Hornsby Tenure Ends on Up Note -- His Leaving

While you were focused on Memorial Day weekend doings, the Prince George's County school board tried to slip a scandalburger onto the grill without anyone noticing. It won't be easy to scrub the smoke from this cynical maneuver.

In a classic Friday night display of cowardice, the superintendent of schools, Andre Hornsby, and the school board issued a statement announcing Hornsby's resignation because of "external distractions." The schools chief vanished to a remote vacation spot, reportedly in the Bahamas. The school board let it be known that it has little interest in taking on the task of finding a new head of the school system -- might as well wait a year and leave that job to the next board. Now everyone in the county gets to spend the final weeks of the school year sorting through the underlying messages of this sordid episode.

Bye-bye, Andre Hornsby! You did what any reasonable person would have expected you to do: After a career riddled with ethical lapses, you came here and delivered more of the same. As state Del. Jim Hubbard, education chairman of the county's delegation to Annapolis, told me last year: "There's a pattern here that goes back to his jobs in Yonkers [N.Y.] and Houston. All of this was foreseeable, even if it wasn't foreseen."

True enough. Hornsby jumped right into the cronyism racket upon his arrival in Prince George's in 2003. The superintendent didn't bother to tell anyone that he was living with Sienna Owens, a saleswoman for LeapFrog SchoolHouse, an educational software company that just happened to sell $1 million of its products to the Prince George's system after Hornsby came on board. The president of the software company stepped down in the scandal that followed that episode; law enforcement agencies are still sniffing around that set of transactions.

Prince George's gave a contract to a New York construction management company owned by the same guy who had been Hornsby's construction chief in Yonkers. Just a few months ago, the Prince George's system hired a consulting company run by the husband of a woman whom Hornsby had worked with in both Houston and New York.

Most recently, Hornsby considered hiring as his chief of staff a Houston schools administrator who had worked with him in Texas and who supervised three schools that were under investigation for cheating on state tests.

Despite Hornsby's consistent record of sketchy behavior, riding the ethical boundaries in a career-long game of How to Beat the System, the appointed school board in Prince George's hired him, arguing that his aggressive style was just what a troubled system needed.

Gee thanks, school board! The sun had barely set on Hornsby's resignation letter when board members let it be known that they'd rather ride out their remaining year than go through the superintendent sweepstakes one more time. They'll leave that job for their successors, an elected board. The Prince George's board has become a favorite plaything of Annapolis legislators, and so the school system ricochets from elected to appointed and back again while the superintendency remains a revolving door, test scores continue to stagnate, and parents keep fleeing the system in search of high standards, stability and security.

Good riddance, parents! You've been played for suckers by politicians, school board members and educators who believe you can be silenced by rhetoric about race. Since the 1980s, many of the country's big urban school systems have hired almost exclusively black and Hispanic superintendents in hopes of providing majority-minority student populations with leaders who will be role models for students and staff. Inspiring, effective leaders and cynical, corrupt figures exist in every ethnic group; Prince George's can hardly afford to limit its searches.

The joke's on you, students! As the latest superintendent slips away, happily pocketing a $125,000 severance payoff -- that's money right out of your classroom, kids -- you learn some lessons, too: Adults who do wrong get to vanish while admitting only that "unfortunate" questions were raised about "the propriety of certain operational issues." Try that next time you break a rule and see how far it gets you. Ask your social studies teacher how the Hornsby case fits into the behavioral code by which you and your friends must abide.

But look on the bright side: At least Hornsby's gone. Across the river in Alexandria, the drunk-driving superintendent, Rebecca Perry, is still in office, sitting on a nice raise and a vote of support from the school board. Remember kids, do as we say, not as we do.