Chicago School Board Set To Consider Firing Schools CEO Friday

CHICAGO — The Chicago school board is meeting Friday to consider firing district CEO Pedro Martinez after months of speculation about his future driven by a conflict with Mayor Brandon Johnson.

A board agenda posted Wednesday evening lists two agenda items: approving Martinez’s termination and approving a settlement agreement. No other details are included.

The agenda says the board could vote on these matters at a later date. The special meeting is scheduled for Friday evening.

The vote will come three months after Mayor Brandon Johnson asked Martinez to resign, which Martinez has refused to do. Amid that tension and questions about the district’s financial future, Johnson’s previously appointed board resigned en masse.

Martinez’s potential firing would come just weeks before a new 21-person body made up of 10 elected officials and 11 mayoral appointees is seated. Four of those appointees are current board members. Some elected members and other elected officials have asked the current board to withhold making major decisions before the new board is sworn in on Jan. 15.

In a Wednesday interview with Chalkbeat before the special meeting was announced, Sean Harden, the mayor’s appointee to lead the school board, demurred when asked if Martinez should continue to lead the district, saying it wouldn’t be appropriate to get into personnel matters.

“The board will evaluate all of its leadership and make sure that it is focused on delivering high-quality education for students,” he said. “What you can be assured is that whatever decision is made, whomever is the leader, that individual is going to have a focus and a commitment, and will be able to tangibly point to their focus on making sure students are first.”

Harden, a consulting firm executive and former CPS administrator, will be named board president at Friday’s special meeting.

Martinez’s contract, which was amended in December 2022, allows the board to fire him for just cause – such as criminal activity or “any improper act that is contrary to the best interests of CPS.” The board can also fire Martinez without citing a reason, but that would allow Martinez, who makes $340,000, to keep his job for an additional six months, plus 20 weeks of severance, according to his contract.

Over the past several months, the mayor has declined to answer questions about Martinez’s future, citing it as a personnel issue that would be inappropriate to discuss in public. But the mayor’s office and Martinez have disagreed on a number of issues in recent months, including Johnson’s idea for CPS to take out a short-term loan to pay for pension obligations and labor contracts. Those contracts include one with the Chicago Teachers Union, a close ally of the mayor, who used to be an organizer with CTU.

Negotiations have grown increasingly tense between CTU and CPS in recent weeks, with CPS unclear over how it will pay for the contract and CTU claiming Martinez has been a hindrance to a deal. The union has pushed for a contract deal by Christmas.

Tension also grew in recent weeks after the Acero charter school network announced it would close seven campuses, impacting 2,000 kids and more than 200 staffers who are members of the Chicago Teachers Union. The planned closures sparked rallies from families and the union, which has pressed CPS to absorb the charter schools. While Acero is permitted to close those schools under its contract with CPS, Johnson pressed the district to create a “contingency plan” in response to the closures.

On Friday, the board will also move to direct the CEO to “create a detailed plan” to turn five of the Acero schools — Cisneros, Casas, Fuentes, Tamayo, and Santiago — into CPS-run schools starting in the 2026-27 school year. At a board meeting last week, CPS officials said they supported keeping those schools open and would consider eventually transitioning them into district schools.

With Martinez out, the mayor could potentially appoint a CEO who is more amenable to his ideas, including taking out the short-term loan and more quickly closing a deal with the CTU.

But firing Martinez would also have significant political costs for the mayor — and cause profound disruption mid-school year to a district that has grappled with constant leadership turnover for years.

Many aldermen have come out in vocal support for Martinez, whom they have come to see as a bulwark against the teachers union’s unchecked influence over the district. Almost 700 CPS principals and assistant principals representing about 80% of district campuses signed a letter urging the board to keep the schools chief in his job, arguing he has brought capable and collaborative leadership that resulted in academic gains and national recognition for CPS’s pandemic recovery.

A Chicago native and former CPS chief financial officer, Martinez was the superintendent of the San Antonio Independent School District when Johnson’s predecessor, Mayor Lori Lightfoot, tapped him to lead CPS in 2021. He steered the district during a turbulent time, as school buildings reopened for full-time in-person instruction after being shuttered during the height of the COVID-19 outbreak.

By some accounts, his tenure has brought a measure of stability after COVID’s massive disruption. His administration has touted data showing the district’s students have recovered in reading faster than most other districts across the country, as well as graduation rate, college enrollment, and other student outcome improvements.

During his roughly three years at the helm, Martinez presided over a significant expansion of its workforce, using federal pandemic relief dollars to bring on thousands of new teachers and support staff. He also oversaw an overhaul of the district’s approach to budgeting this spring that de-emphasized student enrollment; instead, the district now provides base staffing positions to all schools and factors in a school’s level of student needs in budgeting for additional positions and support.

Some school board members elected to a new hybrid board have joined aldermen and others calling on the outgoing school board not to take action on Martinez’s post until the partly elected board steps in come January.

One of those elected members, Ellen Rosenfeld, voiced dismay at the possibility of a Martinez ouster Friday — and urged the current board and mayor to stand down.

“I don’t think this instability is in the best interest of our school system and our kids,” she said. “The elected school board should be involved in all decisions regarding our schools, and we are just a few days shy of being sworn in.”

This is a developing story.

Reema Amin is a reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Reema at ramin@chalkbeat.org .

Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter covering Chicago Public Schools. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org.

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

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