For Phila. schools, calm after a storm

Vallas' successor is taking a low-key approach. The interim CEO is out to make his appointment permanent.

Thomas M. Brady, the interim Phila. School District CEO, spent 25 years in the military.Read moreELIZABETH ROBERTSON / Inquirer Staff

by Susan Snyder, Inquirer Staff Writer

Published Jul. 8, 2007, 3:01 a.m. ET

In one of his first acts as the Philadelphia schools' interim chief executive officer, Thomas M. Brady traded in his district-issued Crown Victoria for a less audacious, fuel-efficient Ford hybrid, already in the district's fleet.

Brady, leading a deficit-plagued district seeking more city and state funding, said it was a matter of perception.

"There's a difference between the CEO pulling up in front of an elementary school, sitting in the back of a Crown Victoria, than . . . sitting in the front seat of a Ford hybrid," Brady, 57, said in an interview at district headquarters last week. "I think it's a message that you send."

Brady, a retired Army colonel with 71/2 years' experience in school administration before coming to Philadelphia, took the helm of the 174,000-student district Monday. He will earn $275,000, the same base salary offered former CEO Paul Vallas, who departed last month for the superintendent's job in New Orleans.

Brady, who came to the district as chief operating officer in March from the Washington, D.C., school system, said he would vie for the permanent CEO job. The School Reform Commission is launching a national search but will consider internal candidates.

Brady has spent his first days preparing for the opening of summer school and developing goals for the months ahead, including making cuts to balance the $2.18 billion budget, rebuilding public trust after last fall's surprise $73 million deficit, and preparing for September.

On Monday, his first day, he advised young college graduates who were about to start teaching summer school.

"Are you nervous?" he asked at a reception at Fairhill Elementary School in North Philadelphia. When they confessed they were, he said: "You're in charge. When you're in charge, take charge."

Looking ahead, Brady said he would like to develop more small high schools, possibly enlisting help from the Gates Foundation, which has given money to other large cities. He also will aim for smaller classes. And he has already begun making "unannounced" school visits.

His less flashy style stands in stark contrast to that of his predecessor, who was known for passionate outbursts, an initiative-a-minute approach, and a desire to be involved in everything. Brady offers a more "focused," "calm" and "orderly" style and believes in stating goals, then stepping aside and allowing staff to carry them out, district staffers say.

"It's like comparing a calm stream to a tornado," said one staffer.

He keeps a small, battery-operated cartoon figure on his desk - he calls it his "hair on fire" guy because the hair lights up at the push of a button. A friend gave it to him in Washington, where people lined up to complain about the crisis of the moment.

"It reminds us that not everything is a crisis," he said.

Born in Manhattan, the son of a New York City police officer, Brady grew up in Queens and on Long Island. An Irish Catholic, he attended parochial school, then earned a bachelor's degree in education from Niagara University, with a speciality in social studies. He also has a master's in human-resources management from Pepperdine University.

Brady entered the Army, where he had a 25-year career, ending in 1997 as the commander of Fort Belvoir in Virginia. He has been married for 32 years and has five grown children and five grandchildren.

He became a PTA president for his children's secondary school in Fairfax County and got to know people in the Fairfax school system. Brady got a job there in 1999, his first in public school administration.

While overseeing operations there, Brady enrolled in the Broad Foundation's Urban Superintendents Academy, which trains corporate and military types for school administration. "Tom's easily in the top five to 10 of our graduates," said Tim Quinn, managing director of the academy, which has yielded 110 graduates over five years.

There, Brady became interested in urban school reform and landed a job in operations in the D.C. district. He focused on improving procurement, closing underused schools, and supervising $4.3 billion in school renovations.

"The city and system didn't always give him the resources and authority he needed to make broader changes he would've liked to have tackled," said Michael Casserly, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools, a national lobbying group in Washington, who called Brady "very good strategically and operationally."

Brady said he was encouraged that Philadelphia Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter had pledged to be an "education mayor." In Washington, Brady said, city and school services were not aligned well: "Cooperation is so important."

Brady also has begun to try to bridge relations with staffers for Mayor Street and Gov. Rendell. Both expressed reservations about the commission's interim appointments of Brady and two others, saying they hadn't been consulted and questioning the trio's qualifications.

"I never took it personally," Brady said.

Brady's military background shows. He calls his early goals for the district his "entry plan." His first cabinet meeting included discussion on first reports "from the battlefield," which he said tend to be wrong 99.9 percent of the time and should not be used to make rash decisions.

But he doesn't want people to call him "colonel."

"I'm proud of the fact that I served, but I'm not serving now," he said.

Greg Wade, president of the Home and School Council, the district's parents group, said Brady had made a positive first impression.

"There are some things I asked him to look into, and he took care of them right away," Wade said.

The district had nailed 60,000 old-style school windows shut after an accident last year in which a window slammed and severed a teacher's finger. Parents complained as warmer months approached. Brady ordered $4.2 million in repairs; all the windows will be ready to reopen by September.

Brady has purchased a rowhouse in Society Hill - another change from Vallas, who rented for five years. Taking root, Brady said he had no school-management aspirations beyond Philadelphia.

"I want to be CEO of Philadelphia and help Philadelphia," he said, "and when that ends, that's it."

Thomas M. Brady

Top five goals for the Philadelphia School District

1. Make cuts and find savings to balance the budget. Keep expenses within 1 percent of quarterly projections.

2. Improve public trust.

3. Prepare for September opening: Have fewer than 100 teacher vacancies. Complete all scheduled renovations and have all textbooks and materials on hand. Increase first-day student attendance by 1 percent over the last two years' average.

4. Institute sound management practices.

5. Focus employees on the district's educational mission.

Personal

Age: 57.

Family: Married with five grown children and five grandchildren.

Education: Undergraduate degree in education. Master's in human-resources management.

Career: Twenty-five years in the military, and a school administrator since 1999.

Last book read: Wild Fire, by Nelson DeMille, about a retired New York City detective's battle with terrorists.