Andover Parents Petition For Superintendent's Resignation

ANDOVER, MA -- Andover resident Betsy Streeter has started a petition calling on Andover Superintendent Sheldon Berman to resign. Streeter has been a vocal critic of Berman and the Andover School Committee in the wake of the suspension of a volleyball coach and Berman's release of a draft memo to a newspaper that contained damaging -- and unfounded -- allegations about the coach.

"30 signatures in one hour at Stop and Shop means there is HUGE support for Berman to resign!" Streeter posted in Andover Cares about our Schools & Town, a closed Facebook group for Andover residents. "People are eager to sign."

But at a School Committee meeting on May 24, Chairwoman Shannon Scully said she had spoken with berman and he has no intentions of stepping down. Scully said the committee took the release of the memo about boys volleyball coach E.J. Perry "very seriously."

""Everyone has acknowledged that happened," she said. "There have been apologies for that happening."

The school committee has declined to discuss Berman at public meetings because those discussions involve "personnel issues." The committee has faced charges from parents that they are trying to curb the free speech rights of residents. During a meeting in April, police were asked to escort one speaker from the room.

Berman has apologized for releasing the memo that was written by Andover High School Principal Philip Conrad but has declined comment on the push by a group of parents who want the school committee to fire him if he does not voluntarily resign.

Last month Perry was placed on administrative leave based on what Andover High School Athletic Director Bill Martin called "credible enough" allegations into his coaching practices. The investigation followed an April 11 match in which senior Alex Shih refused to leave the court after Perry tried to substitute Matt Guthrie for him. After the match Perry stripped both players of their captaincy.

Perry was reinstated after an investigation, but Berman released a draft memo to a newspaper reporter. Despite the investigation concluding otherwise, the memo said Perry had used racial stereotypes and demeaning comments about student athletes.

The committee has tentatively scheduled a June 19 workshop to review district policies for athletes and coaches, but some committee members worried that the "movement" by parents calling for Berman's dismissal would have a chilling effect on student athletes who wanted to report legitimate transgressions by their coaches.

The district has not released complete details of the investigation, but Perry's reinstatement and the decision by a New Hampshire school to hire him as boys basketball coach suggest the allegations against him were anything but credible. Shih boasted about the incident on social media after the April 11 match. Later, evidence emerged that some players had undertaken an effort to oust Perry in a plan they called "Operation Hydra," in reference to a Marvel Comics plot line in which a company infiltrates an organization in an attempt to ruin a person's reputation.
Coach Perry's brother and attorney Timothy Perry said earlier this month that "there was not a scintilla of credibility" to the allegations uncovered in the investigation.

"It is unclear why the principal started the draft of that memo or from where he concocted the irresponsible information reported in that memo, as he was never involved in this investigation," Perry wrote in a letter to the Eagle Tribune and the Andover Townsman. "However, I do know that everyone involved — from the superintendent on down — admits that the memo was a draft and the document you have printed and reported on is not in E.J.'s personnel file."

Subscribe to Andover Patch for more local news and real-time alerts.

Patch file photo of Sheldon Berman.

Dave Copeland can be reached at dave.copeland@patch.com or by calling 617-433-7851. Follow him on Twitter (@CopeWrites) and Facebook (/copewrites).