Mike Mattos
"Change is the space between who we are and what we hope to become. Unless we are willing to enter this space, we can not improve."
Mike is a former principal of Marjorie Veeh Elementary School and Pioneer Middle School in Tustin, California. At both schools, Mike helped create powerful PLCs, improving learning for all students. In 2004, Marjorie Veeh, an elementary school with a large population of youth at risk, won the California Distinguished School and National Title I Achieving School awards.
A National Blue Ribbon School, Pioneer is among only 13 schools in the US selected by the GE Foundation as a Best-Practice Partner and is one of eight schools chosen by Dr. Richard DuFour to be featured in the video series The Power of Professional Learning Communities at Work™: Bringing the Big Ideas to Life. Based on standardized test scores, Pioneer ranks among the top 1 percent of California secondary schools and, in 2009 and 2011, was named Orange County's top middle school by the Orange County Register.
For his leadership, Mike was named the Orange County Middle School Administrator of the Year by the Association of California School Administrators.