Northlands deputy principal Randolph Benjamin is considering suing the Education Department.

Mr. Benjamin revealed this to The Royal Gazette on the heels of news that three teachers with a total of more than 50 years of experience will be the first deputy principals of CedarBridge Academy.

Education Minister Jerome Dill yesterday announced that Berkeley Institute first assistant and supervisor of senior students Carlos Symonds, social studies education officer John Walsh, and Somerset Primary principal Kalmar Richards will take up their new posts at senior secondary school which is scheduled to open in September at Prospect.

He also announced that Berkeley Institute's first assistant Levyette Robinson and deputy principal Stanfield Smith will be second in command at Berkeley which is to be the Island's other senior secondary school.

And Mr. Dill named Dena Lister, Earl Hart, Olga Stovell, Gareth Davies, and Derek Tully as the future deputy principals of Sandys Secondary, Warwick Secondary, Dellwood, Whitney Institute, and St. George's Secondary, respectively. All but Mrs. Lister and Mrs. Stovell held deputy posts at the schools which are scheduled to become middle schools in September.

Mrs. Lister is Sandys learning support teacher in English, mathematics and history while Mrs. Stovell is the first assistant at Northlands Secondary.

Government has taken out a full-page advertisement in today's paper to acknowledge the new appointees and their contributions to education.

"It is my hope that we can now move forward into the final stages of the process of restructuring in harmony, without disagreement,'' Mr. Dill said, referring to a recent dispute between the Education Department and the Bermuda Union of Teachers over the department's hiring practices for the top posts.

The Department and BUT locked horns last September when education officials told applicants for the posts they would have to complete a standardised test and personality profile to be considered.

The BUT -- along Mr. Benjamin -- called for the tests to be scrapped, complaining they were given insufficient notice about the tests and questioning the Ministry's motives.

The union also filed a grievance against Education Permanent Secretary Marion Robinson and Chief Education Officer Joseph Christopher, accusing them of breaching the Collective Bargaining Agreement and teachers' terms and conditions of employment.

But the Ministry maintained that the tests, from Personnel Services, were one of several tools it was using to select the most suitable candidates for the posts.

Last December, as the two sides were scheduled to go to arbitration over the matter, the Ministry agreed to forfeit arbitration, scrap the results of the tests, and talk with the BUT through a combined consultative committee.

As a result of this applicants -- including Mr. Benjamin who had never been interviewed -- had to go through a new interviewing process.

But speaking yesterday from the US where he was undergoing medical treatment, Mr. Benjamin told The Royal Gazette the interviewing process was "cosmetic''.

Convinced that at least two of the appointments had already been made before he was interviewed, Mr. Benjamin said he was disappointed with the procedure and planned to examine his options which included suing the Education Department.

"I was denied from being part of that process since September, 1996 when they omitted me from the interviewing process,'' he said.

"I applied to one place so it leaves me out of any administrator post in teaching. I feel like a two-star general being relegated to a private.

"My immediate option will be to sue. There are a lot things that happened with this process. They have diminished my capability to earn. I've been paid at a deputy principal scale for the past 20 years. For me it is like starting over.'' Mr. Benjamin, who also noted that he had a family to support and a new mortgage to pay, admitted that he would consider settling for early retirement if he was offered an "attractive'' severance package.

But first, the veteran teacher said, he planned to obtain a copy of his last evaluation which verified his "outstanding'' performance.

"None of the people they (education officials) have talked about have my experience,'' he stressed, "and I don't think they have better recommendations than I have.''