Bad Education , a new HBO original film starring Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney, and Ray Romano, tells the true story of the largest embezzlement scheme ever to target an American school district, which found students in Roslyn, New York robbed of over $10 million in funds.
The movie was written by Mike Makowsky, who was a middle school student in the town at the time the case unfolded. “I wanted to write something more personal about my hometown,” Makowsky told Vanity Fair , “and this story was ostensibly the biggest thing that has ever happened in it." Here's what you should know about the real events.
Who is Frank Tassone?
Tassone joined the Roslyn, Long Island school district in 1992, and quickly became a popular superintendent. He introduced initiatives like community service requirements for high schoolers, and foreign language learning for kindergarteners, programs that earned write ups in the New York Times.
Born in the Bronx, Tassone had earned two master's degrees and a PhD at Columbia University's Teachers College. There, he studied Dickens, and continued to promote literature in Roslyn, convening a local book club and increasing the membership of New York's Dickens Fellowship literary club nearly tenfold during the years of his involvement with the organization.
In 1999, he penned an op-ed for the Times about his district's efforts to find qualified teachers. “The increasing demands of a profession that is still not as well compensated as many others, and a strong economy...widens the income gap between teaching and more lucrative careers,” he wrote.
Still, schools in the community thrived throughout his tenure, with nearly all students completing high school and 95 percent going to college . A quarter of each senior class went on to attend a highly selective university. Schools in affluent towns like Roslyn, where the median Income in 2000 was nearly 150 percent of the state average , often boasting high student performance. But the community's schools won acclaim for being among the best in the state and the country. In 2004, the Wall Street Journal named Roslyn High the 6th best public income high school in the nation.
How did he defraud the school district?
In October 2002, then-assistant superintendent for business Pamela Gluckin (played in Bad Education by Allison Janney), was discovered to have stolen $250,000. The theft was uncovered when a Home Depot employee became suspicious when Gluckin's son, John McCormick, used a Roslyn school's credit card to purchase construction material to be delivered to his home. It was later found that McCorkmick had purchased $85,o00 worthof supplies for his contractor business using the Roslyn credit card. Tassone convinced the school board not to press charges against Gluckin, arguing that it would cost the schools more money to continue paying her $160,000 annual salary during the years of legal battles that would ensue than it would be to demand that she repay what she'd stolen and allow her to quietly resign.
In early 2004, an anonymous letter was sent to the school board and local newspapers accusing the then 57-year-old Tassone of stealing from the schools. “We believe that Dr. Frank Tassone participated in this embezzlement scandal so as to support HIS lavish lifestyle, with the help of Ms. Gluckin,” read the letter. “He submitted ... his personal credit-card statements, bills for personal vacations and trips, and various household bills ... and included them in the cover-up .” The letter writer was never named, but the missive sparked investigations into Tassone, who resigned from his position after it was discovered that a contractor paid $800,000 by the school was actually Tassone's partner of more than 30 years, Stephen Signorelli.
Tassone and Gluckin covered their tracks by roping in conspirators and sharing the ill-gotten cash widely. District employees with oversight jobs were given bonuses; Debra Rigano , Gluckin's niece, worked as an accounting clerk for Rosalyn schools and stole more than $850,000. Investigators discovered that seemingly legitimate checks were written to vendors and were then drawn by the conspirators. One million in cash was drawn out of ATMs, while 74 cash unauthorized Rosalyn school credit cards were circulated among the district employees and their friends and family members.
Ultimately, more than $11 million dollars in thefts would be uncovered. The district had paid the rent on Tassone's Upper East Side apartment, funded more than $55,000 in fees to a weight-loss doctor, $33,000 worth of his local dry cleaner, and $50,000 in flights to London in the Concorde. Gluckin used district money to buy four houses , while Tassone kept his Manhattan apartment, a house in the Bronx, and bought a home in Las Vegas with an exotic dancer. Hundreds of thousands were spent on cars, including a Jaguar and a BMW; Rigano bought a Rolex, and Gluckin paid her pool cleaner with district funds.
View more about Bad Education reviews
