Fairfax County, VA, School Superintendent Makes More Than the U.S. President
“runs a declining school district with about 180,000 students”
Fairfax County in Virginia has become a lightning rod for explosive political stories, whether it’s about secret gender transitions in public schools or crimes committed against Americans by illegal immigrants. It’s a bastion of progressive policies.
Now we are learning that the superintendent makes significantly more than the President of the United States, and she is not the only employee making a small fortune.
The Daily Signal reports:
When Local Bureaucracy Pays Better Than the Oval Office: Fairfax County’s Salary Problem
Fairfax County Public Schools Chief Equity Officer Nardos King makes $288,064 this year—more than every single member of the president’s Cabinet—Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, all of them—each of whom earns $253,100 to run a federal department.
King’s job is to oversee equity initiatives for one county’s school system. Virginia’s largest public school district holds “equity” at the center of its strategic plan, and King is just one of ten district “chiefs” whose salaries clear that bar. A public records request revealed that 13 Fairfax County Public School employees earn more than the U.S. Secretary of Education.
By comparison, Virginia’s Secretary of Education, Jeffery Smith, makes $229,136. In other words, it is more lucrative to be an assistant superintendent overseeing a small region of one Virginia county than to run the Virginia Department of Education.
At the top of the heap, Michelle Reid, Fairfax schools’ superintendent, is paid $469,936 a year—nearly $70,000 more than the President of the United States makes to run the executive branch, command the armed forces, and set foreign policy for 340 million people. Reid, by contrast, runs a declining school district with about 180,000 students.
So the district is losing students, too? Apparently, so.
The Washington Times reported back in May:
In August 2025, Fairfax County Public Schools purchased the former King Abdullah Academy in the western part of the county for $150 million. The purchase adds to a growing set of data points highlighting the district’s irresponsible leadership.
Skyview High School, the name school board members unanimously approved for the new school in February, has been in the district’s capital budget planning since 2015 to address overcrowding and expectations of an increasing student population.
Those projections, however, didn’t account for the mass exodus of students fleeing from a public school district in significant decline.
From 2015 to 2025, Fairfax County Public Schools experienced the largest decrease in student enrollment of any district in the state. It lost 6,894 students, according to the University of Virginia Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service. From 2020 to 2025 alone, enrollment fell by 11,348 students.
The district’s enrollment is expected to decline by an additional 6.6% from 2025 to 2030, according to Weldon Cooper Center projections.
Just stunning.
MY GOSH: When Local Bureaucracy Pays Better Than the Oval Office: Fairfax County’s Salary Problem
"Fairfax County Public Schools Chief Equity Officer Nardos King makes $288,064 this year—more than every single member of the president’s Cabinet—Secretary of State Marco Rubio,… pic.twitter.com/BxIlu8kkmW
— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) September 27, 2026
When did public school administrator jobs become a path to such wealth?
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Comments
LARPing as a net good pays well, doesn’t it.
On the ballot this november are two ballot measurse for more fairfax county spending. Such arrogance and disrespect is shown the taxpayer.
Counting futures and stocks?
Corruption, plain and simple.
It isn’t just a school superintendent. Virtually every public sector school employee is obscenely overpaid, administrators especially but also teachers. Spare me the garbage about poorly paid teachers. It’s all bovine scatology.
“When did public school administrator jobs become a path to such wealth?”
The entire Democratic Party business plan is to gain power so they can funnel tax money to themselves and their friends.
Solyndra. Bullet Train. Bridge to Nowhere. Big Dig. Mass Turnpike. Baby2Baby. SPLC. Offshore wind farms. Acorn. PBS/NPR. Planned Parenthood. Commie universities. Name some more.
Nardos King, Chief Equity Officer, makes more than every single member of the president’s Cabinet because…….equity baby!!!
Used to live in Fairfax county and subway commute to DC to work. At the time it was one of the most high-income demographic places in the US – 1st place I lived where the banks had to offer fee-free overdraft protection w. ACTUAL employee phone calls to customers to get customers.
Concierge banking FTW.
At that salary ranking, the public schools he “supervises” must have the highest literacy and grade-level metrics in the country, right?
Right?
RIGHT?
Well, all the students speak at least two languages.
But are they literate in either of them?
A common complaint within the Haredi community is that our schools, in which we invest a lot of money and a lot of hope and pride, turn out students who are illiterate in four languages.
This is the US. The only language for which literacy matters is English.
Stop wondering where your school taxes go or what children don’t learn what kids did 50 years ago. There is your answer
If only it were just that bad. The County Board of Stupidvisors rubber stamps school board budgets. Budgets go up while enrollment declines. And then there’s this:
Superintendent Michelle Reid, who pays a great deal of lip service to “equity,” makes $469,936 a year, plus a $12,000 car allowance. She also has four around-the-clock personal security staff.
https://www.wmal.com/2026/09/22/71-fcps-central-admins-make-over-200k/
Please just make NoVa (especially Fairfax) part of MD. It has ruined VA.
That would require the consent of the VA legislature, and with a large Dem majority in both houses why would it approve that?
Fairfax County dysfunction at it’s best.
At least, when Babe Ruth was asked about making more money than the president, he responded: “What the hell has Hoover got to do with this?” demanded the Babe. “Anyway, I had a better year than he did.” With the student performances, few, if any, superintendents should be paid more than GS-15 wages.
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