Richard Whitmore has been deeply involved in California public education from a variety of perspectives, from community volunteer to district and state leadership.  He began his public education work at the California Department of Education, serving as Chief Deputy Superintendent and overseeing the day to day work of the state agency.  He has been a superintendent in Davis, Los Gatos, and Lafayette, as well as serving as the state administrator in the Compton Unified School District.  His career also includes a leadership role in one of the state’s premier research and service organizations, WestEd, where he most recently served as Chief Administrative Officer and originally joined as the Chief Financial Officer.  His education experience includes fifteen years as a school board member, professional and trustee service in independent schools, consulting with charter management organizations, and work in higher education at Stanford University where he was one of a four-member strategic planning team.  He also contributed consistently to his local community through chairing the local school foundation (LASF, now LPIE), classroom volunteering, parent committees including site councils and PTA’s, and athletics as a long-time swimming official, president of the Lafayette Girls Lacrosse Association, AHS boosters rep and team parent for boys water polo.  He continues to be an active volunteer and is currently a board member at the College Futures Foundation, a member of the Obama Scholars Advisory Council at Occidental College, and the Board Chair at EdSource, California’s largest journalism organization focused on education. He was born and raised in eastern Maine, was Maine’s Presidential Scholar, and is married to a Lafayette native, Jacinta Pister, with three adult children. He is a graduate of Stanford University and has a masters degree in Business Administration from Harvard University.