The interim principal of a Lower East Side gifted and talented school cancelled a “State of the School” address scheduled for last night that had been intended to help resolve a conflict with parents critical of her leadership.

A week after seven members of the Parent Teacher Association for the school resigned during a heated meeting that ended with police being called to eject parents, the principal of the New Explorations Into Science, Technology and Math school, Olga Livanis, sent an e-mail to the school’s parents calling for a “cooling-off period.”

“We cannot allow another meeting with the negative atmosphere that marked the PTA meeting last Thursday to happen again,” she said in the email. “We all love our children too much to bring such high levels of hostility into the halls of our beloved school.”

At the beginning of last week, Ms. Livanis asked parents to send in questions on index cards that she would answer at the “State of the School” address. After the PTA meeting last Thursday, which, according to some parents, devolved into a shouting match that caused some children present to cry, Ms. Livanis decided to cancel her address. In her e-mail to parents, she said that instead of giving a speech, she would begin to answer parent questions in letters to be sent out over the next few days. She said she would reschedule the meeting for a later date.

“I wanted to have everybody together,” she said in an interview. “I believe in transparency, I believe in the right to disagree, but I don’t believe in chaotic disorder.”

In her e-mail, Ms. Livanis also asked parents to refrain from talking to the press, saying coverage had exacerbated the ongoing conflict between parents and the administration.

The former PTA president, Emily Armstrong, said in an interview yesterday that she was frustrated by the last-minute cancellation of the meeting.

“I think it’s outrageous,” she said. “I think this was a damage control thing because there were so many questions.”

The PTA members that resigned led a lawsuit last year to prevent the city from installing a charter school in the same building as NEST+m. The lawsuit was dropped when the charter school was located elsewhere, but the principal, who had a close relationship with the PTA, was replaced.

In their resignation letter, PTA leaders cited Ms. Livanis’s refusal to meet with parents as one of their primary reasons for quitting.