Keller ISD board President Charles Randklev wished outgoing Superintendent Tracy Johnson the best in her future endeavors.
Trustees Joni Shaw Smith and Chelsea Kelly wished her departure had never happened.
During a Feb. 20 special meeting — at 9 a.m. on a school day — Keller ISD trustees officially accepted the voluntary resignation of Johnson, their superintendent of just over a year. The vote, 6-0 with trustee Chris Coker absent, left residents who spoke at the meeting questioning the future of Keller ISD’s leadership.
Immediately after that vote, trustees officially appointed Cory Wilson as interim superintendent in a 4-2 vote, with Smith and Kelly against, noting their votes were not a critique of Wilson’s ability to perform in his new role. The board had named Wilson, the district’s assistant superintendent of education services, as interim during its Jan. 30 meeting.
The Fort Worth Report requested both Johnson’s separation agreement from Keller ISD and Wilson’s contract. Neither have been released as of 6 p.m. Feb. 20.
Attendees voiced strong opposition to Johnson’s removal and some accused the board of forcing her out by continuing to pursue a controversial plan that would split the district in two. Resident Stewart Rennie likened the board to “self-aggrandizing, money-grubbing charlatans,” while DaLana Barsanti said the situation wasted tax dollars.
Of the 10 residents who spoke, none supported Johnson’s exit.
Johnson’s departure follows weeks of tension surrounding a push by several trustees to split Keller ISD into separate districts, which they say would help alleviate a $10 million budget deficit for the 2025-26 school year. Johnson was vocal in her opposition to that plan.
She drafted a resignation letter and was prepared to present it to trustees during executive session at the board’s Jan. 16 meeting, she said at the time. At that meeting, Randklev and trustees John Birt and Micah Young complimented Johnson’s brief tenure as the district’s leader.
“We have a fantastic superintendent who has done an incredible amount of work, so I don’t want to see her resign at all,” Randklev said.
A little over a month later, Johnson is gone. She has not commented publicly on her decision to leave the district.
“She truly has what is in the best interest of our kids, our teachers in this district, in her heart and in her desire to be the superintendent,” Smith said. “I don’t feel that this is something that she really, truly wanted to let go of, but she felt she was going against her beliefs of what was right and what was good for students.”
Like Smith, Kelly expressed concerns over the situation. Some trustees held a discussion surrounding Johnson’s resignation just days before the board’s Jan. 30 meeting, she told the Report. She was not part of those conversations, she said.
Randklev did not respond to requests for comment.
“I think the whole situation took my duties and my responsibilities away from me by not allowing me into the conversation about why she was being removed,” Kelly said during the meeting.
Residents criticized the board for making another major leadership change in the middle of a school year.
Previously, some residents had expressed concerns about the search process for Johnson in 2023, following the retirement of former Superintendent Rick Westfall. The district hired a search firm in the middle of the 2023-24 school year, while more qualified candidates were already under contract elsewhere, Barsanti said.
Johnson was first named as Keller ISD’s superintendent in November 2023, five months after Westfall announced his retirement.
Now, with her abrupt resignation, Barsanti fears the district is repeating the same mistakes as more tax dollars are spent on yet another hiring process.
“Some might have been skeptical, but many prayed for her success,” Barsanti, who ran unsuccessfully for a Keller board seat last year, said. “Sadly, we will never know what good she could have done for the students, staff and stakeholders in this community.”
While they wished Johnson the best, Randklev and Birt expressed confidence in Wilson’s leadership.
“I wish Dr. Cory Wilson the best of luck as he takes over in his new position,” Randklev said.
Birt echoed his board president.
“I wish you the best in your role as interim superintendent as you help guide us through some of these troubled waters we find ourselves in,” Birt said.
Resident Rachael Jenkins yelled from the audience.
“You caused them!” she said, with her 2-year-old son by her side, before she was escorted out of the Keller ISD Education Center to raucous applause.
Matthew Sgroi is an education reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at matthew.sgroi@fortworthreport.org or @matthewsgroi1.
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This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
