Former Orange Superintendent Hired by Westminster School District
Dr. Gunn Marie Hansen has landed a new gig, less than two months after she was unceremoniously fired from the Orange Unified School District.
Hansen will serve as Superintendent of the Westminster School District at an annual salary of $335,000. The vote for Hansen was unanimous.
“Dr. Hansen is widely considered one of the best superintendents in California as she won over a dozen professional awards over the past decade,” WSD said in a news release. “Most notably in 2021 she won the Orange County School Board Association Maureen DeMarco Award for Exemplary Superintendents and in 2022 the Orange County 4th District Parent Teacher Association (PTA) Outstanding Superintendent Award. Dr. Hansen served the Orange Unified School District for thirteen years including nearly six years as Superintendent, with prior administration and teaching experiences in Compton USD, Montebello USD, the LA County Office of Education, and as a professor at California State University in Los Angeles. She has devoted 32 years of public- school service to students, staff and community focusing on the core value of supporting educational excellence and ensuring successful operations of award-winning schools.”
WSD's board president called Hansen “one of the best Superintendents in the entire state.”
That sentiment is not shared by OUSD’s conservative school board majority. The board abruptly terminated Hansen over winter break. The firing shocked and outraged many parents and twachers, as Hansen was widely considered a popular leader.
OUSD Board President Rick Ledesma later said Hansen had been “focusing too much on the social politics of education.”
See also:
Orange School District Hit With Two Brown Act Lawsuits Over Superintendent Firing
