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During lunch at the Broad reception this afternoon, Miami superintendent Anthony Carvalho did take the podium on behalf of his district, and the awkwardness between him and his predecessor, Rudy Crew, continued, our source reports.

Carvalho, who our source notes spoke suavely and has a full head of hair, praised his district’s (recently dismantled) School Improvement Zone, a group of troubled schools where teachers work longer hours for more money, and Parent Academy, which trains parents to become involved in the schools. Rudy Crew, who was seated nearby, launched both initiatives. Carvalho didn’t mention him at all.

To answer my earlier question, Rudy Crew did in fact represent Miami during the discussion about urban school leadership that preceded the Broad Prize announcement this morning, according to our source at the event. His successor as Miami’s superintendent sat in the audience and watched, probably somewhat uncomfortably.

But freshly confirmed Miami-Dade superintendent Alberto Carvalho should try to enjoy his moment out of the spotlight: Since he was given Crew’s job in September, Carvalho has been under fire for having an improper relationship with a reporter on the schools beat and for the opaque process by which he was selected. Today, he’s enjoying an awards ceremony and catered lunch in MoMA’s picturesque statue garden, but tomorrow, he’ll have to face his critics once again.

Rudy Crew

Over at the Museum of Modern Art right now, philanthropist Eli Broad, Chancellor Klein, and hundreds of other education-oriented folks are gearing up to award the 2008 Broad Prize for Urban Education. Unlike last year, there’s no clear frontrunner, but my money’s not on Miami, nominated this year for the third time in a row.

The Miami-Dade County Public Schools have had a tumultuous 2008. This past spring, superintendent Rudy Crew, New York’s chancellor from 1995 to 1999, won the American Association of School Administrators’ National Superintendent of the Year award — and then was run out of town by an angry school board last month. Superintendent since May 2004, Crew helmed the system for all of its Broad Prize nods, awarded largely because Miami’s test scores gains have outpaced the rest of Florida’s. Is Miami’s new superintendent, who’s spent his entire career in the city’s schools, representing the system at today’s ceremony?