|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Gobsmacked initially, I’ve started finding the right words to reflect on the sudden superintendent switcheroo Pleasanton Unified School District is seeing.
Maurice Ghysels, whom the PUSD Board of Trustees brought out of retirement as interim superintendent for the 2024-25 school year and then implored to stay on for two more academic years when they couldn’t find the right candidate in spring 2025, submitted his resignation to the district last week effective at the end of December – six months early.
The trustees, in almost the blink of an eye at their Sept. 24 regular meeting, voted to solidify a multiyear contract with deputy superintendent Ed Diolazo to become the next permanent superintendent on Jan. 1. A respected PUSD administrator, Diolazo received cheers throughout the boardroom – including from some trustees who very publicly passed over Diolazo for the same job 2-1/2 years ago.
Diolazo is a popular choice to lead PUSD; he has the local experience, local knowledge and local foresight. But his new bosses did him no favors last week in helping ensure his tenure got off on the right foot.
The process to rush his contract through a vote without the level of public disclosure residents in Pleasanton and throughout the Tri-Valley have been accustomed to was so unsettling … and so unnecessary.
School Board President Kelly Baehr confirmed to me that the board, knowing they’d have a superintendent vacancy at the end of June when Ghysels’ contract ran out, conducted three closed-session meetings in August to figure out whether to embark on a costly external recruitment or promote internally (with or without a screening panel of local stakeholders).
The trustees decided Diolazo was their man – “the leader best positioned to meet the District’s immediate and longer-term needs and provide the experience, continuity, and leadership PUSD needs at this time,” Baehr said.
“In reaching that decision, the Board was also mindful of the significant time and cost associated with conducting a full external search,” she added, politely pointing out Board Policy 2120 that outlines PUSD’s rules on superintendent recruitment and selection. “Once the Board reached that determination, it saw no benefit in delaying the transition through an additional search process.”
Ghysels told me that when he was informed, “My decision to retire was considered carefully and strategically.”
“Since July 2024, I have maintained that my tenure as PUSD’s superintendent would be guided by the best interests of students, families, Team PUSD, and our community,” he said. “With that in mind, and with the Board selecting Ed to succeed me, I concluded that December 31 was the right time for me to hand over the reins.”
Here’s where the timeline confounds me.
The school board’s Sept. 24 agenda was amended last week after it was published to state that the trustees would discuss Ghysels’ retirement letter and consider approving a contract for an unnamed new permanent superintendent. Neither document was released in the agenda at that time, and the contract wasn’t posted until 5 p.m. on meeting night.
The latter is something I don’t think I’ve ever seen in my 13 years covering the Tri-Valley.
When a prior PUSD board hired David Haglund in 2017, he was publicly identified as the finalist for two full weeks – a delegation from Pleasanton even went down to Santa Ana to interview folks at his then-current district before Haglund’s contract was worked out and posted in advance.
In Dublin just months ago, Matt Campbell was named as his board’s pick for 2026-27 superintendent in February, pending successful contract negotiations. Those came through in May, with plenty of public awareness of the terms.
I count almost a dozen similar examples for superintendents and city managers in between, each following that familiar transparent pattern.
Tony Limoges was confirmed as Livermore Valley Joint Unified School District’s superintendent finalist on June 8; his contract was approved June 16.
His predecessor, Torie Gibson – named publicly June 10, 2024; approved eight days later.
CJ Cammack in the San Ramon Valley: finalist announcement May 3, 2024; contract inked 11 days later. I could go on…
Not so with PUSD last week. And I’m not the only one who noticed.
“We look forward to working with Ed Diolazo as superintendent and hope that he will work to support students and educators. We are disappointed that neither labor partner was consulted in the process. The district continues to show distrust towards their own educators by leaving them out of critical decisions,” said Association of Pleasanton Teachers President Evan Branning, who is also a Livermore City Council member.
Now, I have every reason to believe the district followed the basic letter of the law with the Brown Act, but that is not how they and their peers have conducted business in the past.
“For clarity, the Brown Act does not require a draft employment agreement to be published 24 hours in advance of a regular Board meeting. Under Government Code section 54957.5, materials relating to an open-session agenda item that are distributed to a majority of the Board less than 72 hours before a meeting must be made available for public inspection at the time they are distributed,” Susanne Frey, PUSD’s safety and communications coordinator, told me.
“The draft agreement was made publicly available at the same time it was distributed to the Board,” she added. “The Board subsequently considered and approved the Superintendent employment agreement in open session.”
Pleasanton Unified has built a strong reputation in education by being more than a bare minimum district, yet it is the pass-fail grading scale they want to be measured on here.
Their report card will actually say, “Incomplete”. In their haste, it appears the trustees overlooked an obvious requirement for an active teaching credential – which we inquired about after being tipped off by an insightful reader.
Obvious because it’s a local, PUSD-only rule listed right there in that same Board Policy 2120 the district flaunted to me in defense – admittedly you do have to scroll down the page a bit to find it: “The selected candidate shall hold both a valid school administration certificate and a valid teacher’s certificate.”
The district plans to rectify its error next week.
“The Board will take action on a resolution at its October 8, 2026 meeting to waive the teacher’s certificate requirement for incoming Superintendent Ed Diolazo who holds both a school administration certificate and a pupil personnel services credential,” Frey told our reporter Christian Trujano when he inquired.
Another avoidable misstep in just a baffling, needless situation.
Ghysels is giving PUSD three months of lead time, when his contract called for only 60 days. Diolazo is a respected, galvanizing member of the executive cabinet. Just one trustee seat is turning over in the election, so there’s no concern of a majority shift. And his contract, in the quick glance that we got, raised no initial red flags.
So why threaten community trust and transparency when there was no legitimate rush? There was plenty of time to name Diolazo publicly (whom I think nobody would’ve objected to), release his draft contract with days of notice and get his credentials all buttoned up for the Oct. 8 regular meeting, for example.
I asked Baehr, Ghysels and Diolazo separately for comment or reaction to the rushed process, being explicit with my premise that I don’t think I’ve ever seen this lack of public disclosure on a permanent superintendent before. These district leaders basically skirted the direct question while defending their process generally in a joint response to my inquiries.
Knowing the trustees prefer for the board president to be their public spokesperson on board matters, I still forwarded them my email questions to Baehr out of respect that each is their own elected official that might want to stand up for themselves on arguably the most important decision they’ll make in office. Two acknowledged my email and stood by the process while deferring to Baehr.
I also had my hand slapped for inquiring separately with the board president, current superintendent and superintendent-in-waiting (with different questions targeted to each person) and independent of their PR representative.
“We appreciate your interest in the transition process. In the future, please remember to contact (Frey) for media requests, including requests for direct quotes from district staff, personnel, or trustees and she can assist with the facilitation of your requests,” Baehr said.
Forgive me. I’m a journalist who likes to be forthright with the individual people involved in a story because, in this case, PUSD is more than an institution; it’s made of humans working their best to make the best decisions. Sources deserve me and everyone with the Pleasanton Weekly to be transparent with them.
Which brings me to another perplexing part of the timeline here. I sat down with Ghysels and Frey less than three weeks before the superintendent transition was announced.
The specifics of that conversation were off-the-record, but the fact we met is a matter of public record – my name surely appears on his district work calendar. But what I should say in hindsight: I walked out of that candid conversation about our future working relationship with zero indication or impression that Ghysels would be leaving his post early.
We’ll see what we can dig up in our forthcoming California Public Records Act request to try to learn what’s been going on behind the scenes. In particular, I’m still confused about exactly when and how the trustees and Diolazo (and/or their representatives) actually negotiated the final terms of his contract if Ghysels’ retirement letter is dated Sept. 23 and the draft employment agreement was released at 5 p.m. Sept. 24.
Still, beyond reputational impacts, the process last week only matters so much at this point. Diolazo’s deal is done, other than the teaching certificate waiver, and he is the superintendent going forward when the calendar turns to 2027.
“I am fully committed to the full term of my three-and-a-half-year employment agreement. I see the opportunity as a continuation of my dedicated service to PUSD and I believe my knowledge of the District will allow me to build on existing strengths while bringing new ideas and perspectives to the District’s next chapter,” Diolazo told me in the joint response.
“I recognize PUSD’s strong academic standards, commitment to serving each student, and workforce as important strengths, while pointing to fiscal stabilization, revenue generation, and addressing achievement gaps among student groups as areas that will require continued attention,” he added.
Editor’s note: Jeremy Walsh is the associate publisher and editorial director for the Embarcadero Media Foundation’s East Bay Division. His “What A Week” column is a recurring feature in the Pleasanton Weekly, Livermore Vine and DanvilleSanRamon.com.
Court records reveal abuse allegations before fatal shooting in Dublin parkSeptember 30, 2026 9:17 am
Halloween-themed events, Night Market coming to Alameda County Fairgrounds this monthOctober 1, 2026 8:58 am
