After ten years, the Baltimore City Public Schools is getting a new leader. On April 20, the school system announced that it had selected Jermaine Dawson, a career school administrator with experience in Philadelphia, Birmingham, Houston, Duval County Public Schools, Fulton County Schools, and Charter Schools USA.
Dawson – who is expected to officially start his job in Baltimore this summer – is taking the helm of the Baltimore school system at a time when the school district is struggling with chronic absenteeism, lagging test scores, and lackluster graduation rates.
With Dawson taking the helm in Baltimore, a city where nearly 90% of students struggle with math, his expertise as a "mathematician by training," could be key to ensuring more students don't need "remedial" math in college and are actually prepared for the rigors of a college degree.
Here are five essential facts about Dawson and his philosophy on education:
1. He was a math teacher
Dawson earned a master’s degree in mathematics education from Nova Southeastern University, a private nonprofit institution located in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and went on to become an elementary and middle school math teacher. While he views himself as a “mathematician by training,” his interest in math goes back to his childhood.
“When I think about my upbringing in mathematics, I’ve always had this love and passion for numbers,” Dawson said in an interview with WBAL-TV 11 News.
