The Poway Unified School District Wednesday announced the tentative hiring of the head of a district in Orange County as its new superintendent.
Marian Kim-Phelps, now the superintendent of the Westminster School District, will be the first minority and first female chief of Poway schools if her contract is approved by the Board of Education at a March 7 meeting.
She was selected out of a pool of 91 applicants to replace John Collins, according to the PUSD. Tony Apostle is running the district on an interim basis.
PUSD board President Michelle O’Connor-Ratcliff said Kim-Phelps “is an incredibly accomplished superintendent.”
“She has outstanding credentials and brings the experience and vision needed to lead the district and embrace the community,” O’Connor-Ratcliff said. “We are very excited to have her as our next superintendent.”
Under her leadership, the Westminster district established the first Vietnamese Dual Language Immersion Academy in California, a Spanish Dual Language Immersion Academy, a math and science magnet school, an academy for high-performing students and Orange County’s first computer science magnet school, according to the PUSD.
Last year, the Westminster School District was one of 13 in California to be named an Honor Roll District, a national program recognizing high- performing schools that improve the outcomes for students.
—City News Service