Former Harford County Public Schools superintendent Sean Bulson says his career unraveled after a disorienting night in New Orleans. Speaking publicly today for the first time since the school board voted this winter to end his contract, Bulson recounted waking up in a hotel room after a conference night, still wearing the same clothes as the night before, realizing his work and personal electronics were gone, and using a colleague’s phone to call 911. He now believes he was drugged and contends that political opponents seized on the episode to remove him, even as he defends his tenure by pointing to rising student achievement and fewer classroom disruptions.
In an exclusive interview with The Baltimore Banner, Bulson walked through the blurry timeline of that night and the morning after and rejected any suggestion of intentional misconduct on the trip. He said he remembers being with Deputy Superintendent Eric Davis and a woman he did not know, and that once he realized his devices were missing, he reported it to the district’s IT staff and to school board leadership. Bulson said the fallout was the climax of what he described as a sustained campaign against him, which came to a head when audio of his 911 call from New Orleans began circulating online in January.
Inspector general: devices recovered, no evidence of tampering
A report from the Maryland Office of the Inspector General for Education found that hotel staff recovered the missing equipment and that the district’s IT director saw no indication the laptop or phone had been accessed or altered. The office confirmed that the voice on the New Orleans 911 recording is Bulson’s and characterized what happened as a personal matter outside its fraud and abuse jurisdiction. According to the report, Harford County Public Schools disabled accounts tied to the devices and took other steps that, in OIGE’s view, mitigated any risk to student data.
Political fallout moved fast
Local officials moved quickly once the recording appeared online. Harford County Executive Bob Cassilly publicly called for Bulson’s resignation in early January, saying the county “deserves better,” according to a statement from Harford County. That phrasing helped set the tone for the weeks that followed.
In the days after the audio spread, the school board placed Bulson on paid leave, Board President Aaron Poynton resigned, and the district put other leaders on administrative leave while officials reviewed the situation, CBS Baltimore reported. The outlet also covered the appointment of a replacement board member in January.
Bulson pushes back on critics and highlights results
Bulson says the controversy ultimately cost him his job just as he was touting improved academic numbers. He points to higher Advanced Placement participation and pass rates, SAT scores above the state average, and what he calls a sharp drop in classroom disruptions. In his interview with The Baltimore Banner, he argued that critics were more focused on “salacious” theories about what happened in New Orleans than on student performance. He told the paper he is not looking to return to a public-school superintendent role “right now.”
Board vote, interim leadership and lingering questions
The school board voted in February to terminate Bulson’s contract and to pay out the remaining balance under the terms available to them, while naming Deputy Superintendent Dyann Mack as interim superintendent as a broader search gets underway, according to WBALTV. The station noted that the OIGE review helped guide the district’s next steps.
The result is a tangled timeline: a New Orleans hotel incident in April 2024, a January 2026 social-media posting of the 911 recording by a local law-firm account, and a rapid sequence of resignations and leaves that followed. The chain of events has left many in Harford County asking how unofficial social media posts and fast-moving online claims should intersect with formal investigations, Patch has reported.
