New York City Public School Chancellor Joel Klein resigned Tuesday, prompting Mayor Michael Bloomberg's appointment of Cathie Black, chairperson of Hearst Magazine, to take the reins as chancellor of the largest public school system in the country.
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According to New York school district spokesperson Natalie Ravitz, Klein "felt it was the right time to move on."
Klein will take an executive position and join the Board of Directors at News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch's news conglomerate.
"I've long admired News Corporation's entrepreneurial spirit and Rupert Murdoch's fearless commitment to innovation," Klein said in a press release.
According to Ravitz, Klein has been in talks with News Corp. for the past few weeks.
"His record of achievement leading one of the country's toughest school systems has given him a unique perspective that will be particularly important as we look into a sector that has long been in need of innovation," Murdoch said in a statement.
"He brought vision and a commitment to educating poor children to his role as chancellor," said Pedro Noguera, NYU professor of teaching and learning.
Though test scores increased during Klein's tenure at New York City's public schools, he was met with mixed reviews over the eight years he served as chancellor. In February, the United Federation of Teachers along with other election officials sued Klein and the Department of Education for planning to shut down 19 low-performing schools.
"He had no clue what he was doing," said Queens College junior and New York City native Aaron Lin. "He doesn't understand the need of the students."
A teacher at Holy Cross High School in Queens said, "He, like them all, are politicians and ultimately have had very little real impact on the day-to-day lives and education of teachers and young people respectively." The teacher asked to remain anonymous as he was worried he would face repercussions from the incoming administration.
Earlier in the decade, the city instructed schools to decorate classrooms with quality student work to promote better performance.
"We were told that representatives from the city were going to come on a monthly basis to make sure we were keeping up with that," the teacher said. "It got us all in a tizzy and made us do more work than what we already had to do for no reason at all. That was a fun one."
But others were saddened by Klein's departure.
NYU professor of sociology and education Richard Arum, who has four kids in the public school system in the city, called Klein's departure a "real loss."
"While I disagree with some of his policies, he fought the good fight for many years in a very thankless job," Arum said.
Black, Klein's replacement, was previously president and chairwoman of Hearst Magazines, president and publisher of USA Today, and CEO of the Newspaper Association of America.
Joel Westheimer, a professor of education at the University of Ottawa, said the decision to appoint Black was "evidence of the undying faith in corporations to run public affairs, to have people who know nothing about education or teaching in the highest position in the teaching system."
"The fact that the city has thousands of teachers and millions of children under a top position of someone who knows absolutely nothing about education is a statement about how we value education," Westheimer said.
He added, "Maybe she'll surprise us all by knowing what to be done in education, but that's doubtful."
