Open Letter to Gloucester Township Superintendent John Bilodeau

Dear Mr. John Bilodeau,

Congratulations on the renewal of your employment contract as Superintendent of the Gloucester Township Public School District. The ratings of Gloucester Township schools have been in decline in recent years, so there is a lot of important work to do to improve our school district, and the residents of Gloucester Township are counting on you.

Gloucester Township needs you to be a principled, strong, compassionate, un-conflicted leader of our schools.

Gloucester Township needs you, when making every decision, to consider only what is in the best interest of the souls that enter our school buildings every day; to consider what is in the best interests of the residents of our town.

Do this, Mr. Bilodeau, and all outside influences can be treated as merely opinions to be considered at your discretion.

If the NJDOE tries to pressure you toward something that you can demonstrate is not in our schools’ best interest, then make your case. The GT residents and the school board will back you for doing the right thing.

If the NJ School Boards Association tries to pressure you toward something that you can demonstrate is not in our schools’ best interest, then politely thank them for their input and remind them that they have no standing in GTPSD. The GT residents and the school board will back you for doing the right thing.

When officials from our Gloucester Township municipal government try to influence your actions, listen to them, work with them. But, again, make your decisions considering only what is in the best interests of our schools.

Most importantly, Mr. Bilodeau, we need you to show conviction by challenging our school board on the occasions when it does not act in best interest of our schools.

This can get complicated. In theory, the district superintendent answers to the school board.

But it can be documented that, over the years, the school board has surrendered its independence and has succumbed to political pressures exerted by GT politicians.

School board members have openly accepted political donations from partisan Mayer-controlled PACs, then have voted to award jobs to the connected politicians.

School board members have openly accepted political donations from businesses, then have voted to award contracts to these same businesses.

In at least one instance, the school board awarded a contract to a firm, then a short time later, a school board member became a full time employee of that firm.

Mr. Bilodeau, we need you to stand up and speak out against such unethical conflicts of interest.

We, the residents of Gloucester Township, are looking to you to strongly lead our school district and reverse its recent decline.