Assistant superintendent resigns

MAT-SU -- In his letter of resignation sent to all Mat-Su Borough School District staff last week, Assistant Superintendent Don Chicarell describes Colony High and the entire district as a place where conflict thrives, all while the school board stands by and lets it happen.

In response, a former Colony High administrator challenged Chicarell to a public debate, claiming his letter is another example of the administration's "indefensible war against Colony High."

Chicarell announced last week that after 19 years in the Mat-Su Borough School District, and more than 40 as an educator, he will retire June 30, the same day Superintendent Pat Chesbro steps down. Chicarell e-mailed his resignation letter to all principals and staff last week, and in it he criticized the district's three unions and Colony High staff for "embracing dissonance."

Chicarell claims the leaders of these groups have used "toxic leadership to poison the emotional climate of the workplace," and that the school board has not done enough to put an end to the conflict.

Following investigations of the two separate cases of teachers having sex with students last school year at Colony, the superintendent transferred Principal Bill Harlow to central administration and Assistant Principal Mark Okeson to Wasilla High.

"Ultimately, our goal was to ensure a safe environment for children," Chicarell wrote. "Any resulting action was intended to promote critical analysis among the leaders of the building and provide opportunities to reform the culture of the school."

Following the investigation and transfers, Chicarell wrote, Colony High staff and the district's three unions "tapped into the dissonance" instead of seeing it as an opportunity to improve the school and district.

Chicarell wrote that the administration has no secret agenda to destroy Colony High, as some have alleged, and points out that he and Chesbro, as members of the principals' union at the time, championed for Harlow during an earlier, unrelated investigation and helped him to retain his position as principal at Colony High.

"It's ironic that we are now accused of intentionally demoralizing the CHS community that we risked so much to support not too long ago," Chicarell wrote.

Finally, Chicarell lays some of the responsibility at the feet of school board members, saying they have been unwilling to confront the growing level of dissonance and have permitted people to defame school employees during public testimony. He said the board has allowed "overt and covert influences of individuals and special interest groups to drive educational decisions.

"In the end, does any rational individual believe the superintendent is solely responsible for the climate and culture of our district?" Chicarell asks in the letter. "It's a shame that a minority of this district's staff can manipulate a school board."

But the accusations are flying both ways.

Having read the letter, former Colony High Assistant Principal Mark Okeson responded last week with an e-mail addressed to Chicarell but sent to all staff. In it, Okeson accuses Chicarell, the superintendent and others in central administration of using evaluations to ambush employees, manufacturing evidence, lying under oath, conducting unethical pre-screening processes during hiring, tampering with evidence and being deliberately rude.

"These actions tend not to foster the kind of trust you fault us for not having in you," Okeson wrote.

Okeson, who now serves as assistant principal at Wasilla High, is in arbitration with the district over his involuntary transfer.

Rather than promoting dissonance, as Chicarell claims, Okeson said he and others are choosing to combat "depraved indifference."

In his letter, Okeson challenges Chicarell to a public debate in which the audience in the end would vote.

"It will be a learning exercise only and you will not be compelled to take any action as a result of its audience-vote outcome," Okeson writes. He goes on to say, "If you choose to ignore this request for healthy, self-reflective debate … and your note was simply the desperate attempt to try and save face before you retire, then so be it. Retire, move on, and let the district pursue our quests for ethical leadership."

Chicarell told the Frontiersmen last week that he sent his letter to all school staff in order to promote a discussion of what has happened in the district during the past two years. When asked about the challenge to a debate, Chicarell dismissed the idea and said that it should instead be a challenge to Okeson. He described Okeson's suggestion of an audience vote as a sort of popularity contest.

"I wouldn't engage in that with somebody," Chicarell said.

Okeson could not be reached for further comment before press time.