BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. – Brevard County Superintendent Dr. Mark Mullins took a few minutes during Monday’s school board meeting to thank members for what he calls a respected and fair separation process.
“Life present us with the ending of chapter some that we anticipate and some that we don’t but the reality of a chapter a new chapter begins,” Mullins said.
Last month, Mullins agreed to step down and enter negotiations for “a mutually agreeable separation agreement,” he said during the school board meeting on Nov. 22.
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School board members signed off on a deal on Monday to part ways with Mullins after several members started raising questions about his leadership during the pandemic.
Seventeen speakers took the podium on Monday.
“You came into this decision and took this action without a plan in place, and we are now going to be without a leader,” one speaker said.
“I’ve never seen an employee who was reprimanded not once but twice his boss, who is the state of Florida,” Janice Crisp said.
This comes after newly-elected school board Vice Chair Megan Wright raised concerns over district leadership.
“I believe our community has expressed multiple different ways and different times that they’re calling for a change in leadership,” Wright said during the Nov. 22 meeting.
According to the separation agreement, Mullins will resign on Dec. 31. He will be paid five months’ worth of his $218,000 salary, plus 800 unused sick and vacation hours. He will also be reimbursed for up to $10,000 on what he spent on attorney fees reaching the agreement.
“It’s been 29 years. I’m proud of the work we’ve done I’m proud of where we are as a district and it will continue to do the right thing for kids,” Mullins said.
Mullins has been with Brevard Public Schools for nearly 30 years. He started as math teacher and was a principal before becoming the superintendent in 2018.
School board members said on Monday they will begin their search for an interim superintendent.
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