Marnie Hazelton Comes Home to California to Lead Alum Rock

Tue, 22 Sep 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Marnie Hazelton has spent most of the past four decades in the New York metropolitan area, and the superintendency of Alum Rock Union Elementary^↗ is the job that pulled her back across the country. She spent her formative years in Southern California, from fourth grade through her second year of college, and still has family in the state.

"In many ways, coming to California feels like coming home, but it was the opportunity in Alum Rock that truly drew me back," Hazelton said in a written response to The CAEdTribune.

The Alum Rock Board of Trustees appointed Hazelton after a national search, according to the district's announcement of her appointment, and the district's superintendent page now lists her in the role, where the state directory previously listed Sandra Garcia. She arrives with three superintendencies behind her: Englewood Public School District and Linden Public Schools in New Jersey, and the Roosevelt Union Free School District in New York, according to the same announcement, which also records her doctorate in educational and policy leadership from Hofstra University, a master's degree in education from Brooklyn College, and a bachelor's degree from SUNY Old Westbury.

She is direct about why this district, of all the ones she could have chosen. "I saw Alum Rock as a district with tremendous potential where my experience could make a meaningful difference," she said, pointing to her background in school reform, organizational systems, and what she calls navigating challenging fiscal environments. The second draw is the setting itself: a TK-8 district in East San José, surrounded by Silicon Valley. "A child growing up in East San José should be able to see a pathway from an Alum Rock classroom to San José State University, the technology sector, the arts, entrepreneurship, or any other future they choose," she said.

The district she is taking on

The landscape waiting for her is defined by enrollment. Alum Rock's district-run schools enrolled 6,758 students in 2025-26, the most recent year in the state's published data. That was 501 fewer students than the year before, a 6.9 percent single-year decline, and 609 fewer than in 2023-24. The current 2026-27 school year, her first, is not yet in the state's files.

The longer arc is steeper, though it needs a careful label. California reports charter schools under the district that authorizes them, and the published data separates Alum Rock's own schools from its authorized charters only from 2023-24 onward. Counting both together, the schools reporting under Alum Rock's district code went from 12,386 students in 2014-15 to 8,119 in 2025-26, a decline of 34.5 percent across eleven consecutive annual drops, over a stretch when statewide enrollment fell 8.1 percent. Within that combined figure, the charter sector has held steady: ARUSD-authorized charter schools enrolled 1,361 students in 2025-26, up slightly from 1,301 two years earlier, and now account for 16.8 percent of all students reporting under the district's code.

The grade pipeline points the same direction. In 2025-26 the district's own schools had 619 kindergartners and 807 eighth graders, or 76.7 kindergartners for every 100 eighth graders. That cross-section is not a forecast, but for a TK-8 system it is the shape of the planning problem.

Hazelton does not talk around any of this. Among the goals she names for her first three years: "I want enrollment growing because families recognize Alum Rock as a competitive, innovative school district offering outstanding academics and exceptional opportunities in the arts, STEM, technology, language, and enrichment."

A hundred days of listening, and one ELA lesson

Hazelton entered the district with a hundred-day entry plan, which she says the district has shared publicly on its website. "Before you can effectively lead a community, you have to listen to it, learn from it, and understand its history," she said of its premise. Her first weeks went to meetings with parents, teachers, classified staff, administrators, students, board members, labor leaders, and community organizations, along with San José's police chief and mayor.

She also visited every school, and at William Sheppard Middle School she taught a seventh-grade English language arts lesson herself. "It reminded me that there is a tremendous difference between talking about teaching and actually standing in front of students," she said, describing the work of engaging a class, checking for understanding, and adjusting instruction in real time as a renewed appreciation for what the district's teachers do daily.

What the listening tour surfaced, in her telling, is a system that varies too much from building to building. "In a school system, consistency matters," she said. "Families and employees should not have dramatically different experiences depending upon which school or department they encounter." The pleasant surprise ran the other way: "There is an authentic emotional connection to Alum Rock. I respect that history, and I look forward to working with the community to write its next chapter."

What she wants true in three years

"Three years from now, I want us to be able to say that we changed the trajectory of the Alum Rock Union School District," Hazelton said.

The specifics she lists start in the classroom: eighth graders leaving for high school ready for advanced mathematics, higher Algebra proficiency, and growth that shows up for every student group rather than only in the district average. The students in front of her make that agenda concrete. In 2025-26, 76.0 percent of students in the district's own schools were economically disadvantaged, 40.3 percent were English learners, and 79.2 percent were Hispanic.

She wants the district's Spanish and Vietnamese dual-language programs to keep expanding into statewide models, arts programs with real reach, and a gifted-and-talented program she describes as a North Star for East San José. "Intervention is essential, but acceleration is equally important," she said. "Every child deserves to be appropriately challenged, including students who are ready to move beyond grade-level expectations."

The through-line is the sentence she closes on, the one the next three years will test against the enrollment table above: "The students of East San José deserve excellence, and their ZIP code should never determine the opportunities available to them."

How we reported this story

Enrollment, grade-level, and student-group figures come from California Department of Education enrollment data files covering the 2014-15 through 2025-26 school years; district-operated and charter figures are separated only where the state publishes that split (2023-24 onward). Quotes and first-weeks details are from Dr. Marnie Hazelton's written responses to The CAEdTribune. Appointment, career history, and degrees are from the district's announcement of her appointment, provided to The CAEdTribune, and her current role is listed on the district's superintendent page.

Detailed code that reproduces the analysis and figures in this article is available exclusively to EdTribune subscribers.

Alum Rock Union Elementary - EdTribune CA - California Education Data

Marnie Hazelton Comes Home to California to Lead Alum Rock

The district she is taking on

A hundred days of listening, and one ELA lesson

What she wants true in three years

How we reported this story