Doris Hope-Jackson is a former superintendent of the Willow Run Community Schools.

Hope-Jackson was assistant superintendent, principal and assistant principal in the Harvey, Illinois school system from June 1994 to June 2002.

 

In the news

At Willow Run

Legal action contesting the firing of former Willow Run Superintendent Doris Hope-Jackson may finally be nearing closure, despite a new lawsuit that was filed Oct. 22 in Washtenaw County Circuit Court.  The legal battle between Hope-Jackson, the Willow Run school board and former board President Sheri Washington has dragged on for two and half years.

Recently demoted Willow Run Superintendent Doris Hope-Jackson repeatedly misappropriated local and federal funds during her tenure as the district’s leader, the school board alleges in a 46-page memo approved Thursday night.

Board members Clifford Smith and Sheri Washington said Hope-Jackson sent the board an e-mail after 3 p.m., saying she was no longer resigning. She asked that her resignation be removed from the agenda of Thursday night's school board meeting. Reached tonight, Hope-Jackson said "one board member approached me and asked me to reconsider." She said she was still considering whether to resign, but said she's withdrawn the resignation request in the meantime.

Hope-Jackson was serving a four-year term on the Harvey Public Schools District 152 Board of Education when she was hired in Willow Run in June 2007. Hope-Jackson said during her interview for the Willow Run position that she was a board member there.

Former Dolton Elementary District 149 Superintendent Doris Hope-Jackson has been hired to run the Willow Run Community School District in Ann Arbor, Mich. Hope-Jackson, who is to receive a salary of $120,000, took over as superintendent this month. In 2003, the District 149 School Board placed Hope-Jackson on remediation after just about seven months on the job following her hiring in July 2002. The board's action led to Hope-Jackson filing a federal lawsuit that was eventually dropped after the district agreed to a settlement.

At Calumet Park

Documents exchanged between Doris Hope-Jackson and attorney Robert Hall Jr. reflect her strained relationship with the board. In a letter dated March 3, Hall told the board that an employee who had resigned called Hope-Jackson a "bully and said she does not believe that the board will be able to protect her from Dr. Hope-Jackson's ongoing harassment."

The Calumet Park school board fired a superintendent who already had resigned, recalled an administrator with phony degrees and triggered an investigation into possible Open Meetings Act violations - all in the span of a week. Calumet Park School District 132 Supt. Doris Hope-Jackson was informed Wednesday that it is the "consensus of the board" she be "relieved of all duties and responsibilities" effective April 28, according to a letter from board president Bill Connor. The board is willing to continue paying her through June 30 when her contract expires, the letter states.

On our tour, the bathrooms looked much cleaner then the pictures but we saw missing and stained ceiling tiles, crumbling walls and a cluttered "passage way" that connects two classrooms. There were other problems that school leaders acknowledged, like the duct taped wall that was recently baited for termites, heavy dirt buildup on the floors, and missing bathroom wall stalls. "We have a lot of issues in terms of the washrooms and the cleanliness of the building, since we had to cut back on our staff. District 132 was on the state's financial watch list. We had to cut costs," said Dr. Doris Hope-Jackson, Calumet Public Schools superintendent.

At Dolton

Feb. 4, 2004 -- A circuit court judge in Calumet City, Ill., ruled last week that a Chicago-area school district must publicly release the terms of its settlement agreement with former Superintendent Doris Hope-Jackson. Judge Deborah Mary Dooling held Jan. 28 that the agreement "does not constitute a 'personnel file' nor does it contain 'personal information' " about Hope-Jackson. Dooling further ruled that the disclosure of the settlement agreement would not constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy because the terms of the settlement concern "public duties and public monies." Illinois's Freedom of Information law specifically states that information about the public duties of public employees is not considered an invasion of personal privacy. The Times, a daily newspaper serving the greater Chicago area and northwest Indiana, filed suit against the Dolton Elementary School District 149 in October, following repeated FOI Act requests for a copy of the settlement agreement. According to court records, Hope-Jackson sued the school board early last year, claiming her contractual and constitutional rights were violated when she was suspended and placed on paid administrative leave by the school board after a mid-year performance evaluation last February.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court, Supt. Doris Hope-Jackson, who is on paid administrative leave, alleges that board Vice President Arthur L. Myers repeatedly demanded that she give a salary increase, title and private office to a school district employee with whom he has been "politically allied." When she refused, Myers told her "that she would be in jeopardy of her job status," according to the lawsuit.

News references


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