DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Three months into his tenure leading Des Moines public schools, Ian Roberts asked the district's board for emergency approval of $116,000 in contracts.
The agreements to provide training on “culturally responsive coaching,” the superintendent said, had to be approved within days. But the district’s procurement manager discovered one contract was earmarked for a company that marketed Roberts as a consultant and speaker, sold
his books and helped raise his profile, an Associated Press investigation found.
Finance officials warned Roberts that contracting with Kansas City-based Lively Paradox would be a conflict of interest, and Roberts canceled the special board meeting he'd requested in September 2023.
Since his arrest last month by immigration agents, the public has grappled with how Roberts became a longtime superintendent despite allegedly lacking authorization to work in the U.S., having a history of criminal charges and touting falsified credentials.
The AP found that as Roberts' profile in education rose, his connection with Lively Paradox and its founder Nicole Price became rewarding during a period when many organizations championed diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Blurring the line between his public and private jobs, the investigation found tens of thousands of dollars in contracts were awarded to Price from school districts where Roberts held leadership posts.
The AP reviewed district records, court filings and books and marketing materials published by Lively Paradox and Price, who met Roberts during a chance encounter at an airport a decade ago.
Roberts, who remains in federal custody, has defended his outside work as helping transform education. His attorney declined comment.
Months after Des Moines officials stopped his attempt to contract with Lively Paradox, the district paid the firm $6,476 in consulting and travel expenses for Price's work facilitating a two-hour team-building exercise at a school board retreat in December 2023, records show. That amount could be approved by Roberts without board approval, a spokesperson said.
Roberts included on his original resume for the Des Moines position that he was an executive leadership coach at Lively Paradox and had been since its inception, as he hopped from one district position to another across four states. Price co-authored two books with Roberts and wrote the foreword for another, promoting him as a former Olympian and inspiring educator known for turning around schools.
“I just find Dr. Roberts to be one of the finest leaders I’ve ever met,” Price said in an interview after Roberts' arrest, when he allegedly fled from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and illegally possessed a firearm. “Calm under pressure, leading with empathy, mission driven and focused and just able to bring people along."
As Roberts changed jobs, Price and Lively Paradox followed behind getting new clients, the AP found.
Price’s clients have included a range of corporations and government agencies, her curriculum vitae shows. But for the ones where Roberts has been employed, the school districts she listed as clients appear to be located exclusively in Kansas and Missouri.
In a 2021 video posted on Instagram, Roberts joined Price to celebrate the five-year anniversary of Lively Paradox. She recalled targeting St. Louis Public Schools for business for the new firm when Roberts served as the network superintendent.
“Your district was one of the ones that I was like, ‘OK, I got to get them as a client’,” Price said. “But I went through the same RFP process everybody else did.”
Roberts said, with his district position and Lively Paradox affiliation, they made St. Louis among the first “to take on the work of becoming a culturally responsive district."
It’s unclear how much Price was paid by the district, but records show she received one payment for thousands of dollars for a 2017 presentation. She also conducted a workshop there in February 2018, her curriculum vitae shows.
After Roberts became an administrator at Aspire Public Schools in Oakland, that public charter school system paid Price at least $8,300 for services, according to a disbursement report covering part of 2019.
Price provided leadership training to the Millcreek Township School District in Pennsylvania in 2020 and 2021, while Roberts was superintendent, according to her curriculum vitae.
She said there was no impropriety in her work at Roberts’ districts, “just a long-standing commitment to mission-driven work and empathetic leadership.”
St. Louis Public Schools, Aspire Public Schools and Millcreek Township School District didn't respond to requests for comment.
Price recalled that Roberts was “dressed impeccably” when they met in 2014 at a North Carolina airport. She was working then at a leadership firm where she focused on diversity and inclusion.
Price credited Roberts with teaching her about how education was different than corporate fields she had worked in. They discussed his idea that, rather than firing unproductive subordinates, education leaders should give them every chance to develop.
Price said they kept in touch. In 2016, she was fired and founded Lively Paradox, in part to focus on providing training to urban school leaders.
Roberts was with her from the beginning. In 2017, the two co-authored, “The Power of Seven Second Chances,” their vision for managing schools with compassion.
They later co-authored “Dangerous Indifference: The Case for Culturally Responsive Leadership,” calling for leaders to embrace and understand differences. Price wrote the foreword for Roberts’ next book, “Radical Empathy.”
Price said the books, self-published and available for purchase online, didn’t “really have great sales” because Roberts mostly ordered them to give away at conferences.
She said the two worked closely for years to coach school leaders and transform organizations.
It’s unclear how much outside income Roberts received. Lively Paradox advertises a two-day “high performance workshop” for $38,975, keynote presentations for $15,000, and coaching packages for $9,995.
Their collaboration has continued with Roberts behind bars. Price said on Sep. 29 she was told by Roberts' wife to move forward with publishing a book called “Unshakeable,” a compilation of Roberts’ inspirational messages to Des Moines schools.
Price said she knew nothing about his immigration status and was shocked by his arrest.
When he was hired in Des Moines in 2023, board members were aware of Roberts’ outside work. His contract, which included an annual salary of $286,716 this year, allowed him to “undertake occasional consulting or speaking engagements, writing, lecturing, or other professional endeavors” with the board chair’s approval.
The sole agenda item for the meeting called for Sept. 29, 2023 included Roberts’ recommendation to award $116,000 to Lively Paradox and another firm for professional development.
The document said the district evaluated four vendors and Roberts made the recommendation that the two “best met the district’s needs." The expenses would come from federal funding intended to improve school leaders' performance.
District procurement manager JoAnne Khounlo-Philavanh discovered that Lively Paradox listed Roberts as part of its team, district spokesperson Phil Roeder said. She and district chief financial officer Shashank Aurora met with Roberts to discuss the conflict of interest, he said.
Roberts wrote board members that the meeting was no longer necessary after he "received another update from the finance team.”
The board's current chair, Jackie Norris, was a board member at the time and said district staff told her about concerns of a conflict of interest and they were addressed with Roberts. She added, “I strongly feel that a review is needed of all expenditures related to the former superintendent.”
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Foley reported from Iowa City, Iowa.
