Dr. Shelley Jallow was appointed as the State Monitor for the Rochester City School District in May of 2020. The New York State legislature enacted legislation in 2020 that requires the State Education Commissioner to appoint one monitor for both academic and fiscal issues.

Dr. Jallow has decades of experience in school district turnaround and leadership operations. As Monitor, Dr. Jallow will provide oversight, guidance and technical assistance related to the educational and fiscal policies, practices, programs and decisions of the school district, the Board of Education and the superintendent.

Dr. Shelley Jallow most recently served as Senior Director of School Improvement in the Learning Innovations Program at WestEd. Prior to joining WestEd, Dr. Jallow supervised, coached and mentored school and district leaders in school districts throughout New Jersey, representing low-performing elementary, middle, and high schools. Her work resulted in a state designation change from Priority Schools to Schools in Good Standing. Dr. Jallow’s classroom and administrative experience is vast, having served as a mathematics teacher, mathematics director, director of curriculum and instruction, chief academic officer, founding principal, assistant superintendent and deputy superintendent. Her teaching and leadership experience include 3 NYC school districts; Mt. Vernon, NY; Hartford, CT, New Orleans, LA; Trenton, NJ; and Prince Georges County, MD. She earned her doctorate in education at St. John Fisher College in Rochester.

Under legislation included in the Enacted State Budget, the Rochester Monitor oversees academic and fiscal issues. Dr. Jallow is a non-voting ex-officio member of the board of education, entitled to attend all meetings of the board including executive sessions.

Among other duties, the monitor works with the district’s shared decision-making committee in developing the financial plan, academic improvement plan, district goals, implementation of district priorities and budgetary recommendations. Dr. Jallow also assists in resolving disputes and conflicts, including but not limited to, those between the superintendent and the Board of Education and among members of the Board.

The district is required to provide quarterly reports to the monitor and annual reports to the Commissioner and Board of Regents on the academic, fiscal, and operational status of the district. The monitor is required to provide semi-annual reports to the Commissioner, the Board of Regents, the Governor, the Temporary President of the Senate, and the Speaker of the Assembly on the academic, fiscal, and operational status of the district which include all the contracts that the district entered into throughout the year.

The Board and the monitor will develop proposed Financial and Academic Improvement plans for the 2020-2021 school year and the four subsequent school years no later than December 1, 2020. These plans will be the subject of public hearings to consider the input of the Rochester community. Once the plans are approved by the Board, the plans must be submitted by the monitor to the State Education Commissioner for approval by January 15, 2021.