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Andrew Pulido

Principal Kimberly Figueroa-Oliveira is in her first year as the principal of Daniel Pearl Magnet High School after former Principal Armen Petrossian left in June.

New Principal Kimberly Figueroa-Oliveira’s views on the role of education are shaped by her past. When she was attending Manual Arts Sr. High School in Los Angeles, her family was evicted from their apartment and they were left homeless.

Eventually, she moved up north to Palmdale, where she stayed with her uncle in a room she shared with her cousin. She was heartbroken over losing the opportunity to graduate with her friends as she had to attend Lancaster High School instead.

“I have a different perspective of how I see students,” said Figueroa-Oliveira, Daniel Pearl Magnet High School’s new principal. “I try to see all students, all of them because I feel like we never know what our students are going through… In those difficult times, it was a lot of my teachers who I related to, who were also first-generation (students), that got me through those tough times. It’s a combination of ‘I see my students. I know the journey that you’ve been through.’”

On June 11, former Principal Armen Petrossian announced in an email that he was stepping down as principal. He is now the assistant principal at Ulysses S. Grant High School. Petrossian did not respond to a request for an interview sent in an email on Aug. 20. A Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) spokesperson did not provide any information on why Petrossian left DPMHS, citing confidentiality. To fill the vacant principal position, the Los Angeles Unified School District appointed Figueroa-Oliveira, who has experience in various positions at several schools in the district, during the summer.

After graduating from Lancaster High School, Figueroa-Oliveira enrolled in the University of California (UC) Berkeley, where she majored in political science and ethnic studies. 

“We were still homeless. The first day I was at Berkeley, I cried again because I was like ‘oh, at least I got my dorm,’” she said with a slight quiver in her voice. “Even though it wasn’t the best senior year, at least I got into Berkeley and I had a dorm.”

During her time at UC Berkeley, she tutored at Castlemont High School and Oakland High School through the Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) program. She enjoyed her work on AVID, where she ensured college readiness for students from underrepresented communities. She also interned at an immigration law firm since she planned to become an immigration lawyer. As an intern, she noticed something startling: Lawyers worked long hours. That wasn’t going to work for her because she was pregnant with her first daughter. 

“I need to be able to have a career where I love what I do but also have time to focus on my baby,” said Figueroa-Oliveira, who now also has a 2-year-old daughter.

Although she was passionate about immigration as a child of immigrants, a law career wasn’t going to work for her and her daughter. After her time in AVID, she thought that teaching might be viable for her future. Then, she discovered Teach For America. In the program, she got an opportunity to be an intern who taught children while still in college.

She reached out and sent a heartfelt letter to the program. In the letter, she wrote about her experience of being forced away from Los Angeles due to homelessness and her desire to return. Not only was she admitted into the program but she also returned to teaching at her former high school, Manual Arts Sr. High School.

At Manual Arts Sr. High School, she was the special day class teacher and later worked as a resource teacher. Additionally, she pioneered the implementation of the AVID program at her school and later became its coordinator. Then, she was promoted to the special education coordinator.

After that, Figueroa-Oliveira moved around schools in Los Angeles. She went to Barack Obama Global Preparation Academy and became an intervention coordinator. From there, she worked as a transition teacher at Robert Fulton Middle School, Nobel Middle School, Charles Leroy Lowman Special Ed & Career Transition Center and John A. Sutter Middle School. 

The following year, she became the special education coordinator at Robert Fulton Middle School, then the assistant principal. Finally, LAUSD relocated her to Panorama High School for the same position and then promoted her to principal at DPMHS.

“I am feeling super excited,” Figueroa-Oliveira said about her new position. “It’s a combination of excitement and nervousness. I just want to be good by the school, by the community. I want to do right by you guys.”

Figueroa-Oliveira was particularly impressed by the work of the video production department, specifically a short film made by advanced video production students titled “The Library,” which went on to win in the Sora-School-Stars competition this past spring.

“When I saw that video, I was cracking up,” Figueroa-Oliveira said. “The cherry on top was the phone in the jello. I was like, ‘I cannot. I cannot.’”

Figueroa-Oliveira also has new solutions developed for the various programs at DPMHS. She plans to create committees where individuals can discuss the promotion and expansion of DPMHS’s enrollment. In these meetings, they would also address the individual needs of every department.

“A part of it is just coming up with ideas together as one brain,” Figueroa-Oliveira said. “Then, coming up with out-of-the-box ideas. Multiple brains are always better than one. Let’s try different things so that each program feels like it’s being taken to the next level… It’s all about how we work together to expand our school, but each individual program and what specifically they might need.”

But she will also need to take action on an issue that’s remained consistent within the school: low enrollment. Last year, to combat the problem, the Pearl Ambassadors program was created in an attempt to attract students to DPMHS. Figueroa-Oliveira believes that the problem shouldn’t be approached solely by expanding enrollment. Instead, she hopes to also take action on retaining students as well.

“Let’s make sure our kids feel empowered here and we have school spirit,” she said. “We need to look at culture and climate and survey our students to see what their opinions are and what their recommendations are. Let’s promote and get new enrollees. And I might discover other things once I start surveying my other teachers, which I did. But I also want to survey my parents. I also want to survey our students. It has to be a combination of different voices and different perspectives in order to really see.”

Although Figueroa-Oliveira acknowledges that there are many challenges in the path ahead for DPMHS, she is hopeful. She believes that as both a leader and a team player, the administration can surpass its problems through collaboration.

“She brings a different vision or eye because she’s coming from different experiences and a different sized school,” Magnet Coordinator James Morrison said. “Some of the stuff she has seen at her school, we may be able to implement here in a different way. Whenever you have someone new come in, you see something in a different perspective. I’ve been here through the whole life of the school. Since I’ve been here so long, sometimes I miss things. Sometimes I’m used to seeing things in a certain way and she catches these things and sees them in a different light.”