Wayland Superintendent Omar Easy Put On Leave, School Committee Silent

Editor's note: Since the publication of this story, Easy has filed a discrimination complaint against the school committee. Read more on the filing here.

WAYLAND, MA — Just before 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, three members of the Wayland School Committee — Chair Chris Ryan and members Jeanne Downs and Erin Gibbons — appeared for a one-and-a-half-minute discussion before moving into an executive session meeting.

The closed-door meeting, Ryan said, was being held to discuss "strategy with respect to litigation" — one of the specific categories under state law where elected officials can legally meet out of public view. Ryan also announced the committee would not return to public session, and would not release minutes from two executive session meetings held in January.

Some 17 hours later on Thursday, a short email was sent to Wayland Public Schools parents and staff announcing that Superintendent Omar Easy was going out on leave.

"Dr. Graham will be the Acting Superintendent until further notice as Dr. Easy is on leave," the email said, referring to assistant superintendent Parry Graham. "We recognize that disruptions in leadership can be difficult. We will continue working hard to support our students, families and staff as we move forward together as a school community."

Was Easy's leave voluntary or forced? Was it part of Wednesday's executive session meeting? Did other recent events in the school district have anything to do with it?

The Wayland School Committee offered no answers following the short email to parents Thursday. Neither Ryan nor any other school committee member answered multiple phone calls and emails Thursday seeking clarification about what's happen at the top of the school district.

But Easy's leave follows a rocky, acrimonious period for the superintendent that commenced in October after an administrative council meeting between Easy and top district leaders. After the meeting, several people complained to Ryan that Easy was "berating," "shaming" and "bullying" staff at the meeting.

On Nov. 10, Easy appeared at an open meeting where the school committee was set to vote to suspend him while an outside investigator conducted an inquiry into the October meeting. Instead, they voted — with Gibbons abstaining — to keep Easy in the job while conducting the investigation.

"With the caveat that if during the investigation it is determined by the investigator that there is interference, the school committee will take steps to address it," the minutes from the meeting say.

A little over a month later, Easy was the target of a racist attack. In the week before Christmas, someone scrawled the N-word and Easy's first name on a building at the town pool near the high school entrance. The incident triggered demonstrations outside the school denouncing racism.

And on Tuesday, three school district leaders — including Parry Graham, who was picked to become the new superintendent of Lincoln Public Schools — revealed they would leave Wayland in some form. Wayland Middle School principal Betsy Gavron emailed parents to notify them she would take a one-year sabbatical over the 2023-24 school year. And Easy alerted parents on Tuesday that Happy Hollow principal Tricia O’Reilly would leave for a job in another school district.

The school committee hired Easy in January 2021, and he is the district's first Black superintendent. He previously worked as the executive assistant principal of the academies at Everett High School, and was an NFL player in the early 2000s.

Easy's sudden leave also recalls the recent resignation of former police chief Sean Gibbons. Last March, Gibbons was placed on leave, just four months after he was picked as the town's new permanent chief. Town officials and members of the select board declined to comment on Gibbons until November, when the town released an independent investigation into sexual harassment claims against the former chief. The select board also voted to release several months worth of executive session meetings that detailed deliberations about whether the town would fire Gibbons, or offer a payout in exchange for his resignation.