At last week’s Asbury Park Board of Education meeting, in a vote of 5-2, board members placed Superintendent RaShawn Adams on administrative leave and appointed long-time administrator Mark Gerbino as Interim Superintendent.

This news was first reported by NJ Education Report.

John Napolitani, president of the local teachers union, told the Asbury Park Press that the feeling around the school Friday morning was “euphoric.”

“There has been a complete dark cloud that has been lifted off of this district and fully 100% support what the board did after several years of surveys, votes of no confidence, multiple grievances and a myriad of other issues that went on in this school district,” Napolitani said.

Gerbino will be the sixth superintendent in the last decade for this deeply-troubled district. While teachers are paid well above Monmouth County averages—the median salary in Asbury Park is $93,885—student achievement is under water. Asbury Park students rank 436th out 436 districts in reading and 425th out of 425 districts in math. This is in spite of having the highest cost per pupil in the state.

Here are three items to put the Asbury Park School Board’s decision in context.

How did Asbury Park end up with Rashawn Adams as superintendent in the first place?

In May 2021, shortly after then-superintendent Sancha Gray left to take a position with her predecessor, Kean University President Lamont Repollet, the school board started a superintendent search, as boards do. Yet this wasn’t as much a search as a coronation: While four Asbury Park administrators put their hats in the ring (including Mark Gerbino), the board didn’t bother to interview them. Instead they compared Adams, whom Repollet was reportedly pushing board members to choose, against a single candidate, Michael Rossi, who had just been fired by Sparta Public Schools and eventually withdrew from the search.

It’s unclear if the school board examined Adams’ history. If they had, they’d have discovered that he (reportedly) never received tenure in three school districts where he was previously employed, Newark, Trenton, and Franklin Township. After he was laid off in Trenton, he filed a lawsuit and lost. At Franklin, where he resigned in 2015, he was a defendant in a lawsuit pressed by a special education teacher who said she was not renewed because she had breast cancer and had to take time off for surgery and chemotherapy. The complaint said, “[Adams’] conduct was willful, malicious and/or especially egregious and done with the knowledge and/or participation of upper level management.”

Also notable: in violation of state law, the board allegedly appointed Adams as permanent superintendent without adequate public notice.

The lesson here? Without an independent school board that makes smart decisions untethered from shifting loyalties, we end up with the mess that is Asbury Park. In the last year and a half, voters chose members who appear capable of putting children first and holding adults accountable. This is the only reason Adams is on administrative leave.

Do Asbury Park students do poorly due to poverty or environment?

Some might argue that students face so many obstacles that higher achievement is too much too ask. Yet we have a control group that shows students in Asbury Park are not only capable of learning but excelling.

Let’s look at College Achieve-Greater Asbury Park, a public charter in the city.

There, far more students qualify for free and reduced lunch (a measure of poverty)—99% versus the district’s 57%– yet students do fine. Fifty percent of students meet expectations in reading, the same as the statewide average, compared to 12.5% in the traditional district. Every high school student in the public charter takes a minimum of three AP courses; at Asbury Park High School not a single student took an AP course last year.

It’s nothing in the water, it’s not due to disparities in the social determinants of health. It’s surely not the money: in the Asbury Park traditional district, total cost per pupil is $38,848; the charter gets 47% less, or $20,622 per pupil.

It’s the system.

What can Gerbino do to resurrect the district?

According to a staff survey, he is well-liked by teachers and students. Yet the district faces monumental challenges, from dismal student proficiency rates, to a shrinking budget (as the state takes money away from over-funded districts), to escalating discipline problems, to shrinking enrollment as parents vote for options like College Achieve or simply move next door to Neptune.

Gerbino’s mantra must be “students first,” starting by addressing the absurdly top-heavy administration. Currently this district of 1,300 K-12 students employs six Supervisors of Curriculum and Instruction (as well as a Director) and both a Business Administrator and an Assistant Business Administrator. Couldn’t those payroll costs be used for children instead of adults?

In order to be successful—in order for students to be successful— Gerbino must implement an effective learning loss initiative spearheaded by high-dosage in-school tutoring programs so students have a shot at graduating with the skill-set they need to go to college and/or get jobs.

He also must develop effective disciplinary measures so teachers can teach and students can learn. (At Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School, for instance, teachers report, “the school is run by many out-of-control students who are jeopardizing learning and safety of others.”)

And Gerbino might consider “managing up”: Remember, the State Department of Education has a new Commissioner, Kevin Dehmer, who is astute at finance and sustainability. (He was previously DOE Assistant Commissioner and Chief Financial Officer.) In addition, Asbury Park is represented by Senator Vin Gopal, chair of the Senate Education Committee, who knows better than most legislators the travails of students and staff in this most dysfunctional of districts. Could Gerbino organize a frank conversation with the DOE and Sen. Gopal about what needs to happen for students to be fairly served by the state education system? What would that look like? Nothing should be off the table, including whether the children and families of Asbury Park would be better served if this district merged with another one.

This is not about what’s best for administrators or teachers. This is about what is best for Asbury Park’s long-neglected children and their families. The state constitution guarantees them a thorough and effective education. This is the moment to make good on that promise.