Ben Chavis

Who is Ben Chavis?

Ben Chavis is a former principal and outspoken leader in the education reform movement. His tenure as the principal at American Indian Public Charter School was both successful in raising performance and enrollment and controversial for his methods. He is the author of Crazy Like a Fox; One principal's triumph in the inner city. Chavis featured in the documentary film Flunked.

Chavis is a Lumbee Indian. The eldest of six children, his alcoholic father died while he was young. Chavis grew up in Robeson County, North Carolina. He attended Oklahoma City University on a track scholarship and then Pima College and the University of Arizona, on an academic scholarship. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in education. He also worked as a school janitor to help pay for his education. He got a master's degree through night classes at Northern Arizona University and continued his education at the University of Arizona with doctorate degrees in education, philosophy and anthropology.

Chavis became a professor in the ethnic studies department at San Francisco State University in 1988. He was superintendent of schools at an Indian reservation in Fort Apache, Arizona. Then in 2001, he was recruited by Oakland's Native American community to take over the struggling American Indian Public Charter School in Oakland.