#Board of elite NYC boys’ school forces out beloved headmaster

The beloved headmaster of a Manhattan private school has been forced out amid a bitter legal battle leveled by parents against the school’s board of trustees.

In a letter Friday to parents and faculty the board of St. Bernard’s School said it had “overwhelmingly” determined Stuart Johnson, who has headed up the Upper East Side all-boys school for 35 years, should leave his position immediately — more than a year before his scheduled retirement following an investigation of “multiple credible complaints” against him.

“They’ve carried out a corporate style coup,” said one parent, who supports the lawsuit against the $50,000-a-year school. “The only misconduct in the school does not come from the headmaster’s office, but rather from the boardroom.”

In court papers filed last month in Manhattan State Supreme Court, parents of students at the 116-year-old kindergarten to grade nine school, alleged the executive committee of the board made risky investments with the school’s funds and hired teams of expensive law and public relations executives with school resources to defend themselves.

In his own letter to parents Friday, Johnson said he supported the board’s decision in order to end “the discord over my planned departure, which has preoccupied the school for the last six months.” Johnson, who was scheduled to return for his last school year in September, has now been placed on sabbatical, the board’s letter to parents says.

Parents initially sued the school in March alleging the board of trustees was forcing Johnson out.  The suit was filed by anonymous plaintiffs to prevent board members from targeting the families of individual students, a lawyer for the parents told The Post.