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Alberto Carvalho and Debra Kerr pictured in Los Angeles in 2023 from a post on Kerr\u2019s LinkedIn profile. The post read, \u201cSuperintendent\u2019s Opening of Schools Address was brilliant.\u201d The FBI searched Kerr\u2019s Southwest Ranches home in Broward County and Carvalho\u2019s L.A. home and school district office on Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2026, as part of its investigation into a shuttered AI education company, AllHere. When Carvalho was superintendent of the Los Angeles public schools, the L.A. school board signed a $6 million contract with AllHere.<\/p>\n
LinkedIn<\/p>\n
A South Florida lobbyist who sold hundreds of thousands worth of textbooks to the Miami-Dade County school district has surfaced as a key figure in the FBI investigation of Los Angeles public schools superintendent Alberto Carvalho, who once held the same position here.<\/p>\n
Debra Kerr, an education consultant, was launched into public view on Wednesday when FBI agents searched her home in Southwest Ranches in Broward County at the same time agents carried out related searches of Carvalho\u2019s home and school district office in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe knew Carvalho well \u2014 they got a long very well,\u201d said Marta Perez, a longtime member of the Miami-Dade School Board who lost her seat in 2024. \u201cShe was a very nice, sweet lady. I would see her at the School Board meetings when she was there for a contract. She was very professional, but she wasn\u2019t in the big leagues like the [education] lobbyists in Tallahassee.\u201d<\/p>\n
A retired Miami-Dade school district employee close to Carvalho said Kerr was occasionally seen in his executive office in the Miami-Dade School Board building off Biscayne Boulevard and was also friendly with his wife, Maria.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe had access,\u201d said the former employee, who did not want to be identified.<\/p>\n
READ MORE: Broward home searched by FBI as part of case linked to L.A. schools chief Carvalho<\/a><\/p>\n Both Kerr and Carvalho came to know each other when she was a lobbyist for Pearson Education, a large textbook publisher, in the 2000s, and he served as the Miami-Dade schools superintendent for 14 years before leaving for the top job in Los Angeles in February 2022. After he left, Kerr started working as a sales representative for AllHere Education, a startup education technology company.<\/p>\n Their lives intersected this week in the FBI corruption probe that sources say centers on Kerr\u2019s landing a $6 million artificial-intelligence contract with the Los Angeles Unified School District when Carvalho was superintendent there \u2014 shortly before AllHere Education filed for bankruptcy liquidation in August 2024. The contract was AllHere\u2019s biggest asset, according to an 18-page list of creditors filed in bankruptcy court in Delaware.<\/p>\n In November 2024 \u2014 eight months after Carvalho staged a media blitz promoting the AI chatbot called \u201cEd\u201d \u2014 the startup company\u2019s founder, Joanna Smith-Griffin, was charged with defrauding investors. She now appears to be negotiating a plea deal with federal prosecutors in New York, according to court records. It is unclear if Smith-Griffin, who was charged with fleecing $10 million from investors in AllHere Education, is cooperating with federal authorities.<\/p>\n Smith-Griffin retained Kerr as a sales representative for AllHere in 2022. Kerr was credited with closing the AI-tech deal with the LA school district; she and Carvalho touted the chatbot as a tool to combat student absenteeism.<\/p>\n But in AllHere\u2019s bankruptcy case in Delaware, Kerr claims she was stiffed out of her $630,000 commission fee. Her son, Richard Kerr, an employee of AllHere, claims the company owed him $6,750.<\/p>\n Kerr, 63, who started her own education consulting company, LeadershipMax, LLC, eight years ago, did not respond to an email. Carvalho, 61, also could not be reached for comment. Smith-Griffin\u2019s defense attorney also did not respond to an email query.<\/p>\n Neither Carvalho nor Kerr has been charged with a crime. But the FBI investigation, even if it leads to no charges ever being brought, has already taken a toll on Carvalho\u2019s career as the top administrator of the nation\u2019s second-largest school district.<\/p>\n On Friday, the L.A. school board, after holding two closed-door emergency sessions on Thursday and Friday, placed Carvalho on indefinite paid administrative leave. He makes $440,000 a year. A senior school district official, Andres Chait, was named interim superintendent.<\/p>\n READ MORE: L.A. School Board places Carvalho on indefinite leave after FBI investigation<\/a><\/p>\n Unlike Carvalho, who joined California Gov. Gavin Newsom last year in condemning the Trump administration\u2019s crackdown on immigrants in Los Angeles, Kerr is an unknown figure. That is, until the FBI searched her $1.4 million Southwest Ranches home on Wednesday as part of its Los Angeles investigation into Carvalho.<\/p>\n This week, the New York Post turned the spotlight on Kerr.<\/p>\n The prose was classic Post: \u201cThe federal probe into LAUSD Superintendent Alberto Carvalho has swept up a Florida consultant who had a child with Bob Marley\u2019s legendary guitarist \u2014 a son who later became a Hollywood actor.<\/p>\n \u201cThe woman is Debra Kerr, a Jamaica-born education consultant and former Miss Jamaica runner-up whose son, David \u201cDavo\u201d Kerr Jr., is a Los Angeles-based rapper and actor. Davo\u2019s father is Junior Marvin, the legendary guitarist for Bob Marley & The Wailers.<\/p>\n \u201cDavo appeared in the 2024 biopic \u2018Bob Marley: One Love,\u2019 in which he portrayed his own father Marvin, the guitarist who joined Bob Marley & The Wailers in 1977 after famously turning down an offer to join Stevie Wonder\u2019s band.\u201d<\/p>\n After the flashy intro, the Post pivots to Kerr\u2019s LinkedIn profile, which describes her as CEO of LeadershipMax LLC, based in Hollywood, Fla.<\/p>\n Before striking out on her own, Kerr held senior roles at education publishing giant Pearson, where she rose to senior vice president for North America, and later served as head of sales at Age of Learning, the company behind ABCmouse, a subscription-based learning program for children ages 2 to 8.<\/p>\n \u201cEight years ago, I transitioned from executive leadership in K\u201312 EdTech to independent consulting\u2014 driven by a passion to work more closely with the people and products shaping the future of learning,\u201d she wrote on her Linkedin page.<\/p>\n \u201cSince then, I\u2019ve had the privilege of partnering with founders, product teams, and school and district leaders to bring innovative ideas to life and help move impactful solutions from concept to classroom.\u201d<\/p>\n Among them: Carvalho.<\/p>\n In one Linkedin post, Kerr, standing shoulder to shoulder with Carvalho, praises him after he delivered a speech three years ago: \u201cSuperintendent\u2019s Opening of Schools Address was brilliant #schoolleadership @LASchools\u201d<\/p>\n On Wednesday, neighbors confirmed seeing local police and FBI agents at the home in the suburban community of Southwest Ranches. When the Miami Herald visited her home Wednesday evening, a man was working in the garage but refused to comment on what happened that day. Davie Police confirmed to the Herald it was assisting the FBI with a case in Southwest Ranches.<\/p>\n Media reports out of Los Angeles chronicling AllHere Education\u2019s collapse described Kerr as one of many people who were misled or betrayed by the company. An October 2024 report<\/a> by the 74million.org<\/a> news site described Kerr as the Florida-based salesperson who, at a bankruptcy hearing, said she \u201cwas never paid commission for her work closing the lucrative AllHere deal in L.A.\u201d<\/p>\n Federal prosecutors said AllHere\u2019s founder, Smith-Griffin, duped investors into thinking the company was a thriving educational start-up harnessing artificial intelligence while in fact it was generating a fraction of the money touted in presentations and corporate materials.<\/p>\n A big part of the company\u2019s sizzle was its work in Los Angeles, where Carvalho celebrated the coming of AllHere\u2019s \u201cEd,\u201d the school system\u2019s AI chatbot designed to look like an animated sun<\/a> and accelerate learning for hundreds of thousands of students.<\/p>\n Miami-Dade Public Schools Superintendent Alberto Carvalho reacts during his final meeting with the Miami-Dade County School Board on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022. He left the district after 14 years as superintendent to become the superintendent of the Los Angeles school district. David Santiago dsantiago@miamiherald.com <\/p>\n
The Southwest Ranches home of Debra Kerr, which the FBI searched on Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2026, as part of its investigation into Alberto Carvalho, whose L.A. home and office at the Los Angeles school district headquarters were also searched Wednesday by the FBI. Devoun Cetoute dcetoute@miamiherald.com Had child with Bob Marley guitarist, report says<\/p>\n
Alberto Carvalho and Debra Kerr pictured in Los Angeles in 2023 from a post on Kerr\u2019s LinkedIn profile. The post read, \u201cSuperintendent\u2019s Opening of Schools Address was brilliant.\u201d The FBI searched Kerr\u2019s Southwest Ranches home in Broward County and Carvalho\u2019s L.A. home and school district office on Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2026, as part of its investigation into a shuttered AI education company, AllHere. When Carvalho was superintendent of the Los Angeles public schools, the L.A. school board signed a $6 million contract with AllHere. LinkedIn Broward home raid<\/p>\n