Valley News reported on a working relationship between NH Department of Ed Commissioner, Frank Edeblut and Croydon School Board member:
Croydon — Records obtained through a right-to-know request by the Valley News point to a working relationship over the past year between Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut and a member of the Croydon School Board, which most recently included helping her husband apply for a job at the state Department of Education.
During that time, the School Board and Edelblut, who was a Republican state representative last year, were on the same side of a school choice battle waged simultaneously in the courts and in the Legislature.
The connection continued after Edelblut’s appointment as education commissioner in January. A string of emails from earlier this month indicates that he forwarded a government job listing to Jody Underwood, a former chairwoman of the Croydon School Board who still sits on the panel, and then passed an application from her husband, Ian Underwood, to a Department of Education human resources administrator.
The position, listed as “Education Consultant III,” pays between $56,000 and $76,000 a year. The job posting says the consultant will “plan, develop and coordinate educational programs for K-12 educators and other stakeholders in the state in the areas of academic standards, instruction and assessment.”
The position appears to have been listed internally at the time that Ian Underwood applied, on March 11, and was forwarded to Jody Underwood three days earlier by Edelblut through his Department of Education email account. Underwood used her Croydon School Board account in the correspondence.
