Johnson discusses the Marathon and her decision to resign.

Boston School Superintendent Carol Johnson announced today she will leave at the end of the school year, due in large part to her husband's death last month:

This has been a difficult decision, but as you aware, the loss of my husband and best friend Matthew last month has been life-altering for me and my entire family.

Johnson has served for six years:

We have improved our high school graduation rates and MCAS performance; we have brought hundreds of students back who had dropped out of school, and are closing achievement gaps. We have expanded academic support for our English Language Learners and students with disabilities, and we have increased the number of quality school choices through our turnaround, in-district charter and innovation schools.

Boston Public Schools officials formally released five possible plans for re-aligning assignment zones for elementary and middle-school students today, but promptly said three of the proposals - for 11 or 23 zones or pure neighborhood schools - were too extreme for the goals of ensuring quality education with a diverse student population.

The Globe reports School Superintendent Carol Johnson is now investigating whether Rodney Peterson, late of the O'Bryant School, abused his sick time - he may have even been marked as present even on the day he was being arraigned for choking and punching his wife.

At least three school officials used their city e-mail to encourage BPS employees to attend a weekend rally in support of School Superintendent Carol Johnson - under fire for the Rodney Peterson affair.

Over the Rodney Peterson affair.

The Dorchester Reporter talks to at-large Councilor John Connolly, who says the Rodney Peterson case - especially the revelation that Johnson did nothing to discipline him even after he pleaded guilty - is just the latest in a string of "bad decision

The Globe details how School Superintendent Carol Johnson did nothing after then O'Bryant co-headmaster Rodney Peterson pleaded guilty to domestic violence and applied for a new job in Memphis - and may have promised to keep that up as long as news didn't leak out (which it did). But the kicker to the whole thing is in the very last two paragraphs:

City and BTU negotiators last night threw up their hands and decided there's nothing more they can say to each other, so they'll be seeking state help to mediate a contract.

The declaration comes 21 months of negotiations; firefighters still hold the modern Boston record for going without a contract, at four years.

But plans to move Fenway High School somewhere, the Globe reports.

City Councilor John Connolly launched a scathing attack on Boston Public Schools this morning, charging the school system's cafeteria system is rife with waste, poor planning and a warehouse in Wilmington full of expired frozen food.

At a hearing this morning, Connolly charged students at 48 public schools were served frozen food past its expiration dates and that school food officials have so screwed up the food requisition process they were ordering frozen chicken patties even as the federal government was giving BPS chicken patties for free.