Black Is Out as City Schools Chancellor

By ELISSA GOOTMAN and MICHAEL BARBARO

Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times Cathleen P. Black with Deputy Mayor Dennis M. Walcott, who will replace her as schools chancellor, at a news conference in January.

Updated | 11:08 a.m. Cathleen P. Black, a magazine executive with no educational experience who was named as New York City schools chancellor last fall, will step down Thursday morning at the mayor’s urging, city officials said, after a tumultuous and brief tenure.
Ms. Black’s resignation, which comes on the heels of the departures of several other high-ranking education officials, was nearly as surprising as her appointment. When Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg plucked her from Hearst Magazines to run the nation’s largest public school system, people in New York and across the country — including some of the mayor’s closest aides — were stunned.
Ms. Black will be replaced by Deputy Mayor Dennis M. Walcott, who has long aided the mayor in educational matters, officials said.
Her time as chancellor was troubled from the start. During her three months on the job, she offended parents with an off-hand joke about birth control, and bewildered City Hall aides when she seemed to mock a crowd of parents protesting the closure of a school. Aides complained that she required intensive tutorials on every aspect of education policy. And on Monday, a NY1-Marist poll put Ms. Black’s approval rating at 17 percent, the lowest ever for a Bloomberg administration official.
Inside City Hall, mayoral advisers said, there was a growing sense that Ms. Black could no longer do the job. Mr. Bloomberg is famously reluctant to dismiss members of his hand-picked team. But even he agreed it was time for Ms. Black to go, they said.
Mr. Walcott is to appear with Mr. Bloomberg at an 11:30 a.m. City Hall news conference to announce the change. Ms. Black will not be in attendance, according to a person briefed on the plans. The mayor’s office declined to comment.
Ms. Black’s resignation is a stinging setback for Mr. Bloomberg, who has made education a priority for his third and final term. It was also the latest sign of trouble inside an administration renowned for top-notch managers and high-function style.
In many ways, the episode seemed to confirm anxieties within City Hall about a third term, which has proved problematic for many previous mayors.

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