Editor’s Note: This story was updated to reflect that Sarita Smith tendered her resignation on April 26 by not signing a contract renewal for the 2026-27 school year.
Days before an Atlanta woman brought to the DeKalb County School Board’s attention that a high-ranking official named Sarita Smith was using a Gmail address to conduct official business, she chose not to sign a contract to continue her employment with DeKalb Schools.
Smith is the executive director of the Student Assignment Project, a controversial district-wide effort to close or consolidate dozens of schools over the next decade. She was hired by former superintendent Devon Q. Horton, who resigned after being indicted on fraud charges at his former school district.
Rough Draft Atlanta and other media outlets were copied on a May 13 email from Margaret Wright Boylan to school board members, Dr. Tricilla Weaver, the school’s chief of access and opportunity, and DCSD Interim Superintendent Norman C. Sauce, asking why Smith was not using her official school email address.
“According to the district’s own website, Sarita Smith has an official DCSD email address: ‘sap@dekalbschoolsga.org,'” the letter said. “Yet a separate Gmail account: ‘sapdekalb@gmail.com’ has surfaced in connection with the SAP process. That should alarm people.”
Boylan said the Smith email issue further erodes the public’s trust in the SAP process.
“Trust in the SAP process was already hanging by a thread,” Boylan wrote. “Parents have spent months questioning enrollment numbers, utilization claims, consultant influence, shifting proposals, and whether decisions were being made before the public was ever brought into the conversation. Finding out that a private Gmail account may have been part of the process only makes that distrust worse.”
“…the public should never have to wonder whether major decisions about their schools were happening in inboxes they were never supposed to see.”
Sauce replied one hour later, thanking Boylan for raising the concern, and saying that he and other administrators were unaware of the existence of the email account.
“The use of an outside email account to conduct district business is not in accordance with our expectations or policies,” Sauce said. “We are addressing this internally, as we discern the facts and origin of this email address.”
According to Jennifer Caracciolo, the department’s deputy chief communications officer, Smith tendered her resignation by not signing a contract for the 2026–2027 school year. The deadline for the central office staff contracts to be signed was April 26 at 11:59 p.m.
“This occurred well in advance of an Atlanta woman bringing to your attention this week the Gmail account Ms. Smith used to communicate with the SAP committee,” Caracciolo told Rough Draft.
In a May 12 email, which was sent from the Gmail address to Weaver and SAP committee members and widely circulated on social media channels, Smith said her decision was “a personal one rooted in the shifting needs of my family.”
“It was not a decision made because of the new administration or any outside pressure,” she wrote. “Ultimately, I reached a point where I needed to prioritize what was best for my family and that is what led me to this transition.”
Caracciolo complimented Smith’s work on the SAP initiative.
We appreciate Ms. Smith’s contributions to establishing and advancing the Student Assignment Project and wish her well in her future endeavors,” she said in an emailed response. “The Student Assignment Project remains a key district priority and will continue moving forward with a commitment to transparency, community engagement, and thoughtful planning.”
Caracciolo said Weaver, who is Smith’s supervisor, “will continue to lead” the SAP initiative.
Before her stint in DeKalb, Smith, according to her LinkedIn profile, served for four years as the director of student assignments for the Evanston/Skokie School District in Illinois, under then-superintendent Horton.
SAP shift
After months of feedback, protests, and angst about DeKalb County’s Student Assignment Project, which proposed closing dozens of schools and repurposing others, the school district announced on May 5 that it is shifting to a new direction.
According to an emailed announcement and an online video, DCDS officials said they heard that the information-gathering process “felt too top-down, scenarios appeared predetermined, conversations separated buildings, boundaries, and programs in ways that did not reflect how communities experience schools.”
“We take this feedback seriously, and it is shaping how this work moves forward,” the statement said. “Simply put, the process is evolving.”
SAP, launched in 2024, has as its goal to maximize resources, ensure long-term academic sustainability for students, families, and DCSD staff with the closure or consolidation of dozens of schools over the next six to eight years.
Parents around the district, especially in the northern end of the county, have decried the changes, saying that high-achieving schools should be a factor in the closure decisions.
Sauce said that the conversations regarding school changes will focus on smaller communities, starting in August, with an independent consultant.
