CEO/Superintendent, Chicago Public Schools

About Chicago Public Schools

Chicago Public Schools (CPS), the fourth-largest school district in the nation, is at a defining moment in its history as we seek a visionary leader to help shape our next chapter. Serving over 325,000 students across 634 schools with an annual budget just under $10 billion, CPS is a system of scale, complexity, and possibilities. Following a historic milestone in the fall of 2024, CPS is now governed by a newly structured hybrid Board of Education, comprised of both elected and appointed members. This means greater representation and voice from parents, students, and community to the district’s leadership. Together, our 21-member Board oversees 10 districts of the city and is actively seeking a bold, equity-driven, and innovative CEO/Superintendent to lead CPS into its next era.

We are proud to be home to some of the highest-performing schools in the nation and we have made measurable progress in critical areas, including academic recovery post-pandemic and rising graduation rates. We have launched an ambitious 5-year strategic plan, rooted in culturally relevant curriculum and restorative principles that are rigorous and engaging, so every student has joyful learning experiences.

And yet, our mission is far from complete. We are committed to closing opportunity gaps, especially for our Black and Latino students, supporting the needs of our vibrant and expanding immigrant communities, adding more students and families to our school enrollment, and ensuring that our highest-need schools receive the resources and supports required for transformative success.

About the CEO/Superintendent Role

The CEO/Superintendent is charged with carrying out the mission, vision, and strategic priorities established in partnership with the Board of Education. This role leads the day-to-day implementation of the district’s priorities, managing the leadership team that executes on the district’s vision, and setting the direction that will enable the district to realize its strategic plan. We are seeking a leader who is ready to think big, embrace innovation, collaborate, and build an equitable, student-centered future. This is a moment of extraordinary promise - and the chance to make a lasting impact on the lives of hundreds of thousands of students, families, and communities across Chicago.

Your Key Responsibilities

Ensure that every student experiences high-quality, joyful, and culturally responsive learning

• Advocate for and cultivate safe, engaging learning environments that fully support all of our students, including multilingual learners, students with disabilities, and students with diverse learning styles and needs.
• Prepare each and every one of our students for career and college by strengthening programming from PK-16, beginning with our earliest learners in PK4, all the way to high school graduation, and ensure that students graduate with credits for college and/or the skills and path to the career of their choice.
• Implement a clear and coherent plan that will fully actualize our five-year strategic plan . Identify successful programs already occurring and solidify or expand them. Mobilize action across board members, administrators, teachers, parents, students, civic, philanthropic, community organizations, labor partners, and state leadership in support of the strategic plan and our vision for student success.
• Invest in our youngest students through early childhood programming, with a particular goal of ensuring that all students learn to read confidently by the third grade.
• Lead the successful implementation of research-based instructional programs that address opportunity gaps, particularly for communities that have been historically underserved.

Steward financial stability and sustainability for CPS

• CPS faces very real structural financial challenges. The CEO/Superintendent will need to provide the CPS community with an honest and transparent understanding of the current state of CPS’s finances.
• Address our facilities footprint compared to our current student enrollment, and lead thoughtful and transparent consideration and planning to protect the district’s overall financial sustainability. This may include finding new innovative solutions, as well as difficult possibilities such as school closures, consolidations, or re-zonings.
• Secure education funding: fight for alternative revenue sources and/or state support to address pension problems and to ensure adequate funding for CPS. Manage complex financial strategies such as issuing bonds for infrastructure projects or securing grants to fund key initiatives.
• Build a financial plan and roadmap that includes investments in modernizing schools, improving technology, and supporting teachers.
• Analyze the CPS budget and identify inefficiencies, redundancies, and opportunities for reallocating funds toward critical areas like teacher support, infrastructure, and technology.
• Align resources with the needs of students. Prioritize funding for under-resourced schools, early childhood education, and mental health services, while ensuring that the district’s finances are balanced and sustainable.

Support, develop, and retain a strong leadership team to deliver on CPS’s vision and mission

• Attract, cultivate, manage and coach a strong, cohesive leadership team from senior leadership all the way to network chiefs and deputies. Ensure that these teams work in alignment to operationalize and deliver the district’s 5-year strategic plan.
• Create the conditions for staff to collaborate, seek support, feel valued, and be empowered to demonstrate their best work on behalf of the students they serve.
• Assess team and individual skills, identify development needs, and provide feedback and support to improve practice, build capacity, and maximize talent.
• Hold self and others accountable for high standards of performance, communication, collaboration and transparency toward the achievement of key goals and priorities.
• Work to ensure that the leadership of the district is representative of our student population.

Partner with our communities to guide and accelerate the work of the district

• Expand partnership and connection with our community by learning what matters to our students, families and communities, and using this insight to inform key decisions and enhance learning for each student.
• Cultivate trust among board members, district staff, teachers, leaders, and core stakeholders to establish a clear and compelling vision for purposeful engagement, rigorous academic experiences, and organizational effectiveness that has a direct and measurable impact on student outcomes.
• Build systems that enable stakeholders to meaningfully shape curriculum, teacher supports, wraparound services, student-centered school climates, meaningful parent engagement, and inclusive school leadership.
• Sustain productive relationships with our unions and employee associations in the district to amplify coherence, build shared understanding, and promote consistent communication.
• Engage the city’s dedicated community-based organizations, philanthropy, and business community to invest in and support the district’s vision for student success.

Support a diverse system of excellent schools in every Chicago neighborhood

• Operationalize a vision for world class, affirming, neighborhood public schools that are accessible to every family within walking distance of their home.
• Support and encourage collaboration and learning across the district’s impressive diversity of schools, including our community schools, magnet, specialized programs, arts, International Baccalaureate (IB) and other offerings.
• Ensure the ongoing authorization, evaluation, and effectiveness of the city’s charter schools.
• Address inequities in opportunities, systems, and programming offered across our schools.

Champion our schools by communicating transparently, and changing the narrative about our schools

• Increase dialogue and cooperation with key local, state, and national groups and organizations. Represent the district as needed at the local and state level to advocate for district resources and support for district success.
• Communicate and collaborate with members of the Board, advising the Board on initiatives and issues in the district; provide leadership to enable the Board to function effectively.
• Speak authentically with stakeholders about what is happening in the district - communicate with integrity and openness.
• Engage others as part of the CPS vision, in a way that inspires families to stay in the district, and invites new families to join or rejoin our schools.
• Navigate politically complex structures, relationships and dynamics to challenge ideas and enable thoughtful decisions and positive outcomes for students.

Core Competencies - the skills, values, and knowledge that you will bring with you to the role

Strong and Clear Communication

• Demonstrates strong communication and interpersonal skills; able to connect and engage with diverse stakeholders.
• Delivers difficult or complex messaging in a way that can be readily understood by various stakeholder groups.
• Leads with empathy and humility; listens to understand, and seeks feedback to improve communication and relationships.
• Engages in transparent decision making, sharing with stakeholders how their input informed final decisions.
• Maintains consistent visibility and ensures the organization’s accessibility to stakeholders.

Political Acumen

• Effectively assesses and navigates informal and formal power structures, both within the organization, and across local, regional, and national government structures.
• Considers the school system as part of a larger network of entities that must integrate and align for every Chicago resident to thrive; and is prepared to openly collaborate with other leaders and institutions as such.
• Works productively to resolve conflict while maintaining alliances and partnerships that are critical for overall district success.

Community-Centered Leadership

• Views families, students, staff and partners as assets; passionate about bringing in other voices, feedback and perspectives.
• Builds coalitions and fosters collaborative relationships with others that are impactful and sustainable.
• Believes that education must be grounded in both academic expertise and community wisdom, and has the skills and inclination to change policy, practice, and resource alignment in CPS and school operations to reflect this.
• Seeks out the voices of marginalized communities to ensure well-rounded and diverse input on key strategies.

Equity-Driven Leadership

• Understands the histories of harm, oppression, racism, and disinvestment that have shaped Chicago and CPS as it is today; and is committed to disrupting that legacy inside and outside the classroom.
• Displays the will and skill to interrupt inequitable processes, systems, and practices through intentional analysis and honest dialogue; goes beyond recognition of racial disparities and takes responsibility, action, and accountability to improve the experience and outcomes for students, staff and families.
• Fosters, promotes, and drives a culture of inclusion in the organization and commits to strengthen equitable practices in the district’s planning, prioritization and implementation of key initiatives.
• Creates authentic, meaningful relationships across lines of difference (race, ethnicity, gender, age, socioeconomic background, LGBTQIA+ status, etc.) both internally and externally.
• Demonstrates cultural fluency, responsiveness, and awareness while approaching the work with a strong equity lens to establish a culture of growth and a learning mindset around issues of equity and inclusion.

Innovation and Systems Perspective

• Thinks expansively; able to find new and innovative solutions to seemingly intractable challenges.
• Analyzes complex situations and data before making decisions, and then sets clear metrics for success, monitors progress and honestly acknowledges mistakes when something does not go as planned.
• Operates at a micro and macro level, paying acute attention to detail while balancing the overarching goals with detailed steps to achieve the district’s objectives and priorities.
• Effectively prioritizes competing demands, and willingly makes difficult decisions – and thoughtfully pushes back when necessary - in the best interest of the district as a whole.

Capacity Building and Team Champion

• Models and fosters conditions for professional growth and organizational learning through continuous feedback, honesty, and coaching.
• Empowers direct reports to provide frequent and open feedback regarding district practices and policies, and to elevate the impact the team’s work has on stakeholders.
• Supports a collaborative and healthy work environment with mutual respect to achieve ambitious goals.
• Models professional growth and learning through continuous feedback, honesty, reflection, and coaching.

Salary and Benefits

Salary for this integral leadership position is competitive, and commensurate with prior experience. In addition, a comprehensive benefits package will be included in the ultimate offer for the identified sole finalist. We look forward to discussing details with you as the interview process progresses.

Background and Experiences

• Significant experience working in the field of public education, with experience in a direct student-facing role strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated track record of improving student outcomes, ideally in an urban public school district setting.
• Experience addressing equity across a system of schools, with measurable and concrete improvements.
• Proven experiences building meaningful partnerships with community leaders and organizations. Experience in community, parent, and/or youth organizing is a plus.
• Administrative experience leading an organization matching the scale and complexity of an urban school system; including managing a budget and leadership team supporting multiple units or organizations.
• Successful experience working in diverse economic, multicultural, and multilingual communities and environments. Proven cultural-competence skills with a history of inclusive and relevant equity practices.
• Community school experience preferred.
• Deep understanding of the complexity of education systems and evidence of leading large scale change in urban public school contexts.
• Experience and successful track record of collaboration with labor unions and collective bargaining units.
• Experience working in conjunction with a board to identify priorities, establish goals, monitor progress, and produce outcomes in service to stakeholders.
• Must hold a valid Illinois Professional Educator License, with a Superintendent endorsement as issued by the Illinois State Board of Education, or an equivalent credential from another state.

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