Blue-clad parents, teachers and staff from Will Rogers Elementary School packed a second-straight meeting of the Edmond Public Schools Board of Education on Monday to sit with and support their former head principal, Anissa Angier-Dunn, who resigned eight days into the school year Aug. 25.
After a five-hour executive session, the board voted unanimously to do what it had declined to at its Sept. 8 meeting: accept Angier-Dunn’s resignation. As the executive session approached its two-hour mark, Angier-Dunn’s attorney, Heath Merchen, declared to district staff and attendees that a request to present his client’s side of the shrouded story had been denied.
“You should not stop bringing pressure on your board to deal with corrupt administrators,” Merchen said to parents. “This is not over.”
Exactly who and what have irked Merchen and spurred Angier-Dunn to resign remain unclear, but the drama has fueled rumors and speculation in the EPS community.
After Monday’s meeting concluded, an anonymous Twitter user “Okie_Rancher” wrote that they were “heartbroken by the callous indifference of the Edmond school board to the horrific abuses of students, staff and parents at the hands of an out-of-control central office administrator.” The user, whose bio identifies them as an attorney, wrote that they were invited to speak during the executive session, but were later prohibited.
“This is what sparked it… Amazing principal who defended a teacher on military leave, demanded ADA compliant playground equipment for special ed students and fought against placement of a suspected pedophile in her school,” the account wrote.
In an email update to parents Tuesday morning, Edmond Public Schools Superintendent Josh Delich, who joined the district in April, informed parents that the board accepted Angier-Dunn’s resignation and that the interviewing and hiring process for a new head principal is ongoing.
“We will work to complete that process, but we also want to ensure we are taking the necessary time to get feedback from many people, including our Will Rogers families,” Delich wrote.
In an August email sent to parents, Delich wrote that Angier-Dunn “made the personal decision to resign her position as principal at Will Rogers Elementary.”
In a Sept. 10 interview with NonDoc, Delich declined to discuss the drama at hand with Angier-Dunn’s resignation.
“I would just say again, personnel matters are personnel matters,” Delich said, “and I hope you would respect that matter.”
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Angier-Dunn: ‘This choice is extremely bittersweet’
Despite the drama at back-to-back EPS Board of Education meetings, Angier-Dunn has declined to comment about her situation publicly.
In her formal resignation letter, however, Angier-Dunn struck a positive tone. Calling her decision “extremely bittersweet,” she expressed a desire to prioritize her “doctoral work” and noted that EPS leaders had looked at “alternative roles” for her in the district.
EPS released the undated letter to NonDoc following an Open Records Act request:
Over the summer and the past few weeks, I spent a great deal of time in reflection and heartfelt conversations with my husband, family, and close friends. Through those discussions, I’ve come to the difficult, yet thoughtful decision to step away from my role as principal of Will Rogers Elementary.
This choice is extremely bittersweet, of course. It is rooted in a desire to give greater focus to my doctoral work and to pursue personal and professional projects that I’ve placed on hold. I want to thank our district leadership for their efforts to explore alternative roles on my behalf. In the end, I feel this is the right time for me to make space for the next chapter.
To say I am proud of Will Rogers would be an understatement. I am insanely proud! Our phenomenal staff, the culture we’ve built together, our incredible PTO, strong community partnerships, and the unwavering support of our Board of Education set Will Rogers apart. The Wildcat community is something extraordinary, and it has been the greatest privilege to lead and learn alongside each of you.
While I may not be on campus each day, I will always be in your corner celebrating wins, available when I can be helpful, and forever proud to be part of the Will Rogers story in any way I can!!! I will forever be a supporter of Will Rogers and of Edmond Public Schools, and I genuinely hope our paths cross again in the future.
Again – love you, mean it!
Angier-Dunn will remain on paid administrative leave until Dec. 1, when her resignation is effective, according to Edmond Public Schools executive director of communications Jeff Bardach.
After Monday’s meeting, Michelle Magnusson, secretary of the Will Rogers Elementary School Parent-Teacher Organization, shared a statement on behalf of the attendees who appeared at both meetings to support Angier-Dunn.
“Dozens of parents and teachers returned to the board’s special meeting hoping for clarity on this major disruption to our students’ school year. We left with the same questions about timing and who was involved in this separation,” Magnusson said. “With so much left unresolved, our hearts are broken, and so is our trust.”
Although he declined to discuss specific circumstances of Angier-Dunn’s departure, EPS Board of Education District 5 Representative Marcus Jones told NonDoc on Tuesday it “is unfortunate that the decision outcome had to be this way.”
Board Chairwoman Courtney Hobgood did not respond to messages Tuesday afternoon seeking comment.
According to her LinkedIn, Angier-Dunn had worked at Will Rogers for more than 10 years. She became an assistant principal in 2020 before becoming head principal for the 2022-2023 school year, according to a welcome video posted on the Will Rogers Elementary YouTube. In September 2020, Angier-Dunn received a $5,000 grant from Flight Night to purchase STEM instructions and an award from the Tulsa Regional STEM Alliance dubbed the “STEM Innovator Award,” according to a district Facebook post celebrating her achievements.
‘It is demoralizing’
A group of roughly 80 parents, staff and teachers had also attended the board’s previous meeting Sept. 8. Those assembled that night had also donned blue, one of the school’s colors, in support of Angier-Dunn.
Following a lengthy executive session that lasted nearly five hours that Monday, the board had the opportunity to accept Angier-Dunn’s resignation along with a list of “certified personnel actions” listed under “Schedule A.” Instead, following a motion by Jones, they chose to pull her resignation from the schedule and table a decision on it until their next meeting, which originally had been scheduled for October.
Questions about the circumstances of Angier-Dunn’s resignation guided that decision, Jones said Sept. 12.
“We just wanted to make sure that all of the ducks were in a row. There were some questions from various board members,” Jones said. “We just wanted to make sure that we were doing the thing that was right, so we decided to table it to find out more information.”
The scores of parents who attended the two meetings also questioned the circumstances of Angier-Dunn’s resignation. During the board’s public comment period Sept. 8, Magnusson — the PTO secretary — said community requests for “inclusive” resources at Will Rogers Elementary should have been heeded.
“As staff and parents, we found gaps in infrastructure and services that threaten our children’s well-being. We followed the rules. We presented solutions that met EPS guidelines. We were told no, repeatedly and capriciously. EPS admin shut down ideas and grants at our site that were celebrated at other schools. It is demoralizing, yet we have wrapped a community around our kids to get things done. We want the inclusive community school that Mrs. Angier-Dunn championed,” Magnusson said. “In August, we lost that principal. We ask you: Why now? What actions could have prevented this separation? Who and what contributed?”
After the Sept. 8 meeting, Magnusson said there were “a lot of questions” about the process that led to Angier-Dunn’s resignation, which she said created a disruptive start to the school year.
“If there is some action the district wants to take, they should have taken it at a different time,” she said.
Other parents also say the disruption is unsettling.
Annaciara Ghajar, a mother to three autistic children, has been a vocal critic of how EPS and Will Rogers Elementary leaders have responded to her concerns about playground accessibility and other requested accommodations.
“As a [special education] parent, I find it unsettling that we have two principals and a new school [psychiatrist], because that means no administrator at the table has any prior relationship with students, parents or teachers when trying to help determine which supports will be signed off on,” Ghajar said Tuesday in reaction to Monday’s board decision.
