Dr. Pauline Dow is the former deputy superintendent for academics and school leadership for the San Antonio Independent School District, where she led the academic, instruction, and school leadership work. She established active, differentiated learning for students and streamlined support for principals and teachers. From 2017 to 2019, the district rating moved from D to B on the state accountability system, the number of low performing schools was reduced by 50 percent in one year, and the district matched or exceeded state gains in most performance levels in grades two through eight in 2019. High school end-of-course exams exceeded state gains at almost every performance level in 2019, and high school graduation rates increased to 84.4 percent in 2019, up from 83.1 percent in 2017.

Currently, Dow serves as vice president of The Holdsworth Center in Austin, Texas. In this role, she supports the center in partnering with school districts to grow and develop their own pipeline of outstanding leaders.

Dow also served as chief instructional officer for San Antonio’s North East Independent School District and as chief academic officer for Austin Independent School District. In each of these roles, she led broad stakeholder teams in developing a shared vision for excellent student results, and helped implement that vision across curriculum, instruction, and assessment.

Dow spent 22 years of her career in her hometown of El Paso as a bilingual teacher and district leader in the Ysleta Independent School District and the Canutillo Independent School District. She is a former fellow of the Kellogg National Leadership Program, a multi-disciplinary experience that fosters a global perspective on human and social issues.

With more than 30 years of experience in public education, Dow holds a bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degree from The University of Texas at El Paso. She is a recipient of the university’s Gold Nugget Award for the College of Education and Dissertation of the Year Award. Dow is also a member of the fourth cohort of the Future Chiefs leadership development program.