When Cathie Black takes the helm of the country's largest school system sometime next month, she'll be equipped with at least one high-level offer of assistance: from Michael Mulgrew, the president of the United Federation of Teachers.
Rob Bennett for The Wall Street Journal Cathie Black at a press conference on Tuesday with Chancellor Joel Klein, left, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg."I'm a teacher and I'll help her," Mr. Mulgrew said Tuesday after Ms. Black was appointed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg to succeed Joel Klein. "We help people learn so that we can make lives better for children. I look forward to working with her."
Ms. Black, who will be the first woman to hold the position, declined interview requests and the Department of Education said she won't be available before she starts her new job. Among her biggest challenges is hammering out with Mr. Mulgrew a new teachers contract. The contract expired more than a year ago, and talks hit an impasse under Mr. Klein.
In addition to a shrinking revenue stream from the state, another big challenge Ms. Black faces is that she'll take over just months after the state changed proficiency scores for public-school students, a move that resulted in tens of thousands more students being deemed not proficient in math and English than the year before.
In New York City, the number of students scoring proficient in English was 42% this year; in math, it was 54%.
In Ms. Black, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he chose a manager that he believes can help New York City students prepare for college and beyond. He said Ms. Black "is a superstar manager who has succeeded spectacularly in the private sector. She is brilliant, she is innovative, she is driven."
Ms. Black attended private schools while growing up in Chicago, and her children attended private boarding school in Connecticut.
Her move to public service ends a four-decade run in publishing during which she helped launch what became the largest U.S. newspaper, USA Today; was the first female publisher of a weekly consumer magazine; and became known as the "First Lady" of magazines.
Ms. Black, 66 years old, began her publishing career as a sales assistant for Holiday magazine in New York. She later moved to New York magazine, where she was elevated to publisher in 1979.
In 1983, Al Neuharth, who had just launched Gannett Co.'s USA Today, tapped Ms. Black to oversee advertising sales for the national daily. As president and then publisher, Ms. Black was one of four or five people who transformed USA Today from a drain on Gannett's finances to one of the country's most profitable papers and, until recently, its largest.
"Without her, I doubt we would have made it," Mr. Neuharth said in an interview. The Wall Street Journal last year overtook USA Today in daily circulation.
Some questioned whether Ms. Black has the right experience to run nearly 1,600 schools with a $23 billion budget and the education of 1.1 million children at stake. Like Mr. Klein, she has no education-administration experience upon entering the job, but she has managed more than 2,000 employees while overseeing the financial performance and development of major magazines at Hearst.
"I am questioning the logic in appointing someone that has no experience in education—we need someone with experience in education to know how to guide this ship," said Council Member Robert Jackson, a Manhattan Democrat who is chairman of the council's education committee. "I would not put as the captain of the ship someone who has not navigated the waters to be in charge to take us across the ocean, especially in rough weather," he said.
Mr. Jackson, an opponent of mayoral control of the school system, also criticized City Hall for failing to discuss Mr. Klein's successor with him.
Ms. Black's book, "Basic Black: The Essential Guide for Getting Ahead at Work (and in Life)," was a business-book best seller. In it, she offers advice from how to behave at an office party ("Don't get drunk") to firing employees ("Do it quickly!").
Filled with examples of where she went wrong and right over her 40-year career, the book shows a woman driven to succeed despite obstacles.
"Of course, I've also worked with my fair share of jerks, which makes for some fun stories in this book" she writes. "I learned on the fly, making lots of mistakes and more than once inserting my foot firmly in my mouth."
Write to Barbara Martinez at Barbara.Martinez@wsj.com, Michael Howard Saul at michael.saul@wsj.com and Russell Adams at russell.adams@wsj.com
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