LAUSD superintendent Carvalho resigns amid FBI probe

Alberto Carvalho has resigned as superintendent of Los Angeles Unified School District effective June 21, 2026, saying he is stepping down to avoid further disruption amid an ongoing FBI investigation tied to an LAUSD AI chatbot contract. Acting Superintendent

On Sunday night. Alberto Carvalho announced he would formally step down as superintendent of Los Angeles Unified School District—an abrupt end to a four-year tenure now shadowed by an ongoing FBI investigation. By June 21. 2026. his resignation was effective. leaving students and staff in an interim phase where leadership questions are no longer theoretical.

Acting Superintendent Andrés Chait will continue running LAUSD while the school board decides on a permanent replacement for Carvalho. But the board has not outlined a timeline or a process for selecting that next superintendent—an uncertainty community groups and education advocates say the district can’t afford.

The stakes are heightened by what LAUSD is already contending with: mounting budget deficits, declining enrollment, and political uncertainty. Experts and advocates emphasize that in moments when district leadership can change priorities quickly. continuity isn’t a luxury—it’s what helps programs hold together.

The school board said in a statement it remains committed to “ensuring stability. continuity. and continued progress through strong leadership.” Its focus. the board said. remains unchanged: providing every student with a high-quality education. supporting its dedicated workforce. and maintaining the trust of the communities it serves.

Carvalho’s decision is tied to an FBI investigation that appears to concern his relations with AllHere, a now defunct company that developed the district’s AI chatbot, Ed. LAUSD entered into a $6.2 million professional services contract with AllHere.

The FBI investigation has not been publicly detailed. Still, the timeline of events has already shifted LAUSD’s internal rhythm. In February 2026. two days after the FBI raided Carvalho’s home and LAUSD headquarters and searched a residence in Florida. the school board placed him on paid administrative leave. He continued receiving his annual salary of $440,000 and other benefits.

At the time of those actions, Carvalho denied wrongdoing. His attorneys at Holland & Knight LLP said they hoped he would be reinstated.

Carvalho now says he is resigning to avoid further disruption and to allow LAUSD to focus on serving students. In a letter released through his attorneys. he thanked students. families. educators. and community members for their support during his tenure. writing. “The successes we have achieved belong to you. I will miss all of you and will continue to pray for the success. health. and wellbeing of every student and family in our District.”.

Federal authorities have not publicly disclosed details of the investigation, and it remains unclear when more information may become available.

What happens next is a question LAUSD families are likely to feel immediately. Chait will continue as acting superintendent while the board determines its next steps. John Rogers—Associate Dean for Research and Public Scholarship in the UCLA School of Education and Information Studies—said he wished the resignation had come earlier. so the school board would have more time to conduct a search for a new. permanent superintendent before the start of the next academic year.

Rogers and others also want clarity around how LAUSD will search. Marsh and other community members feel the board should look within first, and Rogers said he hoped the district would cast a broader net and conduct a nationwide search for the next superintendent.

Community groups and education advocates have been blunt about the cost of delay. Reclaim Our Schools LA—a coalition that works to improve access to Los Angeles public education—said prolonged instability is especially dangerous when the district is dealing with federal attacks on public education. declining enrollment. budget pressures. attacks on marginalized communities. and persistent inequities. The coalition said that uncertainty in leadership has made it harder to work toward real solutions.

The district isn’t only replacing a superintendent. This year, LAUSD is also losing two academic chiefs: Deputy Superintendent of Instruction Karla Estrada and Chief Academic Officer Frances Baez.

Julie Marsh. a professor of education policy at USC. said research shows that these turnovers often create organizational instability—when someone new might shift priorities or stop reforms. She warned that that shift can affect staff morale and make it harder to sustain programs and policies, creating disruption.

Marsh added that new leaders can feel pressure to make their mark, “and that may not be the time for it right now for us to see someone new come in with all new ideas.”

Nicolle Fefferman—a longtime LAUSD educator and co-founder of the Facebook advocacy group Parents Supporting Teachers—stressed transparency in a future leader. She also said Chait’s leadership appears to be encouraging. comparing LAUSD’s needs to work rather than spectacle: LAUSD doesn’t “need a racehorse. What we need is a workhorse.”.

For Elena Price, the urgency is personal. Price has two children in district elementary schools, and she said student progress depends on leadership that stays grounded in what families can see and influence.

“Leadership comes and goes. Our students remain,” Price said. “And my hope is that L.A. Unified uses this transition as an opportunity to strengthen its partnership with parents and stay focused on what matters most: student success.”

Carvalho’s resignation also brings a sharper reassessment of a tenure that both won supporters and intensified criticism.

Carvalho became superintendent in 2022 after leading Miami-Dade County Public Schools for 14 years. He took office as schools emerged from pandemic-era disruptions, with recovering learning loss and reducing chronic absenteeism among his stated priorities.

During his tenure, student test scores improved to pre-pandemic levels. Attendance improved, and the share of students completing A-G coursework required for admission to the University of California and California State University systems increased, according to district data.

Rogers said he credited the district for those improvements while acknowledging Carvalho’s role: “I reflect on Carvalho’s tenure as a time when there were some improvements laid out across the district. and I credit the entirety of the district for those improvements — and have to acknowledge that Carvalho was a leader during that time.”.

In his resignation letter, Carvalho pointed to what he described as historic progress. He said LAUSD raised academic performance on the Smarter Balanced Assessment to the highest levels in the district’s history and surpassed pre-pandemic achievement levels. He cited what he called the highest graduation rate ever. expanded Advanced Placement participation and success. increased LAUSD magnet programs nationally recognized for excellence. significantly reduced chronic absenteeism and increased daily attendance. and secured the largest school modernization bond in the nation’s history. He also referenced negotiating responsible workforce agreements while preserving free healthcare access for employees.

He also emphasized equity. writing that low-income students. students with disabilities. foster youth. and Black and Latino students exceeded their pre-pandemic performance. Carvalho said the district’s executive leadership team valued achievement and equity and placed the most vulnerable students at the center of its agenda.

Yet Carvalho’s tenure was also marked by controversy.

Critics questioned the district’s handling of arts education money, the dismantling of the district’s former Primary Promise intervention program, several cyberattacks and data breaches, and aspects of its response to the 2025 L.A. wildfires.

Fefferman said the district had repeatedly failed to meet responsibilities she described as grave toward children and schools. She said. “There have been numerous occasions over his tenure where we witnessed what we thought were grave derelictions of responsibility to our children and to our schools.” Fefferman said Parents Supporting Teachers had called for Carvalho’s removal early. and she described the resignation as a chance to move forward: “Finally we can be done with this part of the LAUSD story. and hopefully move on to something better.”.

Rogers said he wasn’t “sure that Carvalho always created the most supportive environment for educators in the system.”

For many immigrant families, Carvalho earned particular praise. Evelyn Aleman. founder and CEO of the nonprofit parent group Our Voice/Nuestra Voz. said he understood the immigrant experience and that she had never seen a superintendent take on the cause of immigrant families and vulnerable children in the way she described. Our Voice/Nuestra Voz had previously called for Carvalho to be reinstated.

“He understood the immigrant experience,” Aleman said. “Being an advocate at L.A. Unified for four decades now. I have never seen a superintendent take on the cause of immigrant families and vulnerable children… He was really trying to raise the bar in terms of the quality education that these children received.”.

Ultimately, the investigation around AllHere and Ed has become the central thread in Carvalho’s fall. The district entered into a $6.2 million contract with AllHere on July 1. 2023. and it unveiled the chatbot. Ed. as a virtual assistant designed to help students navigate school resources and services the following year.

The project unraveled quickly. The company’s founder and CEO Joanna Smith-Griffin left and was arrested in November 2024, charged with securities fraud, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. Most employees were furloughed.

Carvalho announced a taskforce to examine what went wrong, but no progress or outcomes have been publicly disclosed.

During the raids connected to the FBI investigation. the FBI also searched a residence in Southwest Ranches. Florida. in Broward County. That residence was reportedly linked to Debra Kerr. an AllHere contractor with ties to Carvalho from when he was superintendent in Miami-Dade. Kerr’s son, a former AllHere employee, told The 74 that he had pitched the company to LAUSD.

Rogers said leaders across California and the nation are still trying to navigate a new AI landscape. “This is not to take responsibility away from Carvalho for the decisions he made. ” he said. “but I do think many educational leaders don’t have sufficient information and are trying to figure out in a context of rapid change and insufficient information how to move forward.”.

Before the resignation announcement, unions had already signaled that they wanted Carvalho replaced. Last week. leaders of the largest LAUSD unions—United Teachers Los Angeles and SEIU Local 99—expressed wanting Carvalho to be replaced. according to the Los Angeles Times. UTLA said in a statement that after months of uncertainty around district leadership. the news of Carvalho’s resignation “does not come as a surprise.” UTLA also said the next superintendent must ensure district resources are invested where they matter most—in schools and classrooms rather than “in billions of dollars’ worth of outside contracts.”.

The sequence of events since the FBI raids has left LAUSD with fewer options than it might normally have. Paid leave in February gave the district time to wait while questions grew louder. Now. with Carvalho’s resignation effective June 21. 2026. the board has the same task—finding a leader who can stabilize a system facing budget deficits. declining enrollment. and major staffing changes—without a clear window for how quickly a permanent superintendent can be installed.

Carvalho’s letter framed the resignation as a choice meant to protect focus on students. “Because I believe our schools must remain focused on students and learning without distraction, I am resigning as Superintendent of LAUSD effective today, June 21, 2026,” he wrote.

But for many families and educators, the immediate reality is that learning can’t wait for process. With Chait acting in the interim and the board still deciding how to select a permanent replacement. LAUSD is entering a new chapter defined by a question people in classrooms understand instinctively: how much uncertainty can schools absorb before it spills into day-to-day decisions that affect students?.

LAUSD Alberto Carvalho Andrés Chait FBI investigation AllHere Ed chatbot superintendent resignation school board UCLA School of Education and Information Studies Julie Marsh John Rogers United Teachers Los Angeles SEIU Local 99 chronic absenteeism Smarter Balanced Assessment A-G coursework