The Ruins of Trenton

Trenton Mayor Douglas H. Palmer is blaming his hand-picked superintendent of schools, Rodney Lofton, after high school students returning from summer vacation entered the main and west campuses this week only to find they didn't have class schedules.

The problem was caused by delays in the work of an outside firm that was revamping the schools' scheduling software, and Mayor Palmer was quick to put the blame on his new school executive, Mr. Lofton.

"The ball was dropped by the administration and the superintendent," said Mayor Palmer in a statement in the Times this week.

The scheduling problems for the Trenton schools are the latest of a series of problems for the district, and follow the release of a report from the state that showed the urban school district was performing very badly and has many underqualified instructors.

There was also the falsification of the academic records of some students at a repeater program at the Sherman Ave. Annex of the high school. That disaster caused some students at the high school to cancel their graduation plans as they were forced to return to make up courses they never took.

With a school board that is filled by mayoral appointment, it looks like some of the responsibility for the district's continuing problems fall squarely on the shoulders of Mayor Palmer.

Right in the midst of this new crisis, Mayor Palmer will be welcoming the U.S. Conference of Mayors to Trenton next week, from Thursday to Saturday.