Los Angeles Unified School District, Superintendent

Thirty-nine Los Angeles Unified schools were recently named National Merit Awards winners by the Magnet Schools of America, breaking the district’s prior record of 16 schools, and bond projects valued at approximately $6.6 billion are underway at nearly 1,000 schools. Carvalho took the reins as superintendent of the nation’s second-largest school district in February last year. He spent 14 years as superintendent of the Miami-Dade County Public Schools; he came to South Florida from Portugal at age 17, then worked his way up from a science and math teaching job.

YEARS ON THE LA500: 2