Jean Desravines - Breakthrough Principals: A Step-by-Step Guide to Building Stronger Schools

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FIRST EDITION

For all the transformational school leaders with whom we have worked, who have inspired and informed us about what is truly possible for all children

Jean Desravines serves as chief executive officer of New Leaders, an innovative school reform organization that develops and supports highly effective leaders to turn around the nation's high-need public schools. He has more than fifteen years of leadership experience in education and community development, with a primary focus on improving outcomes for students in underserved communities. Before joining New Leaders, Jean served as senior counselor to the chancellor of New York City's public school system, the executive director for the Office of Parent and Community Engagement, chief of staff to the senior counselor for Education Policy, and director for Community Relations at the New York City Department of Education.

Jean serves as a board member for 100Kin10; America Achieves; his alma mater, St. Francis College; and St. Benedict's College Prep in Newark, New Jersey. He served on Governor Andrew M. Cuomo's Education Reform Commission and was been named to Forbes's Impact 30, recognizing the world's leading social entrepreneurs. Jean received a BA in history from St. Francis College and a Master's degree in Public Administration from New York University.

Jaime Aquino is the chief program officer for New Leaders. In this role, he oversees the design, development, and delivery for the organization's core programs, ensuring that participants acquire the essential leadership skills needed to build vibrant schools and advance student achievement. Prior to joining New Leaders, he held leadership positions in several major school districts, including deputy executive director for the Division of Instructional Support and local instructional superintendent for New York City, deputy superintendent of instruction for Los Angeles Unified School District, chief academic officer in Denver, and deputy superintendent in Hartford, Connecticut.

Jaime holds a PhD in curriculum and teaching from Fordham University. In 1990 he was named New York State Bilingual Teacher of the Year. In addition, he was featured in the videotape series Approaching the Vision of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Standards: A Videotape Series for Teacher Development.

Benjamin Fenton is cofounder and chief strategy officer at New Leaders. A recognized expert on the quality of principals, Ben leads New Leaders' human capital consulting initiatives, helping states and districts develop new policies and practices for principal evaluation and effectiveness. He is also responsible for the ongoing implementation of the New Leaders research agenda and programmatic evaluation. He co-led the development of New Leaders' Transformational Leadership Framework, identifying the school practices and principal actions found in high-gaining, high-poverty public schools.

Ben was a founding board member of Teach Plus, a nonprofit dedicated to retaining and developing great teachers who improve student achievement. He formerly worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company, focusing on marketing and operational efficiency. Ben is a graduate of Harvard College and the Harvard Business School, where he received the Fiske award for excellence in teaching in the Economics Department.

Lori Taliaferro Riddick is executive director of leadership development for Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD). In this role, she supports academic superintendents and aspiring academic superintendents by building individual and team capacity, facilitating successful implementation of the network and investment school strategy, and assessing the effectiveness and impact of each principal supervisor's work.

Prior to her work with CMSD, Lori was the executive director of policy and practice services at New Leaders. In that role, she managed the qualitative research project to identify the principal actions and school practices in schools that were realizing dramatic achievement gains, resulting in the Transformational Leadership Framework. Lori also developed and implemented evaluation tools for new principals and systems for multiple school districts, including the New Orleans Recovery School District and Newark Public Schools, and states, including Illinois and Louisiana. Based on these experiences, Lori created the New Leaders principal evaluation rubric as an example for other states and districts to use or adapt.

Lori received a BA in urban studies and an MS in education from the University of Pennsylvania.

Jill Grossman is a writer and researcher for New Leaders. She has conducted research for school districts and nonprofit organizations on principal training programs, school autonomy, and teacher teams. Before working in education policy, Jill spent fifteen years as an editor and writer for New York City news outlets, including