The superintendent of Staten Island public schools was abruptly removed from her post amid ongoing accusations of lashing out against staff and vowing “No more white principals,” The Post has learned.
Marion Wilson, who led District 31 schools for three and a half years, was swept out of her office on Sept. 20, and told to report to the Department of Education’s Tweed headquarters in Manhattan.
Wilson “will be transitioning to a central team,” Danika Rux, deputy chancellor for school leadership, said Monday in an internal announcement, without any explanation for the swift and stunning ouster.
Sources said she will keep her $230,000 salary and serve as “facilitator” in the Leaders in Education pprenticeship Program (LEAP), which prepares teachers to become principals with a focus on racial equity.
DOE officials refused to explain Wilson’s removal, but a school insider said she was caught on tape denouncing district employees.
“She apparently went off on a Zoom or Teams call demeaning her own principals and staffers, and didn’t know she was unmuted,” the insider said.
Wilson is also dogged by accusations she has made racially offensive comments.
Last year, the Special Commissioner of Investigation for city schools was asked to investigate widely circulated screenshots of texts purportedly written by Wilson.
“No more white principals on my watch!” said one text.
“I need to clean up this island,” another reads.
“White folks need to recognize this is not the boys club anymore. A strong black woman runs this bitch now, and they can either get on board or get out.”
Wilson filed a police report claiming she received threats stemming from “false accusations” that she wrote the texts.
The NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force said it would investigate, and gave Wilson a police escort for some time. “The investigation is ongoing,” an NYPD spokesman said Friday.
The SCI closed its case several months later after the texts came to light, saying investigators failed to identify who wrote them, a spokesperson told The Post.
Since then, recordings have emerged purportedly catching Wilson making racially charged remarks to black parents, according to a complainant who sent audio clips to the The Post.
“I said no more white principals. I meant it,” a woman the complainant identified as Wilson says in one recording. In another, she says, “Us black folks got to stick together. Ain’t nobody helping us.”
The SCI says it did not investigate the recordings, but referred them to the DOE’s Office of Equal Opportunity.
“The cases involving these allegations were not substantiated,” said DOE spokesman Nathaniel Styer.
Wilson did not return a request for comment on the recordings.
Meanwhile, a white principal, Heather Jansen, claims in a pending discrimination lawsuit against the DOE that Wilson unfairly removed her as principal of PS 46 in June 2023.
“She probably didn’t know what hit her when they pulled her white ass out,” Wilson allegedly texted, according to a screenshot Jansen submitted as evidence.
In January, Jansen told the judge she filed a police report claiming she was threatened by a man who showed up at her home in Monroe Township, NJ, and warned, “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll drop the case against Marion.”
Monroe Township detectives were unable to identify a suspect, a spokesman said this week.
Wilson leaves the Staten Island community with mixed feelings about her tenure.
“Nobody saw this coming. Nobody wanted it,” said Liz Cianfrone, a volunteer family advocate who works for students with special needs and their parents.
Cianfrone praised Wilson as a “role model, inspiration and true advocate for children,” saying she helped kids and tackled problems that other district officials ignored.
State Assemblyman Michael Reilly of Staten Island has praised Wilson as “an ally for our public schools and an advocate for students, parents, and teachers.”
But Wilson made such a concerted effort to fill vacancies with Black administrators, some principals say, it drove other candidates to leave the district.
“Race was the most important criteria in selecting professionals on her team,” one said.