Buffalo Public Schools has announced the appointment of their new superintendent. Pascal Mubenga has been selected to lead the district, succeeding Tonja Williams Knight, who announced in February that she is retiring.
Mubenga has worked in education for over 30 years, most recently as the superintendent of Durham Public Schools in North Carolina from 2017 to 2024. In February 2024 he resigned from that job due to an accounting error giving staff pay raises that district did not have money for causing protests from staff. Furthermore according to a report Mubenga knew the raises were over budget in November 2023 but did not inform the full school board until January. Mubenga assured such a mistake will not be made during his tenure as Buffalo Superintendent.
"When things go well, I take credit for it. When it goes wrong, I take responsibility. For that reason, I was able to learn from that particular mistake and to answer your specific question I'm not expecting that to happen here because I learned my lesson.”
Before serving as Superintendent Mubenga was a math teacher, assistant principal, and principal.
Mubenga mentions he wants to center his first 100 days on the job on listening to the school community rather than implementing his own vision.
“I'm here to honor the work of my predecessors and to build on their successes. I did not come with all the answers because I have my 100-day entry plan, because I want to listen to you first. I'm not going to duplicate what I did in Durham or North Carolina to hear this is a different place. I'm going to listen.”
BPS board members praised Mubenga’s ability to increase student performance and tackle the challenges that come with a large urban school district. 10 of 56 schools in the Durham district received a "F" grade at the start of his tenure. After one year that became just one school to still be graded as an "F". During his time as a principal, he brought a school from 67% proficiency to 90%.
Mubenga will start his four-year contract on August 15, he will paid $285,000 annually.
