DETROIT, MI – When Kevyn Orr took over as Detroit’s Emergency Manager, he was heralded by Gov. Snyder as a “turnaround specialist.” At Detroit’s once-troubled Denby High School, Kenyetta Wilbourn developed a reputation of her own as a turnaround specialist and she is now tasked with doing the same at Mumford High School with a tighter window than Orr has for the city.

“I’m from Detroit and I matriculated through the [Detroit Public School] system,” Wilbourn, 36, said. “I knew that at the end of the day, I knew how to run a school in the inner city. I know what it takes to establish an environment for learning.”

Wilbourn looks to repeat her success at Mumford High School, which she has been principle of for less than two weeks. She is slowly getting to known the students. On Wednesday afternoon, the 4-foot-11 Wilbourn made an impression wearing head-to-toe camouflage The former Army reservist made inspections on her new schoolâs JROTC classes, April 15. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com)

Wilbourn, who goes by the nickname “K.C.”, has been at Mumford for less than two weeks and is still getting acclimated to her new environment. She decided not to hold a grand assembly announcing her arrival to students and staff because she “is not a politician” and would let her actions speak for themselves.

She was in her fourth year at Denby where she’d led a stunning turnaround at what was regarded as one of the city’s most dangerous schools – “It was the worst,” she says bluntly. She instituted strict security policies – including checking hall passes, beefed up security, foot patrols, and an 8-foot wrought iron fence around the building – that helped chase violent gangs out of the building.

“You could conceivably take Denby High School, and unless you saw the black faces that come out of it, you could pick that school up and put it anywhere,” she said. “You would not know the difference. The neighborhood is clean. The inside of the building is clean. The hallways are clear.

“One thing I will be consistent in is that young people who engaging in disruptive and violent behavior will be dealt with and met with aggression. At the end of the day, we have to get back to a place of teaching people how to be civil. And we have a youth problem in this city. It wasn’t germane to Denby.”

On Wednesday afternoon, the 4-foot-11 Wilbourn made an impression wearing head-to-toe camouflage with a 'Principle' patch on her left chest and 'Wilbourn' on her right. The former Army reservist made inspections on her new schoolâs JROTC classes, April 15. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com)

Standing just 4-foot-11, she held a commanding presence at the school. She even carried a metal baseball bat around the building, drawing comparisons to Joe Clark – the New Jersey principal who was immortalized by Morgan Freeman in the 1989 film Lean on Me – and drove her own car around the building on security patrols before and after school. Her passion comes to the surface when talking about the city’s children and the culture of violent behavior.

“There’s a youth problem because there’s a parent problem,” said Wilbourn, who has a 13-year-old son. “Most folks don’t want to own that. When you are in a working class community, and you still have nothing better to do than to associate yourself with foolishness like gangs, that’s problematic for me.

“To have a $54 million facility, or to have a community to call yours, and you still choose to involve yourself in foolish behavior, then it’s time for us to have a conversation.”

"I was going to work at Kentucky Fried Chicken"

Wilbourn grew up on the city’s east side, graduated from Martin Luther King High School, and later Spelman College in Atlanta. She is currently finishing her PhD in education at Eastern Michigan. A former Army reservist, she even wears her camouflage uniform on Wednesdays in unison with the school’s JROTC classes.

Wilbourn is also a survival story, having survived sexual assault and molestation as a child. She points to an accident in June 1996 that left portions of her body covered with third-degree burns as the turning point in her life. A week removed from her college graduation, Wilbourn was severely burned by scalding hot water while working at a Kentucky Fried Chicken in Atlanta.

“Even though I had gone through the teacher’s program at Spelman, I was going to work at Kentucky Fried Chicken,” said Wilbourn, who still remembers the exact day and time of the accident. “I just felt like things happened for a reason. When I returned to Detroit, I decided to [be a substitute teacher] at a Catholic school. I found that the attitudes of the privileged were no different than that of the poor kids.”

Kenyetta "K.C."Wilbourn, 36, is known as a âTurnaround specialistâ for Detroit Public Schools. In 4 years at Denby High School she was able to turn around what was regarded as one of the cityâs most dangerous schools. Wilbourn looks to repeat her success at Mumford High School, which she has been principle of for less than two weeks. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com)

Wilbourn dedicated her life to helping underprivileged kids who she felt deserved same things that children from other families had in their lives. She worked her way through the ranks before landing the Denby job in 2010.

She had visions of building Denby into a diamond in the rough, one that could eventually be on par with the “Big Three” of DPS: Renaissance High School, Cass Technical, and her alma mater MLK. On March 29, as she headed on a trip to Italy during Easter break, she got a call that changed everything.

“We were coasting along at Denby, and then I get a call saying we are sending you to Mumford and you can select someone who can sustain your legacy at Denby,” Wilbourn said. “I got that information on Friday morning, my plane was leaving for Italy at 12 noon, and I had no time to process it. So immediately when I got back on the following Friday night (April 5), I had to had to be ready for work on Monday, and I’m here.”

So, with seven weeks left in the school year, Wilbourn finds herself in a completely new environment, with a new staff, hundreds of unfamiliar students and parents, and 17 months to come as close to duplicating her success at Denby as possible. (Orr has 18 months to turnaround the city, and likely could get an extension, if needed. Wilbourn may not be eligible for such an extension.) Mumford, like Denby, is part of the Educational Achievement Authority – a group of 15 DPS schools, including six high schools, which were deemed by the state to be failing. The transfer over to EAA started last fall and has been a work in progress.

“I’m inheriting some operational issues relative to efficiency,” she said. “There are no systems in place that are sound and that are necessary for operating the school. There’s a heavy gang problem inside of the community and inside of the school. So we’re trying to identify who the usual suspects are.

“Hopefully, I’ll be able to show evidence – not hopefully – I will show evidence to my bosses that I am not only qualified, but I’m equipped to serve in a higher capacity,” she added, referencing her desire to eventually become a superintendent. “There won’t be pockets of inefficiency within the school district. That’s what made the blow [of leaving Denby] a little easier. I hope they see it.”

On Wednesday, the 4-foot-11 Wilbourn made an impression wearing head-to-toe camouflage with a 'Principle' patch on her left chest and 'Wilbourn' on her right. The former Army reservist made inspections on her new schoolâs JROTC classes, April 15. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com)

The school was already in flux after the EAA transition, with many teachers, students, and administrators still trying to adjust to the new system. A sudden change at the top has further complicated matters, but the staff is adjusting.

“Being under a new school district, it has been an adjustment for our students,” said Dr. Melissa Eads, Mumford’s vice principal. “They didn’t recognize any familiar faces. But I feel we’re doing a good job as far as working with our culture and climate and getting that together.

“(K.C.) has been introducing herself to students and getting to know them,” she added. “It is an adjustment getting a new principal this time of year, but we are making the adjustment. We’re all here to support.”

Mumford is a new challenge

Mumford, which originally opened in 1949, boasts famous alums such as producer Jerry Bruckheimer, former Michigan State and NFL standout Derrick Mason, and current ESPN reporter Jemele Hill. The school reopened last fall after a $54 million renovation, which included a new gymnasium, auditorium, a pool, and revamped library. Much like Denby, many of the school's old problems with gangs and violence also remained prevalent in the new building.

New Mumford High School, Principle Kenyetta "K.C."Wilbourn, checks with security during students' lunch hour in the cafeteria on her patrol Wednesday afternoon, April 15. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com)

Wilbourn saw what she was up against as soon as she walked through the doors at Mumford. She saw hallways packed full of kids during class periods – a huge no-no at Denby – and kids arriving hours late for school: “In the corporate world, coming in three hours late is called unemployment,” she said. There is a very loose dress code, another policy she squared away at Denby, which will be addressed in the fall.

She has made it a stated goal to increase the police presence in the building (the day the interview was conducted, three new Detroit Police officers were entering the building for the first time) and has made safety one of her top priorities. She will continue to maintain her zero tolerance policies from Denby and insists that parents step up to the plate for their children.

"We had kids who were truant in the building on my first day," she said. "If you're not going to go to class – we don't have a latch key service for high schoolers – then you've got to go home. Well, their mother came in and said 'this is just your first day' and called me a 'motherf----r'. When did we get to a point where there was no relationship with the school?

"I wouldn't go to a doctor and curse him out, knowing he's about to perform surgery on me. We have to stop that. We have to make a decision: either we're going to lift our children up and prepare them and let them take some of those lumps or we're going to be enablers."

"I'm the last of a dying breed."

Sports car

Wilbourn’s aggressive, no-nonsense style may not rub everyone the right way, but it has been effective and she has no reservations about breaking a few eggs along the way. She hears criticism of her methods and largely brushes it aside.

“There’s always going to be somebody who’s not satisfied with your performance,” said Wilbourn, who drives a luxury car and has dealt with criticism for doing so. “I’m in school full-time. When I wake up in the morning, I have 10 minutes to say hello to my son. When I get home, I have maybe 15 minutes to talk to my son.

“The days that I’m not at Eastern, I’m still at school. After busting my ass all day, if I want to purchase a spaceship, I think I’m entitled to do that. I find it very interesting that people are very critical and concerned about my personal business, but they can’t say anything about my performance.

“They ask ‘why would she drive a Maserati in the neighborhood with the kids?’ Well, drug dealers do it all the time. Pastors do it all the time. The same way a drug dealer can do this, if you go to school and make the right decisions, you can do it too.”

When her tenure ends at the end of the 2013-2014 school year, she openly talks about wanting to take on a much larger role within the school system and feels that she is being tested with this abrupt move across town. Her stated goal is to have reformed and rebuilt the system at Mumford and her confidence has not wavered.

“Ultimately, I’m not going to change,” she said. “I think I’m the last of a dying breed. I totally believe in what I do. When I say that I am the turnaround specialist and this is what I do: This is what I do. I didn’t learn it in a book, but it’s perfected and it’s proven.”

Follow Jay Scott Smith on Twitter @JayScottSmith