BY ELAINE GOODMAN
Daily Post Correspondent
The Mountain View Whisman School District has released an auditor’s report on district spending, including the hiring of an “energy healer” to help employees meditate and former Superintendent Ayinde Rudolph’s stays at luxury hotels.
The audit was conducted by a state-funded agency called the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, or FCMAT. The school board is scheduled to discuss the report on Thursday (Aug. 21).
Auditors found insufficient evidence to indicate that fraud, misappropriation of funds or other illegal fiscal practices may have occurred during the period examined: July 1, 2022 through the end of October 2024, when Rudolph resigned. But the report sheds light on Rudolph’s activities while he was superintendent, particularly regarding travel.
In 2023, Rudolph traveled to eight conferences. Three were in California and others were in Dallas, Denver, San Antonio, Birmingham, Ala. and Washington, D.C. From January to October 2024, Rudolph took seven trips, including two visits to New York City and another trip to Washington, D.C.
He said rental car was too small
In January 2024, Rudolph went to Palm Springs for an Association of California School Administrators conference. Auditors wanted to know why his Hertz rental car bill included a $300 upgrade charge. The total for the four-day rental was $1,119.
Rudolph told auditors that the full-size car that Hertz initially provided was “too small to comfortably accommodate both him and his luggage, especially given his height,” the report said. He upgraded to an SUV. FCMAT was satisfied with Rudolph’s explanation.
Rudolph also traveled to New York City from Feb. 18-26, 2024 to conduct research for the district’s “Re-Imagining Castro” initiative. The three-year program is intended to give extra support to students at Castro Elementary School, which has a high number of English learners, low-income families and homeless students.
Rudolph was joined on that trip by two school board members, three district administrators and a teacher, according to the auditor’s report, which didn’t name the other travelers. They planned to visit schools where the student body was similar to that of Castro.
The group stayed at the JW Marriott Essex House next to Central Park at rates ranging from $455 to $709 per night, not including taxes and fees, the report said. The rate varied depending on the attendee.
What did NYC trip accomplish?
But several of the schools the group had planned to visit were closed for winter break when the Mountain View group was there. They were able to visit at least one charter school in the area for their research, the report said.
Rudolph told auditors that the hotel was chosen because of its location near cultural attractions “that could enhance the educational purpose of the trip.”
“FCMAT did not further assess whether the stated purpose of the trip was accomplished or whether the Re-Imagine Castro initiative was a valid educational priority for the district,” the auditors wrote.
Another time Rudolph booked a luxury hotel was in late 2023, when he stayed at the St. Regis in San Francisco during the California School Boards Association conference. He told auditors that he wanted to stay in the city because the conference sessions started early and so he could “maximize participation” in the conference.
Auditors also reviewed 337 charges on Rudolph’s district credit card. For 44 of the charges, totaling $6,957, Rudolph provided no receipt to substantiate the charge. Instead, he submitted a district form that says he wasn’t able to turn in a receipt because it was lost, accidentally destroyed or wasn’t itemized. The person filling out the form writes a short explanation of the charge and agrees with a statement that “no alcoholic beverages or tobacco products were purchased.”
Most of the charges without a receipt were for food or parking while Rudolph traveled.
‘Food’ turned out to be cigars
In March 2024, there were two charges from Cigar Bar NY, for $49.49 and $64.24. Rudolph said on the form the charges were for food.
During a March 2024 trip to Washington D.C. for the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development annual conference, Rudolph used his credit card to pay $76 to TG Cigar. He didn’t file a receipt for the charge, but said on the district form that the payment was for lunch.
“No tobacco or alcohol purchases using district funds were identified,” FCMAT said in its report.
On July 26, 2022, there were two charges without receipts from Shoreline Golf. Rudolph said a $3,830 charge was for “room rental for leadership retreat.” A charge of $360 was for “leadership team food for retreat.”
The Santa Clara County schools superintendent hired FCMAT to do the audit, agreeing to pay up to $65,000 for the work.
Parents started digging through district finances in May 2024 after Rudolph proposed reducing the number of periods in middle school.
One expenditure that raised eyebrows was when the district hired “master energy healer” Alycia Diggs-Chavis of Blue Violet Energy, who charged more than $1,000 a session to meditate with principals and assistant superintendents.
FCMAT said it’s not uncommon for organizations to look for ways to reduce workplace stress.
“Accordingly, FCMAT determined that, although somewhat unconventional, the retention of meditation services can best be classified as a local decision, subject to review and approval by the district’s governing board but not otherwise specifically prohibited,” the auditors wrote.
So they paid 65k to find out the guy spent about a hundred bucks on cigars. Maybe. They are the ones to be fired.
Corruption!!!
Thousand-dollar meditation session? Luxury hotels in San Francisco? It sounds like criminal malfeasance.
Woah. Time to find a new (honest) superintendent.
The communities be outraged at the waste of education dollars. The board needs to think hard about their role in allowing the one and only district employee they hire, oversee and fire to speed tax dollars this way. FICMAT has always been a respected organization however it seems they no longer take wasted, frivolously spent money seriously.
The auditors are also incompetent! It’s obvious that cigar bar charges & 900 dollar night hotels are an excess at best and corruption at worst. And yet the FCMAT just let him and the SD get away with those!
Fire the auditors and the board that allowed this to happen. What a waste of taxpayers money.
This is what people get for supporting DEI hires. The people of the school district and the school board deserve to be taken advantage of financially. Hopefully other Americans would have a brain can learn from this and get rid of your DEI hires.
Totally agree!
Why is this something you’re bringing up? Who says this man isn’t qualified for the job? You don’t even know what DEI is about. But you’re racist so you just assume it means hire black people instead of white people. Btw, white peoples take advantage of government systems every day on way larger scale. So…
I was one of the Trustees that initially 1) looked at our 72 candidate Superintendent applicant list, 2) asked for school Administrative experience (not out-of-the-box), 3) asked for experience in difficult Economically Disadvantaged places, 4) thought Rudolph had potential (if more and better mentored). Sure – $50,000 less salary (bottom-of-our-‘salary range’) and $50,000 professional mentoring for FIRST several years.
It was the civic and fiduciary responsibility of the Boards of ensuing years (majority of Trustees) to provide adequate, good, or great OVERSIGHT. IMO they failed at doing that. IMO at ‘twice a Board President’ Devon Conley bears a very heavy burden in Dr. Rudolph’s failures (2 giant fights with City / at $10M a year potential negative impact) (Castro Re-Visioning Manhattan “junket”) (etc. see RecallConley.org)
I couldn’t have said it any better!!!
It’s disappointing to see how quickly some in the community and on the board have turned this into a “gotcha” moment rather than focusing on the facts. The independent state audit found no fraud, no misuse of funds, and that every trip had a legitimate educational purpose. Yes, travel and professional development cost money—but strong leadership requires engaging with peers, learning from other districts, and representing our schools at the national level.
What’s really damaging is not the cost of a hotel room or conference, but the constant second-guessing, lack of trust, and public undermining of a leader who has dedicated himself to improving outcomes for our kids. No superintendent can succeed if they are expected to lead without support, treated with suspicion at every turn, and subjected to this kind of hostile environment.
If we want the best for our students, we need to back our leaders with trust and collaboration, not weaken them with politics and finger-pointing.
“Leader who has dedicated himself to improving outcomes for our kids” That’s funny right there. Either this guy doesn’t know Ayinde or he is Ayinde. Ayinde only cares about one person.
George, you’re absolutely right! Complaining that he dipped into taxpayer funds to buy expensive cigars or charging out-of-town trips once a month, flying first-class and staying in luxury accommodations, is undermining this poor beleaguered public servant. We should be quiet and let him keep charging all these things. We don’t need rules for the expenses he is charging to the district. George, I’m sure you’d be OK if he used district funds to procure the services of a prostitute, right? Complaining about that would be undermining a fine educator. And if he wants some cocaine during one of these trips, and pays the dealer with district funds, who are we to complain? Yes, George, I totally agree with you. No rules for this guy. That would be undermining him! (P.S. I’m not saying he paid for a prostitute or drugs — those are only examples for discussion’s sake.)
Clearly, he was within whatever rules are set in place for what he was doing otherwise they would be able to oust him right away. They should change the rules, not punish the player for abiding by them.
I hope he goes to prison for the crime he’s committed.
What crime was that again?
No crimes were found by the auditors so there. Take that!
Ayinde is a miserable human being – was nasty to staff, harassed and sexually harassed staff members, threatened, manipulated, broke trust and created a toxic work environment. That is the true crime here…it will take years to undo his destructive behavior. I hope he rots in hell.
What about Ameswell Hotel Mountain view stay during the summer and Napa resort stay in the same week? If auditors have skipped looking at those, they wasted another 65K of tax payer dollars.
Rudolph picked fights out of his own arrogance with the city, parents, and employees because of his ego. It’s unfortunate the audit didn’t dig any deeper than stuff parents found on their own. The board let him get away with wasteful spending, borderline criminal expenses, and additional perks.