Joseph Olchefske

Joseph Olchefske has been a leader in the K12 educational community for over twenty-five years, holding significant executive positions in for-profit, non-profit and public sector educational institutions.  The breadth of his professional experience across all sectors of the educational arena provides him with unique perspectives on the challenges facing educational institutions and the professionals who lead them. He is excited to bring these perspectives into the classroom to benefit SoPA students as they build their careers in the education field.

He is passionate about the impact that schools, school districts and individual educators can have on the lives of the students they serve. He is a fierce, unrelenting advocate for social equity and the power of individual leaders to change their institutions to dramatically improve educational outcomes for all students, especially students of color and other disadvantaged groups. He has a strong faith in the power of market-based dynamics, entrepreneurial ideas and technological innovation to create the conditions in which true educational change and reform can occur.

Joseph is the former Superintendent of Seattle Public Schools, a public school system with 47,000 students, 100 schools, 4,500 teachers and 7,000 employees.  After leaving the superintendency, he served as Managing Director of the School District Consulting Practice at the American Institutes for Research (AIR) and as CEO/President of four different companies in the K-12 learning marketplace.  Joseph began his career at the investment firm Piper Jaffray, where he spent 12 years as an investment banker in the firm's public finance department. 

In addition to his teaching role at Tulane SoPA, Joseph serves as an Adjunct Professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Education, where he teaches graduate level courses focused on educational leadership, school budgeting and entrepreneurship.  He serves as an Academic Visitor at the Harvard Kennedy School, where he leads sessions for graduate students on school district leadership, financial management and school choice/desegregation.

Joseph holds a BA degree from the University of Chicago and a Masters in City and Regional Planning from Harvard Kennedy School. He has been married to his wonderful wife Judy for 35 years and they have one daughter, India, who graduated from the University of Chicago and is now a professional ballerina in Connecticut.