The Princeton Public School District has selected a temporary replacement for retiring superintendent Steve Cochrane.
The school board at its meeting on May 5 chose Barry Galasso to serve as interim superintendent while the district conducts a search for Cochrane’s replacement.
Galasso most recently served as interim superintendent of Voorhees Township Public Schools for six months in 2019. He is also an adjunct professor at the Gwynedd Mercy University School of Graduate and Professional Studies.
According to his profile at Gwynedd, Galasso holds a PhD in Education from Rutgers University. He has worked in urban, suburban and rural districts as both a teacher and administrator, and has also taught at Rutgers, Rowan, Farleigh Dickinson, Delaware Valley universities.
Galasso served for a total of 21 years as a superintendent—he was head of the Berlin Borough, Winslow Township, and Eastern Camden County Regional school districts. He was subsequently selected as the executive director of the New Jersey Association of School Administrators after his retirement.
For the last nine years he served as executive director of the Bucks County Intermediate Unit in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, working with 13 school districts and school boards serving a 100,000 public and private school students.
He has conducted school board/superintendent retreats in New Jersey and Pennsylvania as an expert facilitator, and helped conduct a number of superintendent searches in both states.
Galasso will work with Cochrane until his retirement at the end of June. Cochrane has been the superintendent of the Princeton Public Schools since 2014. His career in education has spanned a multitude of educational roles, including being an elementary school teacher, principal, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, and an assistant dean at Princeton University.
Cochrane was recently named county Superintendent of the Year by the Mercer County Association of School Administrators.
Barry Galasso has been named interim superintendent og Princeton Public schools. (Youtube photo).,
