135,254 — while working lower-profile jobs with non-supervisory duties that would likely warrant a smaller salary.

A district website once listed him as the assistant director of student activities and athletics, a job that would pay from $74,407 to $133,882, according to a district salary chart. Thompson now works a job in the district’s Information Technology department, making $10,574 more than the director who supervises him.

Thompson’s assignments have continued through three superintendents, who in most cases failed to get School Board approval for these jobs, a possible violation of district policy, which requires employees on temporary or “task assignment” to be renewed by the School Board every six months. The district’s communications department has given contradictory answers on whether Thompson actually is task assigned.

The district’s decision to keep paying Thompson as a principal angers some families of Stoneman Douglas victims, who believe he should have been fired or disciplined for failures that resulted in the school being grossly unprepared when an ex-student with a troubling past walked unfettered onto campus with a rifle bag and murdered 17 people on Feb. 14, 2018.

“Unbelievable,” said Tony Montalto, whose daughter, Gina, was killed at Stoneman Douglas. “It was his security team that failed. His security plan that failed. As the architect of that plan, I still feel he should be held accountable.”

Regardless of his leadership at Stoneman Douglas, some School Board members say Thompson’s recent placements reflect bad management practices that they hope incoming Superintendent Peter Licata can change.

“I have concerns if we actually followed policy for the last five years, and it needs to be analyzed,” said Board Chairwoman Lori Alhadeff, who lost her daughter at Stoneman Douglas.

Board member Nora Rupert said she doesn’t understand why the school district hasn’t found a permanent role for Thompson after more than four years.

“We have had many directors, executive directors and chiefs resign or retire that I am sure he could apply for a position where we really need leadership,” Rupert said. “This will be [a matter] I will be discussing with our new superintendent, Dr. Licata as soon as possible.”

Licata, reached Friday, said he will look into the issue after he arrives. The School Board is expected to approve Licata’s three-year contract Tuesday.

”I’m going to look a little deeper into the practice. We should have people paid to do the jobs they’re qualified for,” Licata said. “The salary should match the job you’re doing.”

Thompson could not be reached for comment, despite attempts on his cellphone Thursday and Friday.

Lisa Maxwell, who represents Thompson through the Broward Principals and Assistants Association, acknowledges it’s problematic to keep him in the role of principal four years after he stopped leading a school. But she said Thompson has done a great job since he left Stoneman Douglas ensuring high school athletics run smoothly in the district.

“He has been performing exceptionally well and doing the job that the district has asked him to do year over year over year,” Maxwell said. “I think it just boils down to the district’s ineptitude and inability to actually manage the organization. That’s not Ty’s fault. They give him a job, and he’s been doing it.”

Thompson, 51, has worked in the district since 1992 as a substitute teacher, social studies teacher, coach and assistant principal before becoming principal of Stoneman Douglas in 2013.

He was thrust into the spotlight after the massacre on Feb. 14, 2018. Thompson was not on campus when the shooting happened; he was set to take a vacation and was pulled off an airplane on a runway before departing.

A state panel commissioned to investigate the school massacre admonished Thompson for not being informed on how his administration handled student threats. Thompson could only guess at the number of official “threat assessments” the school conducted on students each year and “really had no idea of the process,” according to the commission.

A lawyer hired by the district to investigate Thompson and three other administrators after the shooting found just cause to discipline him, saying “the evidence shows that Mr. Thompson delegated away many of his own responsibilities or duties to his assistant principals, but failed to implement any type of system to oversee compliance.”

Maxwell argued the lawyer didn’t understand how schools operate and produced a flawed investigation. “All she did was try to be a rubber stamp for the statewide commission, and she failed miserably,” Maxwell said in 2020.

A committee of district administrators, after reviewing the investigation, cleared Thompson of any wrongdoing, a move that angered some family members of victims, who argued no school administrators were being held accountable for failures that happened on Feb. 14.

During the 2018-19 school year, Thompson’s last at Stoneman Douglas, then-Superintendent Robert Runcie brought in a second principal, Teresa Hall, to help lead the school. They were both replaced by Michelle Kefford, who became the sole principal in the summer of 2019.

Runcie assigned Thompson and Hall to district-level jobs, allowing them to keep their titles as principals. Thompson was assigned to athletics and student activities and Hall was assigned to student support services. The jobs were approved by the School Board but never added as permanent jobs to the district’s organization chart since they were intended to be temporary, district officials said at the time.

“The length of Mr. Thompson and Mrs. Hall’s assignments … have not been determined, but once completed, they will transition to principal positions in the District,” district spokeswoman Cathleen Brennan told the Sun Sentinel in June 2019.

Related Articles

• Education | Parents visit site of Parkland mass shooting: ‘Do not turn away’

• Education | Deputy’s acquittal in Parkland school massacre case shows holes in the law, attorneys say

• Education | ‘It has to go’: Stoneman Douglas building, the site of Parkland massacre, will finally be demolished

Hall’s assignment ended after a year, and she was named permanent director of student support services, but Thompson’s temporary assignment continued.

The Sun Sentinel asked in 2021, 2022 and 2023 why this initially temporary position hadn’t ended yet and got the same answer each year from the district’s communications department: “The District does not have a policy that prohibits a principal from being assigned to a central office location for an unspecified period of time.”

The Sun Sentinel asked a district spokeswoman in July 2021 how Thompson could be held accountable if he has a job with no defined duties or responsibilities. “Individuals task assigned are provided goals and expectations. Performance is measured according to the goals and expectations,” the spokeswoman responded.

Thompson’s personnel file only includes one post-Stoneman Douglas evaluation. There’s no evaluation included for the 2020-21 school year, and no district employees were given evaluations in 2019-20 due to the pandemic. Thompson did receive an evaluation for 2021-22, where district administrator Valerie Wanza, his supervisor at the time, rated him effective across the board with no comments.

Thompson briefly described his duties in the self-comments section of the 2021-22 evaluation, which he signed on March 30, 2023.

“I continued to monitor COVID cases in the area of Athletics,” Thompson wrote. “In an effort to stay ahead of the pandemic, I worked closely with the Broward Health Department and the Coordinated Student Health Services Department to coordinate surveillance testing in both Middle and High Schools. The surveillance testing was a program to help prevent the spread of COVID amongst students that may be asymptomatic.”

In June 2022, Thompson was renewed again as a principal, this time by then-Superintendent Vickie Cartwright. On July 26, 2022, district spokesman John Sullivan said Thompson’s duties had changed. The department he had been assigned to, the Office of School Performance and Accountability, was disbanded by Cartwright.

“For the 2022/23 school year, with the reorganization of the District, Mr. Thompson is principal on task assignment to the Information and Technology Department,” Sullivan wrote.

However, emails during the 2022-23 school year, obtained by the Sun Sentinel through a public records request, show Thompson still handling a number of issues related to athletics and student activities that were unrelated to technology.

“I am at a high school athletic director’s meeting today, and the NEW [athletic director] at Monarch, stopped me to let me know that there is a garbage can in the middle of the gym floor collecting water,” Thompson wrote on July 27, 2022, to a district maintenance manager. “Here is the work order that was submitted back in April of 2021.”

On May 22, 2023, Thompson wrote to some coaches and administrators, “I know things are wrapping up and baseball is this week. If your Spring sport is done, please send proper documentation to the link below for reimbursement. It is a tight time frame to get Spring paperwork in and reimbursement completed before years end.”

Several emails also listed him coordinating logistics for 2023 graduation ceremonies. The emails show he did spend some time in the IT job.

Asked why he was still handling athletics and student activities after being moved to a technology job, spokeswoman Keyla Concepcion replied, “Ty Thompson fully supports the Student Information System project and has supported Student Activities when needed.”

In June 2023, Interim Superintendent Earlean Smiley renewed Thompson as a principal for a fifth post-Stoneman Douglas year.

“Mr. Thompson is currently working as a Principal on Task Assignment to the IT Division in support of the FOCUS Student Information System project,” Concepcion said June 20.

Concepcion said Thompson’s supervisor is now Tina Skipper, director of data intelligence. Skipper makes $124,680, which is $10,574 less than Thompson.

This was the third year in a row the district’s communications team described Thompson’s role as a “task assignment,” which is a job given to an employee on a temporary basis. However, under district policy, these positions can only last for six months unless the School Board agrees to renew them. Thompson’s assignments haven’t been approved by the School Board since June 2019.

The Sun Sentinel asked the district whether it violated its own policy on task assignments.

“I want to clarify our original response. Mr. Thompson is not task assigned,” Sullivan said in a June 21 email. “Mr. Thompson has been re-appointed to the position of principal, and he is currently assigned to the IT Division to assist the District with implementing the new FOCUS Student Information System.”

Although Thompson’s background is not in technology, “his expertise continues to be valuable for this initiative as he is a former master scheduler at the high school levels,” Sullivan wrote.

On July 7, Concepcion contradicted Sullivan’s answer, identifying Thompson in an email as a “principal on task assignment.” Asked for clarity, she said that was an error, and he’s a “principal on assignment.”

The Sun Sentinel asked the district multiple times why Thompson is not given a permanent job rather than continue to reappoint him as principal, a job he hasn’t performed in more than four years. The district provided no response.

Maxwell, the executive director of the principals and assistant principals association, said Thompson has thrived in his recent roles but he should be given a permanent job.

“Why the district plays these games, I can’t answer that,” she said. “But they really need to stop doing that. It’s not fair to people.”