After reviewing her statement one last time, Janine De Iorio, former Crisis Communications Manager for CPS, stepped up to the lectern on March 18, 2024, during a CPS Board Business meeting. 

“For the last year and a half I have experienced an insurmountable amount of bullying, including physical assault [and] retaliation reporting,” De Iorio said. “If something is not done soon, the mental health and well-being of my team will continue to deteriorate and individuals’ careers, as well as CPS, will be negatively impacted by the damage inflicted by the Chief of Marketing and the superintendent… I urge you to take action to end the bullying and the propaganda and remember that education combined with communication results in truth.” 

The cause for her statement dates back to the end of 2021, when De Iorio was hired as a communications specialist at CPS. 

Shortly after, on Feb. 24, 2022, Iranetta Wright was announced as the new CPS superintendent, marking the fourth superintendent in five years. Before entering that role, she was a teacher, assistant principal, principal and Chief of Schools in the Duval District Schools in Florida.

In addition to a new superintendent, a loss of almost half her team and COVID-19 caused De Iorio to juggle many different job duties. For approximately two weeks in June of 2022, she ran the department.

In November, De Iorio settled into the position of Crisis Communications Manager, and Mark Sherwood was hired as the Chief of Marketing.

Sherwood was a member of Wright’s executive leadership team, a committee of different people working directly with Wright. This team was all brought by Wright from different states, except for the Chief of the IT Department and the attorney for the district.

A majority of De Iorio’s interactions with the superintendent were through Sherwood.

“Whenever anybody on our team had a question like, ‘Why are we doing it [that] way? This way makes a little more sense,’ his response 99% of the time was, ‘Well that’s what the [superintendent] wanted,'” De Iorio said.

As the workplace settled, there was a new hire added to the team.

“Everyone seemed to get along really well, and then when this new person started, things started to shift,” De Iorio said. “There seemed to be a bit of a competition between me and [them]; there was a tension and a lack of respect [for] boundaries, roles and responsibilities.”

The workplace environment and culture began to degrade until the tension between De Iorio and the new hire snapped. In September of 2023, De Iorio experienced physical assault by the co-worker.

“I started noting a pattern of whenever I would walk by [them], no matter how much I stepped to the side, we would make contact,” De Iorio said. “On one particular day… I stopped in my tracks [and] put my right shoulder against the wall… [They] probably had five feet to pass by me and still made contact. I was not hurt, I was not injured, I wasn’t intimidated, but it was still physical assault.”

De Iorio reported the incident to her immediate supervisor, who said she would report it to the General Counsel. However, her supervisor reported it to Sherwood instead.

“He basically said, ‘Don’t do anything,’ because I had had other incidents with this person before, like [them] not staying in their lane, trying to do my job [and] other intimidation factors,” De Iorio said.

De Iorio decided to make the report herself since she didn’t trust Sherwood would support her.

“I looked up the board policy on reporting harassment [and] reported it to the General Counsel,” De Iorio said. “They then investigated, [but] I don’t believe that an honest and truthful investigation occurred, and they found the results of the investigation inconclusive.”

For the next six months, De Iorio noticed her job duties were slowly being taken away. 

“I was learning about crises after they had been published in the newsletter,” De Iorio said, “When I started asking, ‘Hey, [why] was I not involved in this?’ I just got excuses like, ‘Oh, we just needed to get it out real quick,’ or ‘Oh, it had to do with the media.'”

Sherwood also told the media associate to report directly to him instead of De Iorio, disrupting the regular flow. This led to even more communication issues and left De Iorio in the dark. 

Additionally, De Iorio began noticing the strain Superintendent Wright’s leadership was having on her team. 

“I’ve had people call me on the phone crying because they are put on deadlines that are absolutely unreasonable,” De Iorio said. “I’ve had conversations with people who have expressed extreme disappointment about not getting the support they needed, about wanting to do the right thing, but basically being threatened that they would lose their job if they did.”

The “final straw that broke the camel’s back” was during a project involving WHHS’ enrollment lottery system that used the platform Focus.

“The way we communicated about the lottery had to be very particular,” De Iorio said. “We spent about four days crafting the communication so that it would make the most sense. The day after it was published, a [Focus] contractor based in Florida screenshotted [our work] and started saying, ‘None of this is accurate.’ Instead of Mark saying, ‘No, this is accurate,’ he [wanted] to change it. That to me was, ‘He’s never going to support his employees.’”

After continuously getting empty apologies and seeing no improvement, De Iorio resigned from her position in March of 2024. However, she did not want to leave her struggles unnoticed and crafted a statement to share her experience to the public and the board members.

De Iorio gave her two-minute speech during the CPS Board Business Meeting on March 18.

“My first reaction was sadness, because I don’t want anything I am aligned with to be causing pain [for] people where they feel excluded, disrespected, unheard and unseen,” Kareem Moffett, one of the CPS Board members, said. “I can tell that she felt pain; it felt unfair. It made me curious; it made me hurt; it made me think, ‘What in the world is going on?'”

From that moment on, De Iorio received calls and messages from other CPS workers who felt the same way as her, intimidated and disrespected. Many felt that their opinions were disregarded.

“There are plenty of individuals in other departments that have reached out to me, especially after I spoke at the hearing of the public, who basically said, ‘Me too,’ but they’re scared,” De Iorio said. “That first week I counted 10 people who reached out.”

Besides CPS employees, De Iorio observed that the opinions of the public were also disregarded. 

At a town hall meeting in October 2023, someone had a question about the budgeting decisions behind moving the safety academy from West High to Woodward, but the superintendent was adamant about not letting him ask his question.

“He kept trying to say, ‘My question is about this program, but it’s different from what we’ve already discussed,’ [but] she would not let him ask his question,” De Iorio said. “At one point I saw a physical change in her face, where it flipped like a switch, and I saw the bully that all my colleagues had been telling me about.”

Many individuals felt frustrated as their views were disregarded by the superintendent, especially since collaboration had been a large part of the CPS District in previous years.

“I think it’s tough to learn the system of Cincinnati and to learn how things work here efficiently because there’s a [general] process with how things work, but sometimes specific places have personalities,” Moffett said. “You really need to make sure that everyone feels respected and feels heard.” 

As president of the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers Union, which makes sure schools are properly staffed and communicates with administrators about their schools’ cultures, Sellers saw the effects that Superintendent Wright’s leadership was having on CPS workers, especially principals.

“We have heard from principals that the method of leadership [was] almost public shaming, and some of the principals were then encouraged to go back and publicly shame their staff,” Sellers said. “We had a big meeting at Walnut Hills and there were over 500 teachers across the district who showed up. We told teachers that if they witnessed public shaming within their own building, by any type of leadership, they should stand together and say, ‘we don’t accept that type of behavior.’”

This lack of respect spread to board members as well. 

“My voice has been silenced multiple times,” Moffett said. “I’ve been made to feel as if my voice didn’t matter as a board member. I have not always felt respected as a board member and by the superintendent, and it’s unfortunate.”

Three board members expressed their concerns in Wright’s mid-year evaluation, in which Wright received low scores overall, especially in effective communication and collaboration. 

“[Superintendent Wright’s] fresh and perceptive perspective is essential for our future but not at the expense of including or discounting others,” one board member anonymously commented on the mid-year evaluation. “You share information with the Board openly and often, but too often resist or think discussion with the Board is unnecessary.”

“Staff have also expressed that they are undervalued and are working in a culture of fear and intimidation,” another board member anonymously commented.

Moffett hoped that Wright would reflect on the feedback she received and create a strong CPS district where everyone can thrive. 

“While I think she’s extremely talented…I had hoped that we would be able to work a little bit more collaboratively together so that we can not only expand her experience but really benefit our kids because [they] deserve the best,” Moffett said. “We cannot afford to turn any partner, any community member, any voter [or] any citizen away.”

Superintendent Wright sent an email to all CPS staff in response to the vote of no confidence.

The culture of CPS continued to degrade, eventually leading all six CPS unions to send a list of grievances to Ben Lindy, the president of the Board of Education, on March 9, 2023. 

“We are contacting you to apprise you of serious ongoing concerns with Superintendent Wright’s performance,” the unions wrote. “Despite our efforts to continue in our historical spirit of collaboration with superintendents, we are being blocked at every turn. We are asking to meet with the Board in the next few weeks to discuss how to move forward.”

Finally, after two years of frustration with communication, collaboration and respect, the CPS unions announced a vote of no confidence in Superintendent Wright on May 4, 2024. With no legal worth, the vote of no confidence was a symbolic vote to show the unions dissatisfaction with Wright’s leadership.

“In order to have a school district where teachers want to work [and] students want to attend, you have to have a culture that is not a dictatorship or intimidation,” Sellers said. “In order to have a good culture, you need to have good relationships and trust, and at this point, I think the trust is broken. It’s broken in some schools and especially at the central office.”

 Two days after the vote of no confidence was released, Superintendent Wright’s resignation was announced on May 15, 2024, after a vote of 5:2 by the Board. She officially resigned on May 20.

“I think that in the best interest of the district, we made a tough decision,” Moffett said. “It was a decision that we had to make with the information that we were given at that time, so I can’t speak to whether it was good or bad.”

Sellers noticed an instantaneous reaction throughout the district following Wright’s resignation.  

“Prior to having the superintendent resign, the culture was so negative, people were so unhappy,” Sellers said. “The first day that Superintendent Murphy was named interim, there was a feeling of relief across the district, especially at the central office. Nobody likes to work for a dictator.”

Faced with many challenges because of the timing of Wright’s resignation, Interim Superintendent Shauna Murphy began working with the board immediately.

“We are working very hard to rebuild and build partnerships within the community that were lost under the previous administration,” Moffett said. “We [want] to ensure that community voices are aware of our plans and [that] their voices are included at the table.”

Murphy has lived in Cincinnati her whole life, and previously she had served as the principal at multiple CPS schools, the CPS Chief of Student, Family and Community Engagement and the Assistant Superintendent for a period of time. 

“We are definitely more team-centered and collaborative in nature,” Moffett said. “Superintendent Murphy has been very intentionally engaging, and she has also ensured that the unions have had a voice, a seat at the table.”

 Murphy focuses on community collaboration, and continues to host “Sundaes with Shauna,” an event for CPS families to ask questions and give feedback. After just four months of Murphy’s leadership, Moffett observed a noticeable change in CPS culture. 

“I’ve heard from the staff that it feels different… they’ve shared that it feels a little lighter,” Moffett said. “They feel that they can express themselves more freely… that even if it’s something negative, they can share that without feeling that there’s potential repercussions.”

On Nov. 18, 2024, in a vote of 4:3, the board decided to skip the formal superintendent hiring process and hired Murphy as the permanent superintendent for the next two years. Just one month into Murphy’s term, CPS has yet to see what’s in store for the next school year and how students and community members will be affected.

To stay updated on the Board’s future actions, visit the CPS website for a calendar of upcoming meetings and their locations, and the CPS Public Affairs channel for livestreams and recordings.