Political career In 1977, Roosevelt served as campaign manager for
John D. O'Bryant, the first black man elected to the
Boston School Committee. In 1990, he was appointed Chairman of the legislature's Education Committee, where he was the co-author and chief sponsor of the
Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993. He also was chief sponsor of a gay rights bill that had been introduced annually since 1972 but did not pass until 1989. The bill's passage made Massachusetts the second state, after Wisconsin, to pass legislation protecting gay rights. in
Danvers In
1994, Roosevelt was the
Democratic nominee for
Governor of Massachusetts and lost the general election to the Republican incumbent,
William Weld. Roosevelt and Weld were second cousins by marriage, as Weld's first wife,
Susan Roosevelt Weld, is also a great-grandchild of President
Theodore Roosevelt. Following his bid for office, Roosevelt served as CEO of Massachusetts Biomedical Initiatives, Managing Director of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education, and as a Professor of Politics and head of the Gordon Public Policy Center at
Brandeis University.
Pittsburgh Public Schools A graduate of the 2003 Broad Superintendents Academy, Roosevelt was appointed on August 3, 2005, to the position of Pittsburgh Public Schools (PPS) superintendent. He accepted this post under the terms of a performance-based "accountability contract." While in Pittsburgh, he implemented measures intended to ease the district's financial problems and improve academic standards. The plan included the closing of underutilized and under-performing schools, opening of accelerated learning academies with a vigorous academic curriculum and longer school hours, the moving of several programs, and an increase in the number of childhood education programs, K-8 schools and 6-12 schools. Under his leadership, PPS met federal achievement standards (AYP) for the first time, received a $40-million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation focused on improving teacher effectiveness, opened several innovative new schools, adopted a more rigorous curriculum, and inaugurated a nationally recognized program to recruit, train and support school principals as instructional leaders. In October 2010 he became a finalist for the position of President of
Antioch College. On October 6, 2010, he held a press conference to announce his resignation as superintendent of
Pittsburgh Public Schools effective December 31, 2010. It was reported that he was the only finalist for the Presidency of
Antioch College in Ohio.
Antioch College Roosevelt served as president of
Antioch College from 2011 to 2015. Hired to reestablish the college, which had closed, Roosevelt helped to recruit faculty and students, began a renovation of the campus; and reestablished Antioch's cooperative education program. He also led a process that resulted in "fast-track" accreditation consideration for Antioch from the Higher Learning Commission. The college won accreditation in July 2016. He negotiated an agreement between the College and
Antioch University that eliminated any future claims of the university to Antioch College's campus or endowment. On May 5, 2015, Roosevelt announced his departure from Antioch by the end of the year. Dr.
Thomas Manley was hired as his successor, to begin in March 2016.
St. John's College Mark Roosevelt was the seventh president of the
Santa Fe campus of
St. John's College, which also has a campus in
Annapolis, Maryland, replacing Michael P. Peters. He took office on January 1, 2016. In June of that year, the St. John's Board of Visitors and Governors voted to make Roosevelt the college-wide president as of July 1, 2016. During his tenure as president of St. John's, Mark Roosevelt was allegedly involved in a union-busting campaign against student workers.
Other work Roosevelt has also taught graduate level courses on the intersection of American history and public policy at
Brandeis University and the Heinz Graduate School of Public Policy at
Carnegie Mellon University. ==Family==