N.J. revises Education Department

TRENTON - New Jersey's Education Department received a makeover Wednesday aimed at making it less of a regulatory agency while putting in place Gov. Christie's goal of successfully teaching and graduating children from all walks of life.

The state Board of Education unanimously approved the reorganization requested by acting Education Commissioner Christopher Cerf and approved appointments to several key jobs in the new structure.

Cerf said the department, as previously organized, had been geared too much toward ensuring that districts complied with rules and not enough toward carrying out its most important job, which he defined as "to graduate all of New Jersey's children regardless of their birth circumstances, their zip code, their level of need, to graduate them college- and career-ready."

Under the new structure, the department has four main divisions: one that identifies and measures goals; one to recruit, develop, and retain teachers and administrators; one to ensure that the state's standardized tests are meaningful; and one to oversee charter schools and other programs. That division will be led by an "innovation officer."

A deputy commissioner will be in charge of making sure the work of the new divisions reaches district officials, Cerf said.

"None of this matters if it doesn't affect what happens within schools," he said.

Cerf also said one of the key figures in the new arrangement would be David Hespe, who was education commissioner from 1999 to 2001 and is Cerf's chief of staff.

Steve Baker, a spokesman for the New Jersey Education Association, an umbrella group of most of the state's teachers unions, said it was the acting commissioner's prerogative to shuffle the organization. That doesn't bother the group, he said, as much as the administration's education proposals.

"It's not what the department heads are called. It's what the end product is that comes out," he said.

Christie has become a national figure in education, leading a state that ranks among the top in standardized test scores, graduation rates, and other measures. But low-income urban districts still fall far short despite huge subsidies from the state.