Less than a year after taking a job as Middlebury Union Middle School’s first dean of climate and culture, Esther Charlestin has left the position.
Hired last fall, Charlestin, 33, said she enjoyed the work, which included overseeing discipline, communicating with teachers and parents, and connecting with the community. But throughout her tenure, she said, “there was a cloud over me and I didn’t know the name of the cloud.”
Charlestin, who is Black, said it took her months to realize that the heaviness she was feeling was the cumulative effect of racism she says she faced at work.
