When Al Mijares was hired as superintendent of Orange County's largest and most troubled school district, trustees were aware he was an educational leader in demand.
The board of the Santa Ana Unified School District knew Mijares had left previous jobs after a few years and before his contracts ran out. But board members hoped he would stay long enough to gain ground against the tough challenges facing the district.
That was 10 years and three contracts ago. Today, some people question whether Mijares, 51, has stayed too long.
The superintendent's fate is likely to be decided Tuesday, when trustees are scheduled to vote on whether to renew Mijares' three-year contract, which expires at the end of June.
Critics and supporters alike expect that a majority of the five-member school board will ask Mijares to remain. Such predictions, however, have done little to quiet the debate over Mijares.
His boosters say Mijares, with a stable and experienced hand, has delivered the district from years of financial and political turmoil.
But critics -- most notably the officials of the 3,000-strong teachers union in Santa Ana Unified -- say that Mijares is an ineffective leader who has mismanaged district finances and fueled poor morale and that the time has come for new leadership.
The schools chief has declined to comment on whether he will accept a new contract, saying only that he often assesses his tenure at the district.
"When I came here, I felt that an important part of my leadership would be longevity and staying the course, regardless of the issues and their complexities," said Mijares, who earns $200,000 annually. "That is still my frame of reference, but I am always looking at what I am doing to help the district move forward. That is an inventory that I make constantly."
Standing out among his accomplishments was overhauling district curriculum to align with state standards and to focus on basic skills and for holding principals accountable for their schools' performance. In 2003, Santa Ana showed the greatest percentage growth in state test scores among some of California's largest school districts.
But in a district that serves more than 60,000 students -- most of them poor, Latino immigrants struggling with English -- major academic challenges remain. Thirty-one of the district's 48 schools are failing to meet federal accountability standards and, despite the gains, test scores remain below state and county averages. Several of the county's lowest-performing schools are in Santa Ana.
