District leadership · North Carolina
I lead with people at the center and evidence in view—building the conditions for strong schools, meaningful student pathways, and lasting improvement.
Selected district results · 2025–26
These results belong to students, educators, school leaders, families, and partners across Brunswick County. I began serving as Assistant Superintendent in July 2023 and have supported the shared priorities and routines behind this progress. My role is to help align district and school leaders around clear priorities, give them support, and learn together from the results.
The 2023–24 school year and later fall within my current role. Chart colors mark that timeframe and do not assign individual credit for district results.
Sources: BCS 2025–26 District Data and NC DPI accountability reports. “Helped lead” describes my role in districtwide results.
Teaching & learning
A result matters most when school teams can use it. I support principals and teachers in setting a clear instructional focus. Principals, teacher teams, and district leaders study the evidence together, plan a response, and check whether it helped students.
Our secondary work emphasizes professional learning teams, common formative assessments, standards mastery, targeted intervention, and shared expectations for walkthroughs.
Source: BCS 2025–26 Accountability & Testing board presentation, September 22, 2026.
College, career & opportunity
College credit, career credentials, and work-based learning give students several strong routes beyond graduation. I work with school, college, and business partners to expand those routes.
Teal marks school-year data from 2023–24 onward and annual AP results from 2024 onward, during my current role. Earlier or undated baselines appear in a lighter color.
Career & College Promise
BCS students enrolled in CCP, from 2023–24 to 2025–26. Enrollment reached 579 in 2024–25.
Enrollment increased by 237 students from 2021–22 to 2025–26. Scale: 0–700 students.
Advanced Placement
of 862 AP exams earned a score of 3 or higher in 2026. There were 677 qualifying scores; the rate was 48.9% on 564 exams in 2022.
Scores of 3 or higher +29.6 points since 2022
Share of exams scoring 3 or higher. Scale: 0–100%.
AP exams taken +298 since 2022
Exam volume. Scale: 0–1,000 exams.
Career & Technical Education
Three measures of opportunity, from their starting points to 2025–26. Each chart uses its own scale.
Graduating students completing a CTE concentration.
Credentials earned districtwide.
Student work-based learning placements.
Counts describe distinct measures: concentrators are graduating students; credentials are awards and may include multiple credentials per student.
Sources: BCS 2025–26 District Data; BCS AP dashboard; CTE and CCP presentation.
Workforce readiness
I helped advance the shared effort that earned Brunswick County recognition as an ACT Work Ready Community.
ACT confirmed Level 3 certification on October 12, 2026, recognizing the county’s credentialed talent pipeline. WorkKeys and the National Career Readiness Certificate help connect demonstrated workplace skills with career opportunities.
Level 3 · Certified Work Ready Community
Through Brunswick Built, I am helping share this achievement and build support for what comes next: stronger connections among Brunswick County Schools, Brunswick Community College, our Chambers, and local employers.
Our path toward Levels 4, 5, and 6 focuses on deeper employer participation, aligned training, wider access to testing, and documented workforce outcomes. ACT’s county-specific goals for those levels are pending.
Explore Brunswick Built’s certification pathAttendance · Student engagement
Regular attendance gives students more chances to learn, connect, and succeed. The share of students unlawfully absent for more than 10% of school days fell sharply from 2023–24 and remained far below that level in 2025–26.
Our team recommended a change in attendance policy that the Board of Education supported. We also changed the processes schools used to respond to unlawful absences. Together with the work of students, families, and school teams, these changes helped drive the improvement shown across four school years.
Districtwide
From 2023–24 to 2025–26, a 6.1 percentage-point decrease. The 2024–25 result was 5.6%.
Scale: 0–15%. Lower is better.
Three traditional high schools
The 2024–25 result was 9.2%. The lower rate continued into 2025–26.
Scale: 0–30%. Lower is better.
Measure: approximate percentage of students unlawfully absent for more than 10% of school days. High school figures are the average for North, South, and West Brunswick High. Source: BCS multi-year unlawful absenteeism file.
How I lead
Improvement takes a clear aim and a repeatable way to learn from the work. I help teams move from strategy to daily practice through four connected steps.
Use achievement, growth, attendance, and school evidence to choose a focused goal.
Support principals and teacher teams with time, trust, expectations, and coaching.
Connect common assessments, intervention, and walkthroughs to what students need.
Study results, listen to people closest to the work, and improve the next cycle.
I have built positive working relationships with each member of the Board of Education. I support the superintendent’s work with the Board through clear communication, careful listening, and a shared focus on students.
Ed.D. research · UNCW, 2026
My dissertation examined Advanced Teaching Roles, a model that extends the influence of effective teachers beyond one classroom.
I compared one North Carolina ATR district with three similar districts across 2021–2025, looking at proficiency, academic growth, and teacher retention. The findings point to potential—especially for growth—and to the importance of role clarity, principal support, trust, and implementation quality.
A broader research signal
NC State’s Friday Institute found positive schoolwide effects on English language arts, math, and science test scores in its 2026 statewide ATR evaluation. My district comparison found higher average proficiency and a stronger EVAAS growth pattern in the ATR district. Together, the findings point to the possibility that well-supported teacher leadership can help improve student achievement and growth. The studies use different designs and measures, and my comparison does not establish that ATR caused the differences.
EVAAS growth index
Schools in the ATR district had higher average growth across the study period. The association was the strongest academic signal in the analysis.
School-year observations, 2021–2025. An association; this design does not establish cause.
01 / STUDENT GROWTH
The ATR district averaged a 0.48 EVAAS growth index, compared with −0.92 across comparison districts. This association was the clearest academic difference in the study.
School-year observations, 2021–2025. The design does not establish cause.
02 / PROFICIENCY
Average grade-level proficiency was 49.76% in the ATR district and 45.99% in comparison districts. The difference is descriptive, not a causal estimate.
School-year observations, 2021–2025.
03 / TEACHER RETENTION
Average teacher retention was 86.98% in the ATR district and 83.53% in comparison districts. The inferential comparison was not statistically significant.
District-year observations; p = .123.
School choice · New learning options
The planning and launch of two choice academies expanded opportunities for students to learn in environments suited to their goals.
Designed for students seeking a smaller learning environment, The Achieve Academy centers technical and trade pathways, hands-on learning, industry credentials, and internships. Brunswick Community College pathways connect students to college credit and associate degrees.
A state-approved virtual option for students in grades 1–12, developed alongside stronger district alternative-education and student-support pathways.
My role: directed planning and launch. Program descriptions are drawn from my current executive résumé.
Community engagement
I listen to parents and community members, and work with businesses and organizations to create more opportunities for students.
Partnerships with local employers and Brunswick Community College connect students to internships, industry credentials, college credit, and pathways beyond graduation. Community service helps me stay connected to the people and places our schools serve.
Board service
Supporting a community organization focused on children and families.
Staying connected with local businesses and community leaders.
Board roles and dates: current executive résumé.
Leadership philosophy
“Serve, Inspire, Trust, Empower” is a commitment to how people experience leadership—not just a set of words.
Begin with the needs of students, staff, and the community.
Make a clear, shared future feel possible and worth pursuing.
Be candid, follow through, and treat people like people.
Give principals and teacher leaders the trust, tools, and ownership to lead improvement—and support them as they do.
Classroom teaching, virtual education, school leadership, and cabinet-level service have shaped how I see the whole district.
Read the full resumeSecondary Education & Accountability · Brunswick County Schools
West Brunswick High School
Brunswick County Schools
Public, independent, and virtual learning settings
Let’s connect
Jonathan Kent Paschal, Ed.D. · Leland, North Carolina