Six Pomona superintendent candidates to face board members, staff, public

POMONA -- Six applicants seeking to become Pomona Unified School District's superintendent of schools next week will be in the city.

 

Of the six applicants invited to interview, five are from California and one is from Nevada.

 

"The quality of these six finalists is very good," said Jim Huge, a search consultant working with Pomona Unified school board members. "There are some really stellar people here."

 

Fifteen qualified people completed applications, Huge said.

 

Applicants will go through a series of interviews on Monday and Tuesday with school board members, district labor groups, school administrators, district staff and district residents. 

 

Public forums will be offered both days to give people a chance to meet three applicants each day.

 

Forms will be available after each forum that members of the public can use to provide comments on the strengths and weaknesses of the applicants, Huge said.

 

The information will be compiled and presented to school board members before Wednesday when they have a meeting, he said.

 

Board members have the option of inviting one to three applicants for a second round of interviews; going out to see them in their current jobs or simply select one person they wish to negotiate with, Huge said.

 

Monday's group of applicants consists of Brian Centeno, Edna Davis-Herring and James Hammond.

 

On Tuesday Robert Alfaro, David Linzey and Richard Martinez will interview.

 

The candidates:

 

Brian Centeno 

Centeno is past deputy superintendent of curriculum and instruction of the Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District.

 

Centeno, who has family in Southern California, said he is impressed with Pomona Unified and the improvement it has made in increasing Academic Performance Index scores.

 

"This is a school district that is absolutely on the move," he said.

 

In addition he likes the work the district has been doing to empower parents and prepare them to be advocates for their children  while the district gains greater parental involvement.

 

"That is the sort of thing all districts should be doing because it's substantial," he said, adding it's a critical piece in students' education.

 

Centeno said something he would like to do if he becomes superintendent is talk with the community. 

 

"We go back out to the public and talk about the mission and the vision for the district," he said. 

 

"If we've identified the mission, what will it look like in 10 years?," Centeno said.

 

Leading a successful school district isn't easy, especially in the current financial climate, but it can happen if parents, residents, business and others work together, he said. 

 

Edna Davis-Herring 

Davis-Herring headed the Rialto Unified School District for about 6 1/2 years before announcing her departure following the November 2008 election.

 

Her tenure in Rialto was contentious.

 

Davis-Herring's experience includes teaching in various Inland Empire school districts along with serving as assistant principal and principal. She held administrative positions in Colorado and Louisiana before returning to lead the Rialto district.

 

Davis-Herring said he has studied data on Pomona Unified and sees an urban school district with a population and challenges similar to those in Rialto. 

 

"It's almost like a sister school district," she said.

 

The district faces challenging financial times but leadership can't throw up its hands.

 

"It takes everybody to collaborate and to compromise and say 'We are here for the kids,'" she said. 

 

Although there four school board members who are running in this November's election she said she is not concerned.

 

"I'm coming in with a tremendous amount of wisdom and knowledge," Davis-Herring said.

 

Davis-Herring said she can "bring Pomona out of that political arena" where politics may interfere in doing what is best for children. 

 

 

James Quezon Hammond 

Hammond is superintendent of the Davis Joint Unified School District and before that served as a superintendent in Tukwila, Wash. 

 

He's been a counselor, a middle school teacher and a principal in Washington state.

 

Pomona Unified caught Hammond's attention after former Superintendent Thelma Melendez de Santa Ana was tapped by President Barack Obama to serve in his administration.

 

Hammond is familiar with the area having grown up in Whittier and briefly attended Cal Poly Pomona. 

 

If he became Pomona Unified superintendent, "It puts me in a region I'm very fond of," he said.

 

Hammond, who has led the Davis district since 2007, is a commuter spending weekdays in Davis and returning to Southern California on weekends to be with his wife and children.

 

Although he's currently working in a more affluent district with high-performing schools, Hammond said he has worked in districts with diverse populations and were students have more needs.

 

"I feel blessed to have worked in both ends of the spectrum," he said.

 

Melendez de Santa Ana left a strong foundation to build on, he said.

 

Pomona Unified, like all other school districts in the state, is facing challenging times. 

 

"Pomona is very attractive even with its challenges," he said. 

Robert Alfaro 

Alfaro, an area superintendent for the Clark County School District in Las Vegas, could not be reached for comment. 

 

Alfaro began his career as a migrant education teacher in Plainview, Texas. He taught middle school in Texas schools and worked his way up to principal and finally superintendent of a small, rural and economically disadvantaged school district in Premont, Texas.

 

From there he headed to San Antonio, where he was an area superintendent for the San Antonio Independent School District.

 

He served in various capacities in San Antonio and from there moved to Clark County where he began working in 2005 starting out as region superintendent. 

David Linzey 

Linzey has been a teacher, counselor, assistant principal and principal. 

He served as principal of Diamond Ranch High School and left to work in Huntington Beach while his own son was in high school. 

 

He is chief academic officer and assistant superintendent for The Alliance for College-Ready Schools, a nonprofit that manages a number of charter schools in south and east Los Angeles within the Los Angeles Unified School District. 

 

Linzey said he is familiar with Pomona Unified, with many of its teachers and its staff.

 

Returning to the district would be "a natural progression of my career," he said.

 

During his tenure with The Alliance, several of the schools under its management have made significant advancement in raising their academic performance index scores, some going on to become California Distinguished Schools.

 

Linzey said he can bring that knowledge to Pomona Unified and combined with  the collaboration of parents and teachers help students prepare academically so they are ready to go to college.

 

"The parent community just wants what's best for kids. I think I really do bring about success for kids," he said. 

Richard Martinez

Martinez is Pomona Unified's interim superintendent and has been with the district since 2001 starting in pupil resources and going on to serve in different capacities.

 

Prior to moving into the interim superintendent's post, Martinez was as assistant superintendent overseeing the pupil and community services division, which includes areas such as special education, adult education, alternative education, after-school programs and community and employee relations. 

 

Three years ago, Martinez applied for the job of superintendent.

 

"At that time, the board made the right decision in selecting Thelma. She was the right person at the time and I say that not because Thelma is a friend," he said. "At the time, the district needed someone from the outside who was healing for the district." 

 

Martinez said he came to Pomona seeking to use the skills he developed over the course of his career to serve a district that resembles Montebello Unified, where he started his education career in 1989. 

 

Martinez said he'd like to provide Pomona students the same types of opportunities students in other more affluent areas have by providing the tools to empower them and their parents to overcome barriers.

 

Even though the district faces great challenges "I believe in working together. I don't work unilaterally," he said. 

Working together -- parents, labor groups, businesses and clergy -- the district will weather the challenging times ahead, he said.