Wadsworth Elementary’s Paul Peacock Is Told He’s Done in Flagler Schools; New Principal To Be Named Later

Paul Peacock, the embattled principal of Wadsworth Elementary school who worked with school board members to fire Superintendent Cathy Mittlestadt, was told this morning that his services will no longer be needed in Flagler County schools.

It was a firing in all but name. Mittelstadt informed Wadsworth Elementary staff by email in late morning that Peacock will not be returning. His contract will not be renewed, ending his 18-year tenure as a teacher and administrator in the district.




“I want to thank Paul Peacock for his service to Flagler schools and specifically Wadsworth elementary school over the past year,” the superintendent wrote all teachers and staff at Wadsworth. She apologized for doing so in an email, saying the summer break, and employees being in disparate places, made that form of communication the most efficient.

“At this time, we are moving forward in a different direction for leadership at Wadsworth Elementary School,” Mittelstadt continued. “Interim Superintendent LaShakia Moore will lead the search for Wadsworth’s next principal. There is no current timeframe for when this hire will be made. However, Ms. Moore is committed to bringing in a leader for the Panthers who will empower the teachers, staff and students to excel.”

Peacock has been on paid administrative leave since early May, barred from accessing any Flagler County school campuses. He was under investigation by an independent law firm the district hired. The investigation focused on a number of complaints filed by employees about Peacock. The district itself would normally investigate. But since Peacock filed a complaint against the internal investigator, that sidelined the district’s ability to do so, resulting in the hiring of the law firm.

The findings of the investigation appear to have played a direct role in Peacock’s fate: when his name had not appeared on a list of administrators whose contracts are being renewed, School Board attorney Kristy Gavin cautioned that it was not necessarily the case that his name would remain off that list by the time the board ratified it in two weeks. At the time, the administration was still awaiting the results of the investigation.




The investigation was conducted by David Delaney, a lawyer with Weiss Serota Helfman Cole and Bierman, the Gainesville law firm, and the school board attorney in Levy and Alachua counties. Delaney had completed his work before the Memorial Day weekend, by which time it was apparent that there were findings of concern. But Delaney gave Peacock time to provide a response to the findings. Peacock did so.

Subsequently, Mittelstadt made her decision definitely not to renew Peacock’s contract, in essence making it clear that the investigation’s findings had made a renewal impossible.

Peacock had worked closely with School Board member Sally Hunt, coaching Hunt in February on how to motion to fire Mittelstadt, arranging meetings between Hunt and Dusty Sims, the former principal of Flagler Palm Coast High School (who left FPC and the district in a lurch when he took a job with the state Department of Education the day before the start of the 2018-19 school year), in hopes of channeling him into the superintendent’s job, and all the while grieving a financial matter with the school board that, even to some school board members, had the appearance of a calculated distraction.

Peacock also met with School Board members Christy Chong and Will Furry. It was Hunt, Furry and Chong who voted to fire Mittelstadt, despite a strong evaluation of the superintendent by Chong, and behind tendentious and misleading claims by a local chamber of commerce that academic performance in the district had suffered under her.




Peacock lost the grievance, then claimed that the investigation was retaliation, though there appeared to be no connection between the two. Peacock had lost favor with Mittelstadt after a brief, year-long stint as her operations chief at the district, where he’d been elevated after several years as principal at Indian Trails Middle School, and as district management’s chief negotiators with one of the two employee unions. Revelations of his calculated alliance with Hunt came later.

A letter would have been sent Peacock as well, informing him of the superintendent’s decision. That letter has been requested. He is still under contract, and getting paid, until June 30. Ironically, his last day will also be Mittelstadt’s last day, since a 3-2 majority of the board opted not to renew her contract.

All teachers and administrators work at the will of their principal or the superintendent, their contracts being up for renewal at the end of each school year. Theoretically, any employee in that category could have her or his or their contract non-renewed. But it is unusual for established teachers or administrators not to be renewed. There is no grievance procedure in a non-renewal case. In other words, Peacock will not have that avenue to appeal the decision to the school board, and school board members have no authority over hiring and firing decisions in the ranks–at least not under law.

That doesn’t mean that board members abstain from inappropriately interfering with administrative decisions–as former School Board member Jill Woolbright, for example, interfered in what led to the firing of Abbey Cooke, one of the district’s stellar teachers, after a 13-year career, and over minor misjudgment.

Peacock also has the option to sue the district, and has intimated several times during his grievance procedure that he was considering doing so.