Cambridge School Committee Passes Motion To Expand Principal Evaluations After Leadership Controversies

The Cambridge School Committee passed a motion on Tuesday to expand the evaluation process for school principals across the district, requiring Superintendent David G. Murphy to regularly collect feedback on principal performance from parents, students, and staff.

The motion — brought forward by School Committee members Elizabeth C.P. Hudson, Richard Harding Jr., and Arjun K. Jaikumar — mandates that the district implement “360-degree feedback,” a system that sources evaluations from a range of stakeholders rather than relying solely on assessments from supervisors.

The measure passed nearly unanimously, with School Committee Chair David J. Weinstein casting a “present” vote.

During the meeting, the School Committee and Murphy agreed that the district would begin incorporating the new feedback mechanisms this school year and receive a report on their effectiveness from the district administration before the start of the next school year.

The new process would supplement — not replace — Cambridge Public Schools’ current evaluation system, which is based on the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Model System for Educator Evaluation.

Though the state model is often considered best practice, the motion’s sponsors said the additional layer of feedback would amplify the voices of stakeholders in Cambridge education.

Hudson said the motion would allow the district to scrutinize the performance of school leaders more closely, with the goal of ensuring excellence across the district’s schools.

“We have some absolutely fantastic leaders, but it’s incumbent upon us to ensure that all of our leaders are as fantastic as those strongest personnel,” Hudson said. “We owe it to kids, and we owe it to staff.”

“The intent of this motion is to help everybody build the confidence that we have the strongest leaders, visibility to areas that work and where we can improve, and multiple types of input when we’re deciding who is leading our communities, making those choices, and helping our staff identify areas where they can improve,” she added.

The motion comes as the district grapples with ongoing controversy at two of its public elementary schools — the Graham and Parks School and Fletcher Maynard Academy — where questions about principal leadership have been flashpoints for parents and staff in recent years.

Kathleen M. Smith, the principal of Graham and Parks, has faced complaints from some parents who alleged that she lacked transparency, shifted the school’s curriculum away from project-based learning, and separated long-standing paraprofessional-teacher relationships. The controversy, which dates back to 2023, prompted CPS to engage an external law firm to investigate allegations of a toxic workplace environment — a probe that ultimately found the claims unsubstantiated.

More recently, Graham and Parks volunteer and substitute Sarah Heine sued CPS in November 2025, alleging that Smith barred her from working at the school because of a disability that required her to use a wheelchair.

The district has also faced scrutiny over leadership at Fletcher Maynard Academy, where former principal Bobby Tynes was recently promoted to a district-level position, effective this June.

During his time at FMA, Tynes faced allegations of fostering a retaliatory culture from staff — most notably from School Committee member Luisa de Paula Santos, who worked as a paraprofessional at FMA before reaching a separation agreement with the district in 2025.

Tynes declined to comment on the allegations or his departure from FMA. CPS spokesperson Jaclyn Piques also declined to comment on the situations at either school, citing the district’s policy of not commenting on personnel matters or active investigations.

Murphy said during Tuesday’s meeting that the district’s principals will welcome the additional scrutiny.

“Part of the strength of our school leader team is they are, generally speaking, individuals that want to stay connected to their school community and to understand the impact that their leadership is having on school communities,” he said. “I don’t know of anyone in our administration who is not supportive of the prospect of a 360 evaluation.”

—Staff writer Jaya N. Karamcheti can be reached at [email protected].

—Staff writer Tess E. Sumner can be reached at [email protected].