Mary Skipper is the superintendent of Boston Public Schools (BPS). The district educates more than 54,000 students across 125 schools. Skipper is focused on ensuring students have equitable access to quality education and experiences. As such, she and her leadership team are focused on prioritizing and accelerating academic performance, strengthening access to social-emotional learning, streamlining operations and ensuring student safety, developing authentic family and community engagement practices, improving internal and external communication with families and staff, and, increasing accountability for both the central office and our schools.

Mary previously served as the superintendent of Somerville Public Schools in Massachusetts. During her tenure, SPS emerged as a leader in using data to inform continuous progress and to ensure a student-centered approach to teaching and learning, driven by an unfailing commitment to equity of opportunity and access for all students. That commitment is evident through the continuous work at all district levels to examine current practices, dismantle barriers, and create teaching and learning.

Before going to Somerville, Skipper was a Network Superintendent of High Schools for BPS, overseeing 34 high schools serving approximately 19,500 students. During her tenure in this role, Boston’s high schools’ annual dropout rate consistently decreased from 7.9% in SY11-12 to 4.5% by SY14-15. At the same time, the graduation rate consistently increased from a rate of 65.9% in 2012 to 70.7% by the end of 2015. Among her most notable accomplishments while at BPS, Superintendent Skipper helped launch TechBoston Academy as the founding school leader in 2002. Under her leadership, TBA grew from a 9-12 high school serving 75 students to a 6-12 school with a staff of more than 100 serving a diverse student population of more than 1,000, 30% of which were English Language Learners and 25% of which were Special Education students.

Skipper holds a bachelor’s in English and Latin, a master’s in classics from Tufts University, a master’s in education policy from Harvard, and a master’s in education leadership from Columbia Teachers College.