Schools Chief Offers a Record of Unifying

"I said, 'Okay, this is a problem,' " Deasy recalled.

So he proposed a mandatory deduction of 15 percent from money raised to benefit individual schools. The deductions would flow into a fund to benefit all schools under a formula tilted toward those in high-poverty neighborhoods.

Critics called the mandatory deduction a "gift tax" that would cause fundraising to dwindle. Some warned it would alienate Malibu, the smaller of the two cities in the district. The school board, after months of debate, approved the proposal on a 5 to 2 vote in March 2004. It was one of the few times Deasy's board had not been united.

But his prediction held true: Fundraising did not slacken. The equity fund amassed more than $170,000 in its first year.

School board President Julia Brownley said Deasy was hired in 2001 on a unanimous vote and has kept his board "fundamentally unified" since then.

"He has a spectacular relationship with the board," member Jose Escarce said. "He's remarkably visible in the community, knows everyone, is an incredibly knowledgeable and innovative educator. I don't think there's anything negative to be said."

Deasy is married and has three teenage children. He said they are old enough that he can move cross-country to a job that will place him in the big leagues of public education. His eldest daughter attends Catholic University in Washington. His son is about to graduate from high school, and his youngest daughter is a sophomore. Deasy said he plans to move to Prince George's after he and the school board reach terms on a contract. His tentative start date is May 1.

Over breakfast, Deasy showed detailed student achievement statistics to support his claim that he knows what it takes to raise minority test scores in a system that is 10 times as large as the one he runs.

Evaluating test scores is difficult because they are heavily influenced by student demographics and academic standards that vary from state to state. But Deasy's system appears to measure up well under California's academic performance index. With a student population that is more than a third Latino and about one-tenth black, Santa Monica-Malibu Unified has posted solid and sustained gains in reading and math.

On a scale of 200 to 1,000, with the statewide target being 800, the system is rated at 806 on California's index. That is nearly 100 points ahead of the state as a whole. From 2002 to 2005, data show, Latino and black students in the system made larger gains than non-Hispanic white students.

Whether he can replicate that in the 133,000-student Prince George's system is an open question. There are plenty of operational challenges in the county that Deasy does not face here. For instance, his system does not provide bus service for most students. In Prince George's, more than 90,000 students ride buses every day -- a major operation that the schools chief must monitor closely. In Prince George's, the annual schools budget is $1.4 billion. Here, it's about $100 million.

Deasy asserted that he can handle the operational portions of the job.