Eric Gordon Resigns September Gordon’s bombshell Sept. 12 announcement, that he would resign at the end of the 2022-2023 school year, betokened – to some – a rift between him and the Bibb administration. Gordon was and is beloved, and some in the education sphere told Scene it felt like Bibb was disrupting for the sake of disruption by not retaining the longtime CMSD CEO. Credit: CMSD
Roughly four months after Cleveland Schools CEO Eric Gordon announced he would end his 11-year tenure, the search for his replacement begins officially this week.

Following the intentions in the city’s RFP, the Board of Education will spearhead a trio of listening sessions Tuesday through Thursday this week, with tonight’s kicking off at the East Professional Center. The remaining two will be hosted at Max Hayes High on January 18 and at John F Kennedy High January 19, all from 6 to 8 p.m.

The intention, according to Mayor Justin Bibb and Board President Anne Bingham, is to extend the rising rates of public trust into the post-Gordon era.

For Bibb, who had once been painted as a reason for Gordon’s departure, the engagement sessions seems to be another notch in his approach to historic city changes. (Akin, one could say, to Bibb’s town hall-style approach to the timeless Cleveland question: What to do with Lakefront?)

“Choosing a leader to build on CEO Gordon’s legacy is a tremendous responsibility and one we don’t take lightly,” Bibb said in a statement. “We are fully committed to engaging the community in this important work.”

Yet, some ask, how much engagement?

Shari Obrenski, the head of the Cleveland Teachers Union, worries that, although Bibb and the board’s heads are in the right place, they might exclude certain stakeholders’ opinions after feedback is analyzed behind closed doors.

“To our understanding, the board has not really said what they’re going to do after this portion of the process has concluded,” Obrenski told Scene.

“We want to make sure that before any final decisions are made, that the board is aware that we have some, I think, reasonable expectations about what this process looks like moving forward.”

As per the RFP, the CMSD board hired Alma Advisory Group to lead a series of online surveys, focus groups and mass in-person interviews with residents to, a press release said, “share their hopes and expectations for district leadership.”

And it’s completely plausible that Gordon’s 11 years will be a tough act to follow.

After four years working as chief academic officer, Gordon inherited a school system in disarray when he took the helm in 2011. At the time, in a March 2012, 38 percent of voters deemed CMSD’s education poor quality. The threat of a possible intervention by the Academic Distress Commission—a state body that adopts failing schools—loomed, and took public trust with it.

But, as Gordon gloated in his final State of Schools address on September 21, the system averted major crisis. From 2011 to 2019, Gordon, using the Cleveland Plan as a lodestar, helped spike CMSD’s graduation rate by nearly 30 percent. He oversaw the passing of three levies—the first being the first in 16 years—and a bond issue.

Despite being plagued by 12-plus-hour days, burgeoning gun violence and striking teachers, Gordon, in his final state of the schools speech, took a wholly positive outlook on past and future.

“Good leadership is usually characterized as either a marathon or a sprint,” he told the crowd. “Some say the best leaders are consistent for a period of time, while others say it’s best to go out to move quickly to achieve your goals.

“I’ve attempted to do both.”

Whoever Gordon’s successor in April or May will be, Obrenski knows he or she will have a wide range of choices to make—how to handle the system’s 5 percent teacher deficit, difficulties organizing its pool of 550 substitutes, managing trauma after gun-related deaths, and more.

The recent killing January 11th of 18-year-old Pierre McCoy at a bus stop near of John Adams High, Obrenski said, is a clear reminder that pandemic-era gun spikes aren’t going to disappear.

“Having very focused, impactful, ways to address trauma, understanding trauma, how to more effectively deal with trauma, both on a personal level and with others, I think is something that we’re going to be very focused on moving forward,” Obrenski said.

“We’re at this kind of tipping point where you see the level of stress and strain in our workforce has not significantly improved in the last couple of years.” CMSD’s population is roughly 37,000 students, about a quarter of those with disabilities. There are some 5,700 full-time employees, 3,600 of those being teachers. Gordon’s successor, when chosen this spring, will lead the second largest public school system in the state.

Coming soon: Cleveland Scene Daily newsletter. We’ll send you a handful of interesting Cleveland stories every morning. Subscribe now to not miss a thing.
Follow us: Google News | NewsBreak | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter

Related Stories

This article appears in Jan 11-24, 2023.

Mark Oprea is a staff writer at Scene. He's covered Cleveland for the past decade, and has contributed to TIME, NPR, Narratively, the Pacific Standard and the Cleveland Magazine. He's the winner of two Press Club awards.