Dr. Nikolai Vitti (Screenshot from "Let It Rip")
Newly minted Detroit Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti says he plans to send his four children --- two of them special needs students -- to Detroit public schools.
"I look forward to putting my four children in public schools here in Detroit," Vitti told Fox 2's "Let It Rip" hosts Huel Perkins and Charlie Langston on Thursday evening. He said he is searching for a home in the city.
"I deeply believe in the public schools. I think it is the vehicle for social change," said Vitti, who will earn $295,000 a year.
Before taking the Detroit job last month, he was superintendent of Duval County Public Schools, a 130,000-student district in Jacksonville, Fla. (Detroit has 40,000 students.) He earned two Harvard University education degrees -- a master's in 2006 and a doctorate in 2012. He also has a master's from Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., where he earlier was a history major who graduated magna cum laude in 2000.
Vitti, a native of Dearborn Heights, also talked about the learning challenges he had growing up.
"I am dyslexic. I struggled throughout elementary, middle and high school. I started to wake up the latter part of high school. I was an athlete. That was my ticket to college, and then I woke up up intellectually... ended up thriving in school."
Family photo from Let It Rip
Vitti, who is white, is married to an African American woman he met in college. He said after two months of dating, he proposed to her. He said they've been married for more than 16 years.
During the interview, he also said he plans to give teachers raises and improve the district so it can better compete against open enrollment districts in the suburbs.
