Gerald Zahorchak

Gerald L. Zahorchak is an American educator and the former Secretary of Education for the Pennsylvania Department of Education, a position he held from 2006 to 2010. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Zahorchak worked at various Pennsylvania public school districts in a number of positions, including teacher, football coach, principal, federal programs director, strategic planning coordinator and personnel director. Zahorchak worked as superintendent of the Greater Johnstown School District in Cambria County from 1997 to 2003, when he was chosen to be Deputy Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education for the state. Governor Ed Rendell appointed him Secretary of Education in 2005.

During his tenure as secretary, Zahorchak implemented state funding for pre-kindergarten and full-day kindergarten, developed a new school funding formula, helped increase education funding for school districts, and established the Keystone Exams and the state's Standards Aligned System. In 2010, Zahorchak announced he would leave the Secretary of Education position, coinciding with Rendell's pending departure from the governorship. On April 22, 2010, Zahorchak was selected to be superintendent of the Allentown School District in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where he vowed to establish regular updates to families about their students education, improve safety in schools and implement incentives to attract qualified minorities and top education students into teaching positions.

Early career A native of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Zahorchak received a bachelor's degree master in 1980 from Saint Francis University in Loretto, Pennsylvania, and a master of education degree from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1986. In 1994, Zahorchak received his doctorate in education from Pennsylvania State University, where he wrote his doctoral dissertation on state policy-making. Zahorchak began his educational career in 1980 at the Greater Johnstown School District in Cambria County, Pennsylvania, where he spent two years an elementary school teacher. In 1985, he became a middle school reading and language arts in the North Star School District in Somerset County, where he also coached varsity high school football. Zahorchak taught at North Star until 1989, Zahorchak also previously served as an elected member of the Greater Johnstown School Board, and was a Johnstown city councilman, the Johnston deputy major and president of the Johnstown Rotary in 2003. During his tenure as superintendent, Zahorchak implemented full-day kindergarten, pre-kindergarten and tutoring programs. He also pursued high school reform and hired reading and math coaches to boost student learning. where he oversaw the education of more than 1.8 million children public school children in the state. Zahorchak helped implement the release of Pennsylvania's first Academic Achievement Reports, and led the development and implementation of support systems for public schools trying to meet No Child Left Behind targets. By 2005, Zahorchak was making a yearly salary of $124,458.

Zahorchak served as acting education secretary from August 2004, when Phillips left the position, to September 2004, when Francis Barnes was hired. During the Barnes administration, Governor Ed Rendell encouraged local Pennsylvania school boards to participate in Act 72, a state property tax-relief program. Act 72 used proceeds from slot-machine gambling to finance property tax cuts from homeowners, and included with spending restrictions in exchange for the tax cuts. Barnes himself did not support the program, and most school boards rejected it because of the spending restrictions. Zahorchak, however voiced support for Act 72 and helped Rendell lobby local school districts to support it, which increased his visibility statewide. When Barnes resigned in September 2005, Zahorchak was again tapped to serve as acting secretary and was widely considered the most qualified candidate for the permanent position, although Governor Ed Rendell engaged in a thorough search for other potential candidates around the state. He has managed $200 million in Accountability Block Grants that were used for tutoring, math and literacy coaching, and led the development of Pennsylvania Inspired Leadership, a legislative initiative to develop and support educational leaders in the state. In 2008, Rendell and Zahorchak unveiled the first new school funding formula in about two decades, which set out to more fair than previous formulas and better meet the specific needs of individual school districts. The formula would give more money to districts with large numbers of children living in poverty. Other factors considered under the formula were cost of living, district size, enrollment growth and the number of students learning to speak English. The formula originally called for increasing Pennsylvania education spending by $2.6 billion over the next six years, starting with an additional $291 million in 2008–09, although the final budget passed by the state reduced that expenditure to $274 million.

Zahorchak spearheaded the establishment of the Keystone Exams, state-created math, science and social studies tests that high school students would be required to pass a majority of in order to graduate. The measure was met with criticism by the Pennsylvania School Boards Association and others who felt the plan would be expensive and would undermine local school boards' authority to set graduation requirements. The PSBA agreed to support the Keystone Exams under a compromise that schools might not have to give the tests if their own final exams are rigorous enough. The Keystone Exams were approved in 2009 and will first take effect starting with the class of 2015. Zahorchak also established the state's Standards Aligned System, which created a standardized set of diagnostic tests and curriculum guides for local school districts. The standards were aligned to six components: a curriculum framework, assessment systems, best teaching practices, emotional support practices, proven research resources and best interventions for accommodations for children who struggle. However, Pennsylvania was not included among the states to receive money in the first round of Race to the Top, where funds were awarded only to Delaware and Tennessee for their reform measures. Zahorchak said feedback from the rejected application would be used to strengthen another application in the second round.

Zahorchak announced he would resign as education secretary on May 7, 2010. His decision to leave was spurred by the pending end of the Rendell administration, with the governor leaving the office by January 2011.

Post-Secretary career

Zahorchak was unanimously selected to be superintendent of the Allentown School District in Allentown, Pennsylvania on April 22, 2010. His five-year contract began on July 1, 2010, with a starting yearly salary of $195,000. Zahorchak is the 16th superintendent of the district, which serves about 18,300 students and is the fourth largest public school district in Pennsylvania. He was chosen over four potential candidates, including former Harrisburg School District Superintendent Gerald Kohn, deputy superintendent of St. Louis Public Schools Carlinda Purcell and School District of Philadelphia Regional Superintendent Lucy D. Feria.

Zahorchak said he plans to install a system that would provide regular updates to families on the academic performance of their children and push them toward tangible improvement goals. In response to recent student violence problems at the William Allen High School, Zahorchak identified one of his priorities as strengthening the district's code of conduct and citizenship programs. He also announced he would seek to replace retiring teachers with highly skilled minority candidates, and would create incentive programs to lure top students into teaching positions if they agreed to spend at least five years teaching in Allentown schools.

On October 14, the Allentown School Board Education Committee signed off on Zahorchak's proposed five-year leadership and curriculum plans "Pathways to Success". The full board will determine whether to adopt it on October 28. Among the elements of the plan were social supports to help students transition from one grade level to the next, as well as the introduction to students of college information and career choices as early as elementary school, to ensure they understand their options after high school. The plan would also align programs and curricula across the district, establish a network to provide students better access to college courses and tutoring, and a push for more students to take advanced placement courses. Additionally, the plan would require high schoolers to pass mandatory, internationally recognized exit exams to graduate from high school.

The committee signed off on all of Zahorchak's proposals except for his call to remove four principals in exchange for up to $15 million in federal grants that mandate leadership or staff changes as a condition for receiving the money. Zahorchak proposed transferring the principals from the Allen and Dieruff high schools, Central Elementary and Harrison-Morton Middle School to the district's nonprofit foundation, then use the federal grant money to open a special school for advanced placement and honors students.