Listening her way across the city. Budgeting her way to perdition.

Dr. Jeanice K. Swift was not the Ann Arbor Board of Education’s first choice to lead the Ann Arbor Public Schools. The search for Dr. Patricia Green’s replacement began in April 2013. The BOE relied on a “fast track” hiring approach. Incredibly, the Trustees rehired the same search firm that had turned up Superintendent Green who, in the middle of a late-night school board meeting, and after two years on the job, slipped her letter of resignation to BOE President Deb Mexicotte. Ray and Associates said they would allow AAPS to take advantage of the “two-year guarantee.” If AAPS were to hire the firm again, then only expenses – such as travel for candidates – would need to be paid. No fee would be charged for the search itself.

The result of that search brought Dr. Swift to Ann Arbor. She spent twenty-five years as classroom teacher, principal, teacher coach and district administrator. Prior to being hired to lead the AAPS, Dr. Swift served as Assistant Superintendent for Instruction, Curriculum, and Student Services in Colorado Springs School District 11. Standing barely five feet tall, Swift has brought serious game to the job. She has spent, literally, months out in the field on a “listening tour” at which parents have been asked to give input on what her top priorities should be and what they would like to see the AAPS change. It was a move as crazy as it was brilliant. What superintendent after all, would spend literally weeks with Ann Arbor parents who have a well-earned reputation for chewing up superintendents then spitting them out?

Dr. Swift’s real challenge begins in January 2014 when the AAPS begins its annual Budget Limbo. She faces a dwindling fund balance that stands at $9.4 million, a structural deficit and a debt load almost equal to her district’s annual budget. She faces  a financial precipice at the bottom of which stands an emergency financial manager. She has said that “everything in one the table” this year, including redistricting.

She’ll have to whip into shape her district’s financial accountability, improve its transparency and tackle an achievement gap that has made Ann Arbor the poster child for rich districts that can’t educate minority children as well as non-minority children. Dealing with a Board of Education whose members’ frustrations with each other—and interminable meetings—sometimes boil over will be a challenge, as well.

Will Dr. Swift try to sell Ann Arbor voters an enhancement millage in order to avoid more draconian cuts to student programs and teacher layoffs? This question, among others, is why she’s on our list of Ann Arbor locals to watch in 2014.