32 Facts About Michelle Rhee

Michelle Ann Rhee was born on December 25,1969 and is an American educator and advocate for education reform.

Michelle Rhee was Chancellor of District of Columbia Public Schools from 2007 to 2010.

Michelle Rhee began her career by teaching as a Teach for America corps member for three years in an inner city school, then founded and ran The New Teacher Project.

Michelle Rhee was raised in the Toledo, Ohio area and educated in public schools, through the sixth grade.

Michelle Rhee later earned a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University's John F Kennedy School of Government.

Michelle Rhee was assigned to Harlem Park Elementary School, one of the lowest-performing schools.

Michelle Rhee's "Teach For America" Training did not prepare her well to handle basic classroom management.

Michelle Rhee was so unprepared that in order to quiet down a class she taped children's mouths shut.

Michelle Rhee told The New York Times that those students had national standardized test scores that were initially at the 13th percentile but at the end of two years, the class was at grade level, with some students performing at the 90th percentile.

In 1997, Michelle Rhee began as the CEO of The New Teacher Project, a nonprofit that within ten years of its founding, trained and supplied urban school districts with 23,000 mid-career professionals wanting to become classroom teachers.

Kopp recruited Michelle Rhee serve as CEO while Kopp was the president of the not-for-profit's board of directors.

Critics noted that Michelle Rhee had no experience running a school system, and had not even been a principal.

Michelle Rhee had been highly recommended to Fenty by Joel Klein, the chancellor of the New York City public schools.

Michelle Rhee inherited a troubled system; there had been six school chiefs in the previous 10 years, students historically had below-average scores on standardized tests, and according to Michelle Rhee, only 8 percent of eighth graders were performing at grade level in mathematics.

Under this new agreement, Michelle Rhee fired 241 teachers, the vast majority of whom received poor evaluations, and put 737 additional school employees on notice.

Michelle Rhee contended that under her chancellorship, student achievement in the DC Public Schools greatly improved.

Education historian Diane Ravitch questioned the legitimacy of Michelle Rhee's results, alleging that "cheating, teaching to bad tests, institutionalized fraud, dumbing down of tests, and a narrowed curriculum" were the true outcomes of Michelle Rhee's tenure in DC schools.

Some DC parents and community leaders complained that despite these improvements, the speed with which Michelle Rhee enacted her reforms left them without input on the changes.

The District Council criticized Michelle Rhee for being unresponsive to council members' requests for information about school operations.

Michelle Rhee fired several administrators and school principals, including Marta Guzman, the principal of the high-performing Oyster-Adams Bilingual School, which Michelle Rhee's own children attended.

Michelle Rhee was criticized for closing several DC schools without holding public hearings, for not reporting complete budget figures at DC council hearings, for not involving parents to a sufficient degree, hiring former supporters to conduct an evaluation of her performance, and for spending considerable time before the national media instead of visiting schools.

When Michelle Rhee outlined a proposed new security plan in a talk at what was then Woodrow Wilson High School, many students protested and proposed an alternative plan, Michelle Rhee responded indicating that she found the student plan well thought out and that she would consider incorporating aspects into the final plan.

Michelle Rhee launched a personal website, a Twitter account, and a Facebook page soon thereafter.

Critics of Michelle Rhee, arguing that she had not genuinely improved education in DC schools, maintained that improvement in test scores must have been due to cheating, and attempted to show that changes made on some students' tests, in which wrong answers were erased and correct answers substituted, indicated a systematic pattern of answer-changing, presumably at Michelle Rhee's direction.

On December 6,2010, Michelle Rhee went on The Oprah Winfrey Show to announce that she had declined all job offers resulting from her high-profile work as DC Chancellor and would be focusing on a new advocacy organization she had formed called StudentsFirst.

Michelle Rhee told Winfrey's audience she wanted to have one million members and raise $1 billion in order to catalyze education reform in the United States.

Michelle Rhee has been a visible figure in the national media, appearing on television shows, radio programs, and the documentary film Waiting for Superman.

In May 2011, Michelle Rhee spoke in favor of school choice alongside the Wisconsin Republican governor, Scott Walker, at an event hosted by the American Federation for Children, a pro-school choice education organization founded and funded by Betsy DeVos.

In 2013, Michelle Rhee wrote Radical: Fighting to Put Students First.

Michelle Rhee has served on the advisory boards for the National Council on Teacher Quality, and the National Center for Alternative Certification.

Michelle Rhee was a special guest of First Lady Laura Bush at President George W Bush's 2008 State of the Union address.

In March 2010, Michelle Rhee became engaged to Kevin Johnson, 55th mayor of Sacramento, California, and former NBA player.