Hawaii’s incoming education chief says she’s a school reformer who is committed to narrowing achievement gaps — though she’s also garnered some criticism in districts she’s led in the past.
Hawaii’s incoming education chief says she’s a school reformer who is committed to narrowing achievement gaps — though she’s also garnered some criticism in districts she’s led in the past.
Christina Kishimoto, the superintendent of Gilbert Public Schools in Arizona, was selected last week to serve as the next superintendent of the state Department of Education. She starts the position Aug. 1 on a three-year contract and is slated to earn $240,000 per year.
She is replacing Kathryn Matayoshi, a Hilo native who’s held the role since 2010. Last year, the state Board of Education opted not to renew Matayoshi’s contract for another term. Matayoshi’s last salary was $200,000 per year.
Kishimoto has Hilo ties: Members of her ex-spouse’s extended family reside in Hilo and operate a small business downtown. A family member on Thursday, who requested not to be named, confirmed the ties and said they wished her well.
“When she comes to Hilo, all the cousins here, we always take good care of them,” the family member said.
Kishimoto also said during a press conference with Oahu reporters earlier this month — when she was one of two finalists for the job — that Hawaii “is a place we know and love” and “it would be great to be grounded with family.”
As the DOE’s leader, Kishimoto will manage about 175,000 students and a $1.9 billion operating budget. That’s roughly four times the size of Gilbert, an affluent district in the Phoenix area which has about 38,000 students and a $305 million operating budget.
In Arizona, Kishimoto is known as an advocate of traditional schools over charter schools and even launched a campaign to promote traditional public school education, said Alex Nardone, Kishimoto’s longtime chief of staff.
A high number of Arizona students attend charter schools, which some say is hampering enrollment in traditional schools. In Hawaii, that issue largely hasn’t come up, Sione Thompson, executive director of the state Public Charter School Commission, said Thursday, adding he’s met with Kishimoto who “immediately acknowledged it’s a very different model in Hawaii” and he was overall impressed by her “understanding and sensitivity to the local culture.”
In Gilbert, Kishimoto also started a districtwide student senate aimed at giving students a governing voice, Nardone said, adding that Kishimoto has a teenage daughter and working with high-schoolers “comes naturally to her.”
She’s also known as a technology proponent: During that Oahu press conference, Kishimoto said she helped deliver 50,000 Chromebooks into the Arizona district’s schools.
“Lots of students (in Gilbert) come from families with computers and hot spots, but others don’t,” Nardone said. “So leveling that playing field is very important to her.”
Irene Mahoney-Paige, Gilbert’s director of communications, said Kishimoto helped “bring the district together” in a time of “a lot of changeover.” Arizona media outlets reported at the time several administrative-level employees quit shortly before Kishimoto began.
“Gilbert wasn’t the most cohesive district, and she’s really turned that around,” Mahoney-Paige said. “She was really focused on bringing everyone together.”
But Kishimoto also appears to have opponents in Gilbert, where she’s the topic of multiple posts on a blog that touts itself as opposed to “financial shenanigans, management behind closed doors &wrongdoing” in the district.
Kishimoto told Oahu reporters that controversy stems from tensions between “a very conservative right” in Gilbert and “pressure to start innovating and changing practice.” She said she’s spent her time focusing on students rather than adults “who want to disrupt” and her record “speaks for itself.”
Kishimoto’s prior superintendent post, from 2011-14 in Hartford Public Schools, a 22,000-student district in Connecticut, also appears to have had some controversy. She received negative marks in a 2012 job performance review which critiqued her for poor communication and making minimal student progress, according to an article in the Hartford Courant.
The Hartford school board reportedly thought they weren’t getting enough information from Kishimoto about contracts and other matters to make board decisions, according to another Courant article. In 2013, the board unanimously turned down her request for a contract extension. The Courant also reports some community members at the time felt they weren’t included in Kishimoto’s decisions. For example, Kishimoto reportedly proposed to move adult education classes to a different location in Connecticut without speaking to students directly about the proposed move.
Kishimoto said at the time the negative review in Connecticut was not “an accurate reflection of the work done under my leadership.”
She told Oahu reporters this month that Hartford was “a high-poverty district with lots of challenges.” She called herself a “bold leader” who left the district “in good hands.”
She said on her resume to the Hawaii BOE that she helped close Hartford’s achievement gap by one-third. She also started a school-choice program in Hartford that allowed parents to send students to any school in the district.
“You cannot go into a position like that and lead without having bold leadership and being able to say there are things that you’re going to be attacked for,” Kishimoto told reporters, adding the district was “neglected for a very long time. “… I did bold work there, and I certainly saw the rewards of that.”
In a letter to the BOE search committee, Kishimoto called the state DOE’s size a “unique opportunity.”
A total of 92 applicants applied for her job. Several people criticized Kishimoto in written testimony pointing to her previous controversies and critiquing her lack of experience leading a system as large as Hawaii’s, and the lack of local candidates overall.
Hawaii Island BOE member Pat Bergin, part of the superintendent search committee, said Thursday the board is “very much aware of all the concerns raised” about Kishimoto and “we’ve completely vetted her.”
“We’ve researched every single complaint that came through,” Bergin said.
Bergin called Kishimoto an “innovator” who is hoped to take Hawaii’s school system “to another level.”
“I want to be really clear that’s not a criticism of the current superintendent,” Bergin said. “I think she’s done an awesome job. But I think it’s time for some new perspectives on how we can do better for our children, and I think (Kishimoto) is … bringing a new perspective to how we might look at educating our children.
“Everything we’ve been hearing her say is very student-focused and supportive of teachers and she wants to do exactly what the board has been promoting.”
Kishimoto did not respond to a request for an interview.
Email Kirsten Johnson at kjohnson@hawaiitribune-herald.com.