Superintendent Brian McDonald Talks About His Resignation, Calls It a “Bittersweet Moment”

Superintendent Brian McDonald’s last day in the Pasadena Unified District is June 30.

“We’ve done a lot of good work over the years to improve student outcomes and to improve the standing of the district and the community,” McDonald said on Thursday.

“And so obviously this is a bittersweet moment for me,” he said. “It’s bitter in the sense that I walk away from the work that I love to do. I walk away from a group of people that I’ve worked with for so many years that are amazing, but by the same token, I walk away after having led through the pandemic and all of the difficulties of the job, knowing that I won’t have that level of stress anymore.”

In May, McDonald was announced as a finalist for a job in Columbus, Ohio, but the district opted to hire in-house.

McDonald came to the district as Chief Academic Officer in October 2011 after an extensive career in the Houston Independent School District in Texas. He served in leadership positions in the elementary and secondary levels and held several positions in central administration, including as school improvement officer.

McDonald became interim superintendent in 2014 after Jon Gundry left the district.

“I have mixed emotions about everything because I’ve put 12 school years into this district,” McDonald told Pasadena Now. “My kids have gone through the school system except for the last two. My middle daughter just graduated from high school.”

But McDonald’s exit is also tough to swallow for the longtime educator.

McDonald fought to bring stability to the district. As the Chief
Academic Officer, he had the task of putting in place a robust instructional infrastructure, meaning a robust curriculum instruction, professional development department.

He also wrote a curriculum that was aligned to the state standards, put all of the testing components in place, ensured that there was an effective professional development model.

“In our case, we would provide face-to-face professional development, but we would also provide job embedded support to the teachers at the sites through the use of instructional coaches,” he said.

During his time in the district he also worked to improve the standing of the schools in the district.

According to McDonald when he arrived in the district, there were just a handful of schools that were attractive to families that everybody wanted to get into.

“I would say now the majority of our schools are attractive to families. We’ve expanded the dual language program from just Spanish and Mandarin at two sites to now Spanish, Mandarin,
French, and Armenian, and multiple sites. We’ve also expanded our linked learning or career-teamed academies across the district.”

McDonald also closed the achievement gap in the City’s graduation rate, and continued to fight to close the perception gap – the way community and potential parents perceive the schools to be and what’s actually happening in those schools.

“When you think about the amazing work that’s happening at John Muir under Principal Gray, the enrollment is going up. There is a much more diverse student body in place. I think this points to the fact that as a school system, we are improving, we are becoming more attractive to families. I think if we continue to build on that, continue to focus on student academic outcomes, we will eventually get there.”

McDonald would not discuss interactions with the board or what led to his removal during this interview.

But McDonald had his critics as well.

Some felt McDonald has constantly focused on bringing affluent white families back to the district, but he claims that was not the case.

When McDonald arrived in Pasadena, enrollment hovered at 18,500. Today the district has about 14,000 students and several schools have been closed.

“I think there’s this misconception that my primary focus is on increasing enrollment and bringing affluent families and white families back to the district.

“No. The fact of the matter is that when we continue to
decline enrollment, we lose funding,” McDonald said. “Therefore, we lose the resources that we need in order to help our traditionally underserved kids in the community. In addition to that, the research is very clear that when you have segregated schools, no matter the resources that you pour into these schools,
they tend not to improve. When you have a diverse, robust campus, then all kids benefit from it. Not just kids living in poverty or kids of color, but also more affluent kids, white kids, Asian kids, everybody benefits.”

McDonald said his focus was on stabilizing enrollment and to stop the bleeding.

“I still believe that can be done because while we might not be able to compete with some of the private schools, I do believe we should be able to compete with at least the charter schools.

“And so if we’re able to attract families who send their kids to charter schools, then that should stop the bleeding, so to speak. That’s a lot of kids to lose.”

“But also now we are seeing an increase in Armenian students, because of the Armenian Academy.”

“We have to prepare kids for the society at large, and we have a diverse society. And so if we were to have a segregated school system akin to Little Rock, that has become re-segregated, I don’t see how that benefits our kids.”