Alberto Carvalho Named New NYC Schools Chancellor

NEW YORK, NY — Alberto Carvalho, the current chief of Miami's public schools, will be the next chancellor of New York City's 1.1 million-student education system, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Wednesday. Carvalho will replace outgoing Chancellor Carmen Fariña, who announced her retirement in December.

Carvalho will be moving from the helm of the nation's fourth-largest school system to the largest. Since starting as superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools in 2008, he's expanded the district's curricular offerings and won it academic accolades, accoding to his online biography.

"Alberto Carvalho is a world-class educator with an unmatched track record of success," de Blasio said in a statement. "I am very confident that our extensive, national search has found New York City the best person to lead the nation’s largest school system into the future."

Carvalho will start his new job sometime in the next month, according to Politico New York, which first reported his appointment. The announcement was delayed because of the Feb. 14 school shooting in Parkland, Florida, Politico reported.

Carvalho has been named chancellor more than two months after Fariña said she would retire after four years leading the Department of Education under de Blasio. She came out of retirement to take the job in 2014 after more than four decades working in the city's school system.

De Blasio has said his next schools chancellor will be tasked with continuing the educational progress that Fariña achieved — driving graduation rates and test scores up and continuing to narrow gaps in achievement among students. He'll also play a role the continued rollout of the mayor's signature universal pre-kindergarten program, which is expanding to serve 3-year-olds.

He'll also face challenges, such as entrenched segregation and continued struggles over state funding. But Carvalho's background suggests he's capable of addressing some big issues facing city schools. He won Miami-Dade County Public Schools the 2012 Broad Prize for Urban Education, which honors high-performing districts with small achievement gaps for low-income and minority students.

Carvalho will be the latest new face to enter City Hall at the start of de Blasio's second term. The mayor named Phil Thompson his new deputy mayor for strategic policy initiatives last week.

(Lead image: Alberto Carvalho speaks at an awards ceremony in New York City in 2012. Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)