CPS narrows interim CEO search as negligence allegations surface in top candidate's record

Chicago Tribune

a day ago

The Chicago Board of Education has narrowed its list for the interim schools' chief down to three candidates in recent days, one of whom has a history of alleged negligence as a principal, according to documents obtained by the Tribune through the Freedom of Information Act.
The people in consideration are: Macquline King, the city's senior director of educational policy; Alfonso Carmona, CPS chief portfolio officer and Nicole Milberg, the school district's chief of teaching and learning.
All of the candidates have backgrounds as educators and principals, working their way up to administrative roles. Carmona and Milberg both hold ranks within CPS. King is the only person being considered who works with the city. They all have a professional educator license with a superintendent endorsement.
Managing the nation's fourth-largest school district requires a specific, narrow managerial skill set and focus, several board members and a former district official told the Tribune. The incoming interim superintendent will need both the financial expertise to pass the budget and the school-level understanding to successfully start the school year, they said.
The new 21-person board, which is split between mayoral-appointed and elected members, will decide on the short-term schools leader later this month. It will also conduct a search for the permanent replacement later this fall, according to Che Rhymefest Smith of District 10 on the South Side. A simple majority — or 11 out of 21 members — is required to vote the candidate in.
'The one thing we don't need is any more shameful representations of leadership that were not properly vetted,' Smith said, referring to the abrupt resignation of former school board president the Rev. Mitchell Ikenna Johnson last October for his social media posts deemed antisemitic and conspiratorial.
Other board members emphasized the importance of conducting the interim CEO search with integrity.
'And we are trying to depoliticize it, because it shouldn't be a political process, right?' said Anusha Thotakura, a board member from District 6, spanning neighborhoods from Streeterville to Englewood. 'We want the best candidate for the job.'
Whether outgoing schools chief Pedro Martinez's temporary replacement comes from CPS or the Johnson administration could affect potential borrowing scenarios adopted by the school board to balance a tight fiscal budget for 2026, which begins on July 1. Board members are reconciling with decades of financial mismanagement while balancing CPS' books.
Macquline King, a former principal at Mary E. Courtenay Language Arts Center in Uptown and the now-closed Alexandre Dumas School in Woodlawn, currently serves as the city's senior director of educational policy. She holds a Doctor of Education degree from National Louis University, according to her LinkedIn profile.
As senior director of educational policy for the city, she gets paid by CPS but technically works for the city. King disclosed in CPS documents in 2022 that she is exempt from living in Chicago, as employees hired before 1996 are not required to live within city limits. Public records show she owns property on the Near West Side.
King helped manage the fallout of the 2013 Stockton Elementary merger with Courtenay, a turbulent time marked by staff tensions and student fights, according to district officials who requested anonymity due to the ongoing CEO search.
But her employee record shows she didn't act with urgency on several occasions, according to CPS documents obtained by the Tribune under the Freedom of Information Act. While never formally disciplined beyond warnings, King was cited in multiple internal investigations between 2015 and 2019. Several of the allegations were later dismissed due to insufficient evidence.
In April 2015, she waited several weeks before calling the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services over the alleged physical abuse of a student, according to a CPS memo signed by her supervisor. Under CPS policy, employees are required to report suspected abuse to DCFS within 48 hours. Without enough credible evidence, an investigative report dismissed the finding.
In October that year, a CPS investigative report shows, she failed to implement the school safety plan after two students were found in a bathroom stall together, pulling their pants down and 'looking at each other's private parts and butt,' without staff supervision. The school's policy was changed to require staff members to accompany students to the bathroom before and after school. The reports state, however, that the school's staff didn't take any action to ensure it was enforced.
According to an interview included in the reports, King stated that the assistant principal was in charge of overseeing the afterschool program at that time, as she was on leave.
King was also cited for negligent supervision for failing to properly notify emergency contacts after a student broke their arm in December, according to CPS investigative reports. The assistant principal at the time informed the student's guardian that the reason for the lack of notification was that a nurse on duty that day was absent, according to the reports. The allegation was dismissed due to a lack of credible evidence.
A CPS memo indicates that four years later, King allowed a volunteer to work at the school without requiring a background check. A memorandum of understanding later showed that the person had criminal charges.
King did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request from the district for the other two candidates didn't contain any citations of negligence or misconduct.
Alfonso Carmona, originally from Colombia, is CPS's Chief Portfolio Officer, a role he has held for three years. He oversees enrollment, new program development, and school accountability.
Before that, he worked as a bilingual teacher at Inter-American Magnet School in Lakeview, principal at Healy Elementary School in Bridgeport, and superintendent of St. Augustine Prep in Milwaukee, Wis. He joined CPS administration as a network chief.
Carmona recently led presentations to the school board on options for absorbing seven of 15 Acero charter schools slated for closure. He holds a bachelor's in economics from the University of Cartagena, two master's degrees and a Doctorate in School Administration from Western Illinois University.
Nicole Milberg, CPS's chief of teaching and learning since fall 2023, oversees the district's academic strategy, including curriculum and teacher training. She previously served as a network chief, supporting diverse school models and leading the shift to remote learning.
Milberg began her CPS career as a resident principal at John Fiske Elementary School in Woodlawn, later leading Ellen Mitchell Elementary School in West Town. She has also worked in Newark, N.J. and Washington, D.C. She holds a Master of Business Administration from the Yale School of Management and a Master of Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, according to LinkedIn.
District officials are counting on at least $300 million in additional funding from the city and state to balance the upcoming budget.
However, the state budget was passed at the final hour late last Saturday, with several spending cuts, including to K-12 school districts across the state. In 2017, state lawmakers pledged to increase funding by $350 million annually for ten years to fund schools adequately. This year's budget is $43 million below that target.
And the city will face its own challenges this budget season, with President Donald Trump threatening to cut billions in funding.
Without additional cash, layoffs of as many as 1,700 district employees could be on the horizon, a suggestion floated to board members in mid-April.
To get through the last fiscal school year and meet its growing pension obligations, city officials proposed several borrowing scenarios for the district. CPS CEO Martinez called them a short-term fix that wouldn't help the ongoing financial crisis.
The financial disagreement in part cost him his job last December. His last day with the district is June 18.
Martinez argued for months that while large debt issuances are a fairly routine practice for the large school district, a budget that relies on borrowed revenue for regular expenses wouldn't be sustainable and could hurt CPS' credit rating.
The incoming interim pick will face the same questions and challenges.