Karolyn Belcher joined Achievement First in October 2022 as its Interim Superintendent. A seasoned education executive, Karolyn is focused on improving students’ experience in schools and academic achievement across the 41 AF schools.

Prior to this role, Karolyn was the Chief Academic Officer of the Charleston County School District (CSSD). In that role, she was responsible for leading the academic improvement strategy for South Carolina’s second largest school district, which included CCSD’s curriculum adoption, professional learning, COVID recovery planning, and school turnaround in identified Acceleration Schools. Under her leadership, CCSD students outperformed the state average in all state tests in 2022, the first testing year after the pandemic. Additionally, there was significant improvement among the twelve Acceleration schools – with four being removed from the state improvement list in 2023.

Karolyn was President of TNTP and oversaw all the organization’s partnerships with school systems nationwide to address their most pressing student achievement challenges. She was the principal of the John A. Reisenbach Charter School, one of the first three charter schools in New York State, located in central Harlem. She began her career teaching science in New Orleans as a charter corps member of Teach For America