Biography - John Huppenthal (Rep.)

During Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal's 26 years in public service, he has established himself as one of Arizona's leading education reformers. As a state legislator, he successfully authored and passed over 200 bills, more bills than any other legislator in state history. A substantial number of those bills focused on improving education. For each of his 18 years in the state legislature, Huppenthal either served on or chaired education committees, ushering in an era of important education reforms, including:

1. Reforming Arizona's Career Ladder Program for public school teachers. It is now recognized as the only Career Ladder Program in the country tied to verifiable academic gains.
2. Spreading teacher performance pay programs across Arizona, ensuring good teachers are rewarded for increasing student achievement.
   
3. Revamping measures of academic progress and graduation standards.
   
4. Providing critical resources to special needs children, including children with autism and blind and deaf students.
   
5. Expanding Arizona's charter school system and Teach for America program.
   
6. Improving vocational education opportunities for children.
   

Recently, in 2010, Huppenthal championed common course numbering legislation for Arizona's universities and colleges. He also passed an important school district accountability bill which will hold school district's performance more accountable with fair, easy-to-understand letter grades.

Since the mid-1990's Huppenthal has spent thousands of hours in schools observing best practices and personally implementing important education reforms and programs. His innovative accountability system which ties academic improvement and qualitative measures of excellence with performance pay has shown remarkable success in school districts that have adopted it.

An Arizona resident for over 55 years, Superintendent of Public Instruction Huppenthal was educated throughout Arizona's expansive school system: attending elementary and secondary school in Tucson, Ariz. earning an engineering degree from NAU in Flagstaff and receiving his MBA from ASU in Tempe, Ariz..

Contact Information

The Office is located on Jefferson Street in Phoenix, Arizona.

The mailing address is:
The Honorable John Huppenthal
1535 W. Jefferson Street
Phoenix, Arizona 85007

(602) 542-5393
1-800-352-4558

Phoenix Office
Arizona Department of Education
P.O. Box 6490
Phoenix, AZ 85005-6490

Tucson Office
Arizona Department of Education
400 West Congress
Tucson, AZ 85701

Key Staff & Office Divisions

Main Office

Deputy Superintendent
Elliott Hibbs

Chief of Staff
Merle Bianchi

Public Information Officer
Molly Edwards

Policy Development and Government Relations
Director
Stacey Morley

Deputy Director
Christopher Kotterman

Communications and Innovation
Director
Ryan Ducharme

Business and Finance
Ross Begnoche

Information Technology
Mark Masterson

Audit
Arthur Heikkila

Strategic Planning
Pat Childress

Health and Nutrition Services
Mary Szafranski

Building Operations
Michael Jones

Human Resources / Payroll
Billie Belanger

Teaching and Learning Chief of Programs & Policy
John Stollar

Highly Effective Schools
Marv Lamer

Highly Effective Teachers and Leaders
Karen Butterfield

High Academic Standards for Students
Kathryn Hrabluk

Accountability and Assessment
Roberta Alley

New Learning Development
Annie Gilbert

Cross-Divisional Leadership Initiatives
Karla Phillips

Teaching and Learning Chief of Programs & Policy
Research and Evaluation
Carrie Giovannone

Teaching and Learning Chief of Programs & Policy
Grants
Todd Mason

State Board of Education
Executive Director
Vincient Yanez

June 2012