Brookline School Committee To Select Committee Member

BROOKLINE, MA — After a school committee member abruptly stepped down earlier this year amid pandemic, new job and temporary move out of state, the district has been looking to appoint someone to take her place.

This week, 10 candidates advanced to the interview stage, answering questions from the school committee and the select board.

The candidates ranged from doctors to parents to former teachers. All spoke about the pandemic and room for improvement in town.

Dimitry Anselme a former Brookline teacher, parent and now leading the national Facing History and Ourselves nonprofit said he was stepping up for the position because of the opportunities the challenging time presented.

"In the midst of a global pandemic, I think this provides both the challenge of how to preserve quality education - as we're doing it remotely and through digitally means - and yet it also provides an opportunity for us to think anew and outside the box," he said.

Rachel Levy Wexler, who works at an education nonprofit and is also the mother of three Brookline students said her family had specifically loved their community at the Heath School.

But, she said. for all its resources, Brookline is not capitalizing on its strengths.

"We are putting more time and energy into infighting creating an us versus them environment that is hurting our students, teachers and administrators," she said. "We are missing the mark. And at an all-hands-on-deck time when we need to come together as an academic community in support of our students and teachers, we are not living up to our potential."

Dr. Joe Riley was one of the only to bring up the issue of Black administrators leaving Brookline as something he'd like the committee to look at.

"Brookline schools seems to be hemorrhaging talent at an alarming rate, specifically in the last year losing several black female administrators, we need to look closely at why that is," he said. "On a case by case basis, we need to look at where they're going, why are retention numbers struggling."

Lisa Rodrigues, a daughter of immigrants, said her career choices have been about supporting and helping to connect vulnerable populations to resources. She is a dean at Pine Manor College, and has daughters in the Brookline school system, which she said she has been grateful for.

But, she admitted, that gratitude comes with some questioning.

"Some of those questions include on a macro level: how can an education like Brookline's be more accessible to marginalized students throughout our city and state," she said. "In Brookline specifically, how can Black and Brown students' academic performances meet that of their white counterparts. And, also specific to Brookline, how can there be more recruitment and retention of Black and Brown teachers within the Brookline School System?"

After the interviews school committee members said it was important that a diversity of voices be represented, that those with equity and inclusion and educational technology background also take priority.

On Thursday the two boards are set to meet again to vote.

The full list of those interviewed Tuesday:

• Mr. Dimitry Anselme, executive program director at Facing History and Ourselves
• Dr. Natasha Archer Hartmann, Children's Hospital
• Dr. Steven Ehrenberg, RTI International
• Dr. John Hermos, retired veterans administrator in health care
• Dr. Yael Jaffe, Judaic studies teacher, dean at Maimonides School in Brookline
• Dr. Andrei Krivtsov, associate director at Center for Pediatric Cancer Therapeutics at Dana Farber Cancer Institute
• Ms. Rachel Levy Wexler, senior vice president of market solutions at Penn Foster Education Group
• Dr. Joseph Reilly, recent Harvard School of Education grad, Wayfair data scientist
• Ms. Lisa Rodrigues, dean of students at Pine Manor College
• Dr. Sheri Simmons, a director of research at Johnson & Johnson in Cambridge

Previously on Patch:

Brookline School Committee Member Abruptly Resigns

5 Black Administrators Left Brookline Schools In The ...

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