Jim Sweeney, the superintendent of the 52,000-student Sacramento City Unified School District in California, has announced his resignation.
Mr. Sweeney, 65, has served as Sacramento’s superintendent since October 1997, when he took the job after seven other people had held the position within the previous six years. During his tenure as superintendent, Mr. Sweeney brought national acclaim to the once-blighted district as it showed consistent gains in state test scores.
Chuck McCully, 65, who served as superintendent of California’s Fresno Unified School District from 1991 through 1997, will serve as interim superintendent while the city school board looks for a permanent replacement.
Kathleen Kennedy Townsend has been named the first president of Operation Respect: “Don’t Laugh at Me,” a nonprofit organization founded in 2000 to help promote respect, good citizenship, and safety in schools.
Ms. Townsend, 52, who served as the lieutenant governor of Maryland from 1995 to 2003 and lost a bid for governor last year, helped create the first statewide office of character education in Maryland.
The New York City-based Operation Respect provides a character-building curriculum and training workshops to educators nationwide. Ms. Townsend will be based in Baltimore.
Helen S. Blank, who served as the director of the child-care and - development division of the Washington-based Children’s Defense Fund for 24 years, was recently named a senior fellow with the National Women’s Law Center.
Ms. Blank, 58, left the Children’s Defense Fund in April.
She will work on projects for the Washington-based center that focuses on child care and early education.
—Catherine A. Carroll & Joetta L. Sack
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