NEW ROCHELLE, NY — Xiomara Gonzalez has a secret.
Gonzalez was hired by the New Rochelle Board of Education to work under New Rochelle High School Principal Reggie Richardson as the Chairperson of the Math Department on June 6, 2017.
The school district distributed a statement on her hiring published in Talk of the Sound on June 16, 2017.
Xiomara Gonzalez: NRHS Math Chairperson
Xiomara Gonzalez is described as “an accomplished administrator with years of experience in teaching and managing math and science programs” and notes her job includes “looking for ways to broaden access to Advanced Placement tests for underrepresented groups.”
“Students who experience an engaging math curriculum are able to appreciate the role of mathematics in their cultural backgrounds and community practices,” said Gonzalez.
“Ms. Gonzalez has a wealth of experience and the right attitude to chair the New Rochelle High School Math Department,” said then-Superintendent Dr. Brian Osborne.
The District statement lists two previous jobs for Gonzalez: Assistant Principal at Morris Academy for Collaborative Studies in the Bronx and math teacher, student advisor and Finance Academy Coordinator at the Bronx School of Law and Finance. We found that Gonzalez also worked for 7 years as a teacher before joining New Visions for Public Schools as a Math Instructional Specialist where she worked up until 2013.
New Visions is a Charter School Network which has contracts with the New York City Department of Education (DOE) to operate charter schools and provide support services to district schools. One of those district schools is Morris Academy for Collaborative Studies.
Based on DOE records obtained by Talk of the Sound, Gonzalez worked at Morris Academy from August 31, 2015 to September 1, 2017.
If she was at New Visions in 2013 and Morris Academy in 2015, where was she in between?
It appears an effort has been made to scrub the Internet. She did have a LinkedIN profile which now displays the message “This profile is not available”. The New Rochelle School District statement is no help. There is not much information out there. But there is just enough. You can run but you cannot hide from Google Cache, snapshot back-ups of web pages.
A cached version of a Google Search result for the LinkedIN profile of Xiomara Gonzalez lists her as an Assistant Principal at another New Visions district school, Collegiate Institute for Math and Science in the Bronx. DOE records confirm Gonzalez worked at Collegiate from December 9, 2013 to August 30, 2015.
Shadia Alvarez was appointed as Acting Principal at Collegiate in January 2012. In May 2013 the Office of Special Investigations (OSI) received a referral from the Special Commissioner of Investigations (SCI) concerning allegations of financial fraud by Alvarez. In August 2013, Alvarez was formally notified by OSI that she was the subject of an investigation which continued until January 2014. In June 2014, the OSI delivered its findings that the allegations against Alvarez were sustained. She was denied tenure and demoted to Assistant Principal. Alvarez appealed. In September 2014, SCI opened up a new investigation of Alvarez regarding $114,000 in unpaid invoices which Alvarez and the school’s business manager could not explain. In August 2015 Alvarez was fired as a result of the sustained charges in the OSI Investigation (and hired as a House Principal at New Rochelle High School). In July 2016, Alvarez was banned for life from working for the DOE as a result of the sustained charges in the SCI Investigation.
Xiomara Gonzalez was Shadia Alvarez’ AP at a time when Collegiate Institute for Math and Science was under two separate investigations for financial fraud, one by OSI and another by SCI.
There are no known allegations involving Xiomara Gonzalez pertaining to her time at Collegiate Institute for Math and Science.
At a press conference last Wednesday following the release of the T&M Report which detailed allegations of grade-fixing by Shadia Alvarez, New Rochelle Board of Education President Jeffrey Hastie and Interim Superintendent Dr. Magda Parvey were asked if they would have any concerns with hiring people who worked at Collegiate under Shadia Alvarez. Hastie and Parvey dismissed the question before their publicist from Focus Media shut down the press conference.
“I don’t understand the…I’m sorry…what are you asking,” said Parvey.”
After the question was repeated, the publicist abruptly ended the press conference.
FOCUS MEDIA: This is clearly not connected to this report…
JEFFERY HASTIE: Right.
FOCUS MEDIA: …this isn’t what this news conference is about. I don’t think we want to go completely off the rails so if anybody has anything else about the report. We’re good? OK. Great.
Gonzalez was paid $14,360.61 to work for the City School District of New Rochelle over the summer of 2017 while continuing to be employed by the New York City Department of Education where she remained on the payroll until September 1, 2017.
According to school board records on BoardDocs, Xiomara Gonzalez has been mentioned in six board resolutions, one hiring her, one appointing her as an evaluator of other administrators and four approving payments of stipends. The five financial resolutions are as follows:
On June 6, 2017, under Board Resolution 17-292-2, Gonzalez was given a Probationary Appointment as a District-Wide Administrator from September 1, 2017 to August 31, 2021. She is paid $130,551.
Under Board Resolution 18-83-5, adopted on August 1, 2017, Gonzalez was authorized and approved to work during the summer 2017 to organize her office and prepare her department for the 2017-2018 school year at a rate of 1/200th of her 2017-2018 school year contract salary or $653 per diem for up to 20 days amounting to a stipend of $13,055.10.
Under Board Resolution 18-119-7, adopted on September 5, 2017, Gonzalez was authorized and approved to work during the summer of 2017 at a rate of 1/200th of her 2017-2018 school year contract salary or $653 per diem for up to 2 days amounting to a stipend of $1,305.51.
Under Board Resolution 19-80-8 adopted on August 7, 2018 was authorized and approved to attend Understanding by Design curriculum development training on June 27 or June 29, 2018 at a rate of 1/180th of her contract salary or $725.28 per diem for 1 day amounting to a stipend of $725.28.
Under Board Resolution 19-117-13 adopted on September 4, 2018 was authorized and approved to attend summer 2018 Professional Development at a rate of 1/180th of her contract salary or $725.28 per diem for 2 days amounting to a stipend of $1,450.57.
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