C
rystal Hill is the first black female superintendent to permanently lead Charlotte- Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) in North Carolina, the 16th largest school district in the U.S.
and the second largest in the state with the largest transportation operations. Hill, who’s relatively young for such a prestigious
position and a mother of two girls, was named superin- tendent in July 2023 after serving in an interim capacity for the previous seven months. She is responsible for more than 141,000 students enrolled in the district’s 184 schools and nearly 20,000 employees. What’s even more impressive is 100,000 of the students enrolled ride the school bus to and from school, including Hill’s youngest daughter, a sophomore in high school. Hill joined the district in May 2022 to serve as the chief
of the staff. But after working for two superintendents in a nine-month span, she answered the call to hold down the fort until a new superintendent was named. She not- ed that she had no desire to serve in that role long-term, but after being named interim, she “absolutely loved it.” Her grandfather is an educator and inspired her to forge
a similar career path. He and her grandmother moved in with Hill and her mother when she was baby. “Growing up from 6 months old, it was always, ‘We’re go-
ing to read,’” recalling her “Dick and Jane” children’s books. She was also attending preschool, where the local
high school program planned lessons for the younger students. Hill said she attended that school as both a preschooler and a high school student. As a leader, Hill said she is very collaborative, noting
that it’s rare for her to make an individual decision. “I know that ultimately I am the final decision maker,
but there’s not too many times I will make a unilateral decision,” she said, adding she prefers making decisions with a team perspective. “I operate best when I believe in hiring the very best people. I try to hire people that are smarter than me and are definitely skilled in their area of expertise, and I think that’s the key to having a great team and running a great organization. I’d probably say building a team is definitely my strength, but I also like to have visibility, not necessarily get into the weeds, but I like to have visibility across the entire organization.” Unchartered territory remains for all superintendents:
The potential elimination of the U.S. Department of Edu- cation (DOE). At press time, half of all federal department positions—1,300 employees—were cut. Hill, like many superintendents, is navigating what that might look like from a school district standpoint. She shared that for the fiscal year 2024-2025,
Charlotte-Mecklenburg was allotted $153 million in federal funds, most of which is spent on staffing. In peril, she said, is the $52 million in Title I money the district uses for school allocations, supporting students not on grade level, preschool students and multilingual learners. “If there’s any cuts to that, we would have to look dis-
trictwide and take a scan across our entire organization to make the determination on where we would need to compensate for any of those cuts,” she said. Hill added that she’s committed to preserving the stu-
dent experience and would look at local funding sources as well. She noted that predicting outcomes is difficult, but the district is prepared if the cuts take effect. Meanwhile, Elizabeth Robinson, superintendent for Po-
cono Mountain School District in Pennsylvania, explained that the goal of transportation is to improve efficiency on all school routes, in terms of length of time students spend on the bus and to keep open lines of communica- tions with parents and guardians. She shared that funding cuts or freezing of DOE funds, “would impact transpor- tation of homeless students, summer school programs, extended school year programs for special education students, and after school tutoring programs.” For Madison Metropolitan School District in Wisconsin,
federal funding eliminations or reductions have the poten- tial to create financial hardships. Joe Gothard, who was the 2024 National Superintendent of the Year, said his district is underfunded by $66.4 million for services it must provide under Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. “Providing increased financial support for schools that
enroll large percentages of historically underserved stu- dents is one way we provide direct support to students and families,” said Gothard. “Potentially changing the amount we are reimbursed through our USDA nutrition services program means that districts like Madison may need to generate new funding sources to reimburse the costs for meals for students who qualify for free or reduced-priced meals.” ●
Walter Gonsoulin, Jr., of Jefferson County Schools in Alabama was named the 2025 National Superintendent of the Year last month. Hear from him on Episode 248 of the School Transportation Nation podcast, and read about him and the other finalists at
stnonline.com/tag/superintendent.
www.stnonline.com 41
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