LaVonne M. Sheffield

LaVonne M. Sheffield is Superintendent of Rockford Public Schools, the third largest School District in Illinois and the largest employer in the Winnebago-Boone County area.

Dr. Sheffield comes to the role as a nontraditional leader who began her career as a classroom teacher in Detroit but who worked for many years as a chief executive in municipal government. She has been a Broad Urban Superintendents Academy Fellow since 2002, and she has received the 100 Most Influential Women Award from Crain’s Detroit Business and Crain’s Cleveland Business publications.

A native of Detroit, Dr. Sheffield is the daughter of the late Horace L. Sheffield, a former United Auto Workers executive; her mother, the late Mary Kathryn Sheffield, was a nurse and member of the Detroit Board of Education.

Dr. Sheffield holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from Wayne State University and a doctorate in education from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She is a Fellow of the National Forum of Black Public Administrators-Executive Leadership Institute.

Dr. Sheffield worked as a classroom teacher and community college administrator in the 1970s and 1980s before accepting the position of Chief Administrative Officer for the Mayor in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1992. In 1993, she became Chief of Staff to Mayor Michael R. White of Cleveland, one of America’s most accomplished big-city mayors. In that role, Dr. Sheffield oversaw 9,000 employees and an $828 million annual budget. She also managed the operation of two Cleveland airports as director of the Department of Port Control.

In 2000, Dr. Sheffield returned to the education field as the Chief of Staff for Detroit Public Schools. She was named Chief Academic Officer in Detroit in 2003. Dr. Sheffield served as Chief Accountability Officer for the School District of Philadelphia from 2004 until 2008, when she became superintendent of the Recovery School District-North in Louisiana.

During her career, Dr. Sheffield also has served as consultant with the United Nations and an adjunct professor at Cleveland State University’s Levin College of Urban Affairs, Southern Connecticut State University and Arcadia University. She was named Educator of the Year by Wayne State University.

In private life, Dr. Sheffield enjoys mountain climbing; she is married to William Hudson, a retired Detroit deputy police chief.

ROCKFORD PUBLIC SCHOOLS