‘the
The story of a superintendent’s
promising instructional reforms
in San Diego being sabotaged
by an inability to communicate
BY RICHARD LEE COLVIN
A
lan Bersin
was
U.S. attorney for the Southern Dis
trict of California when, in 1998, he was tapped
to become one of the nation’s
first
nontraditional
superintendents. As one of his
first
decisions, he
hired Tony Alvarado, a tough, fiery New York City
educator who, despite some well-publicized lapses
in judgment, had achieved a national reputation for
improving a swath of schools by investing heavily
in coaching and professional development for teachers and
principals.
Bersin gave Alvarado free rein to do the same thing on a
larger scale in San Diego, and the
two
men also put in place a
comprehensive,
ambitious
plan designed to narrow the district’s
enormous achievement gaps
and
reduce
its
dropout rate.
SEPTEMBER 2013 SCHOOL ADMINISTRATOR
37
