ABOUT DAVID
David M. Corvi
EDUCATOR. AUTHOR. COACH.
Leadership Coach at Lynch Leadership Academy, Boston College — and the practitioner behind Fix Your Tier 1 Instruction.
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"I lead because I believe the best ideas live in the people around me. My job is to facilitate learning, so we find them together."
DAVID’S STORY
Practitioner first.
Researcher-informed.
David Corvi arrived at Forest Hill Elementary School in Camden, New Jersey, as its new principal with a clear-eyed understanding of what was at stake. Camden is one of the most underfunded school districts in the country. Forest Hill was on the state's Priority Schools list — a designation reserved for schools where students are falling furthest behind. ELA proficiency stood at 2.8%. Math was similarly dire. These were not statistics. They were children AND adults whose everyday classroom experience was not working for them.
What followed was not a single program, a consultant's framework, or a mandated initiative. It was a deliberate, sustained effort to fix what was broken at the source: Tier 1 instruction — the everyday learning experience of every student in every classroom.
By the time David's tenure ended, ELA proficiency had grown by 603%. Math proficiency by 766%. Forest Hill was removed from New Jersey's Priority Schools list entirely.
The work had been done TOGETHER with students, teachers, families, and leaders. It had been done by building a school where adults learned as rigorously as students and where the principal was not a manager of operations, but one of its most committed teachers.
Most people think effective leaders have all the answers. David has spent his career proving the opposite — that the best leaders are the ones who know they don't, and build the conditions for others to find them.
David's work in education is grounded in a belief that runs deeper than professional experience. In 2021, he and his wife Katherine lost their son, Charlie, to stillbirth. In the years that followed, David wrote Dear Charlie… Letters to My Son — a collection of letters that explore grief, remembrance, and love. He and Katherine also founded the Charles Martin Corvi Fund in Charlie's memory, supporting families navigating pregnancy and infant loss.
That experience shaped something essential in how David understands leadership: that bearing witness to the struggles of others, and creating the conditions for them to move forward, is not just a professional obligation. It is a form of service.
Learn more at charlesmartincorvi.org.