Bert Carter, President and CEO of Willie Ross School for the Deaf, to Retire
LONGMEADOW — Officials of Willie Ross School for the Deaf (WRSD) announced that Bert Carter will retire at the end of the current school year, effective June 30, ending a 13-year tenure as head of the school.
Carter led the school after serving as the top executive at the Austine School for the Deaf in Vermont. He succeeded former WRSD President and CEO Lou Abbate.
“We want to celebrate all of Bert Carter’s accomplishments as we announce his retirement from the school,” said Claire Sanders, chair of the Willie Ross board of trustees. “We appreciate all that Bert has done for the students, staff, and the larger Willie Ross School community over the past 13 years. We are on a sound footing, and the school is strong, largely due to the efforts of Bert and his leadership. Under his tenure, our school population has grown, he successfully led two capital fund drives that improved our facilities and student areas, and the school’s outreach program that serves public school districts dramatically grew. He also maintained the strong relationship we have built with the East Longmeadow public school system, where many or our students are based as part of our mainstreaming program.
“Bert also diversified the board of trustees, adding the first deaf chair of the board, George Balsley II, who served until his passing in early 2025,” Sanders added. “As a deaf person myself, now serving as chair, I appreciate that Bert brought the voice of the deaf community into all that we do in support of the Willie Ross School.”
According to Carter, “this was the best job I have ever had. My first impression of the school was that the school and staff were great and the partnership with the East Longmeadow schools was excellent. One of my goals coming into leadership at Willie Ross was to strengthen the relationship with the deaf community. I am proud of the work we accomplished over the past 13 years, including the launching of a strategic plan, and feel the Willie Ross School is in a better place and well-positioned for future success.
“As I retire to spend more time with my family and to enjoy my beloved Cape Cod, I can say without hesitation that I have been fortunate to work in the world of the deaf,” Carter added. “After 45 years in the field of deaf education, I can say that I am eternally grateful for the deaf community allowing me to be in their world.”
Carter’s road to a career in deaf education started with an internship at the Boston School for the Deaf while in graduate school at Lesley College in Cambridge. While pursuing a PhD in deafness rehabilitation from New York University, he accepted a position as program director at the Connecticut-based Family Services Woodfield, now known as Lifebridge, as director of Deaf Services. During his tenure there, he grew the program from one full-time employee to 90 employees. He then went on to become president and CEO of Austine School for the Deaf, where he served until his hiring at WRSD in 2013.
During Carter’s tenure at WRSD, the school’s outreach program has more than doubled; a more than $2 million renovation of the school’s Longmeadow campus was completed, transforming its Sidney M. Cooley Administration Building; and a partnership with Bay Path University was formed, where the university houses WRSD’s early education programming in renovated former student dorm space to address the needs of a growing early childhood education program.
Sanders said the board of trustees has engaged outside executive recruitment counsel to work with the board to identify a new leader for the school. The process is expected to conclude in the spring of 2027.