who was named superintendent in March 2025<\/a> before the takeover was announced in October of that year.<\/p>\nLicata comes to Fort Worth with more than 30 years of experience in education. Most recently, he served as superintendent of Broward County Public Schools in Florida \u2014 the nation’s sixth-largest school district \u2014 where he led the district to its first state “A” rating in more than 14 years. He has also worked as a teacher, coach, principal, regional superintendent, assistant superintendent and university professor.<\/p>\n
His immediate priorities center on putting more support and resources into classrooms. Chief among them: attracting and retaining high-quality teachers, particularly at the district’s most challenged schools.<\/p>\n
“How can we get the best teachers? How can we recruit? How can we pay them?” Licata said. “The new model we’re bringing in is really nice for teachers, where they’ll be making $110,000 to $120,000 in some of the hardest schools if they’re showing great results.”<\/p>\n
When asked where that money would come from, Licata acknowledged the work was still underway.<\/p>\n
“That is what we’re working on,” he said. “I am very confident. I’m not confident. I’m very confident we will be able to compete, if not beat the other local ISDs. I just went through the budget, and I know we\u2019re $40 million in debt, but that\u2019s going to change real soon.”<\/p>\n
Schools like Monnig Middle \u2014 where a higher-than-average share of students are economically disadvantaged or considered at risk \u2014 are exactly the campuses Licata says demand the most attention without any reduction in academic expectations.<\/p>\n
“Because a child comes from a very difficult background or poverty, we don\u2019t devalue them,” he said. “We don\u2019t say ok we only expect you to go this high.”<\/p>\n
Licata said results from state standardized testing in the coming weeks will help shape the district’s approach, with major reorganization and professional development on a short-term to-do list.<\/p>\n
“In order to get academic instruction and achievement at the highest level for these children, we have to have the best talented workforce,” he said. “It’s not easy. It’s very difficult, and we want teachers to spend every second doing what they do best, without barricades.”<\/p>\n
Licata said parents and the broader community can expect transparency as the work unfolds.<\/p>\n
“They’ll expect honesty, integrity and a commitment to our \u2014 not your, but our \u2014 community,” he said.<\/p>\n
Peter B. Licata \u2014 By the Numbers<\/p>\n
30+ years of experience in public education<\/p>\n
Most recently superintendent of Broward County Public Schools, Fla. \u2014 the nation’s 6th-largest district<\/p>\n
Led Broward County to its first state “A” rating in more than 14 years<\/p>\n
Has served as teacher, coach, principal, regional superintendent, assistant superintendent and university professor<\/p>\n
Working under a 21-day interim contract pending Board of Managers approval<\/p>\n
Replaces Karen Molinar, who was named superintendent in March 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On his third day on the job, Peter B. Licata was already counting bell rings in a middle…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":222476,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[2826,85192,116,118,8257,117,86577,14260,86576,12539,11457],"class_list":["post-222475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-board-of-managers","tag-broward-county-public-schools","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-isd","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-interim-contract","tag-karen-molinar","tag-monnig-middle-school","tag-school-district","tag-superintendent"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222475"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222475\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}