School not ready; students sent home

The District fired a principal and two other employees yesterday after about 900 Eastern High School students failed to receive their class schedules and were sent home on the opening day of city public schools.

“The school leaders who allowed this unacceptable situation to transpire failed not only my team, but [they also failed] the students and parents of D.C. public schools who rely on us,” said interim Superintendent Robert C. Rice.“There is no remediation for this kind of failure. And after a thorough investigation, I have decided to terminate three individuals.”

The fired employees are Principal Norman Smith and Dr. Juan Baughn, assistant superintendent of the school system’s senior high-school division. A staff member in the school system’s Officer of Information and Technology also was fired, but officials did not release the person’s name.

Wilma Bonner, the school system’s executive director for academic programs, was named as interim principal.

In late March, six fires were set over seven days at the high school — on East Capitol Street in Northeast near the D.C. Armory. No serious injuries were reported, but a school employee was treated for smoke inhalation and a student was treated at the scene.

As a result, Mr. Smith instituted such changes as building patrols and security personnel’s locking and unlocking bathrooms.

Officials said yesterday the student schedules could not be printed because of a computer glitch.

The printing of the final master schedule should have been completed by mid-August. Mr. Rice said he was assured Tuesday night that everything was working, then he received a call about the problem yesterday at about 6 a.m.

“I apologize to the students, parents and community for this failure of leadership,” he said.

Officials tried to correct the problem but could not before schools opened at 8:45 a.m.

Though Mr. Rice expects Eastern to open todayon time, he did not know why he wasn’t told about the scheduling problem until yesterday morning.

“We’ve been in meetings [with school officials] every afternoon for the last 10 days, answering the question: Are we ready for school?” Mr. Rice, 65, said. “We kept getting assurances that everything was 100 percent complete. It became very evident that we did not have the straight story. They should have had this done in July.”

Dannette Milstead of Northeast, an Eastern High School parent, said she was annoyed by the problem.

“This is totally messed up,” she said. “The school system had the entire summer to take care of this. It’s inconvenient for the parents, and it’s inconvenient for students who need to get an education.”

Incoming Superintendent Clifford B. Janey, hired last month to lead the system out of a decades-old malaise, said the students were denied their constitutional right to an education.

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