Clarke Central High School Principal Dr. Swade Huff (left) and Assistant Principal Dr. Sheila Dunham (right) attend a press conference hosted by the ODYSSEY Media Group on Aug. 28. In the press conference, Huff and Dunham spoke on the process of hiring an additional assistant principal for CCHS. “We’re just gonna divide the obligations up into five equal parts, as opposed to four, which will definitely make it more manageable in terms of meeting our obligations in a timely manner,” Huff said. “Because it can become taxing having the lunch rotation and doing the hall sweeps to try to make sure everybody’s in the classrooms.” Photo by Krista Shumaker
The Clarke County School District will hire a third Assistant Principal to join the Administrative Team at Clarke Central High School in response to the school’s increase in student body population.
The Clarke County School District posted a job opening for an assistant principal at Clarke Central High School on the CCSD Career Opportunities page within the first two weeks of the 2018-19 school year. Currently, CCHS has two Assistant Principals: Dr. Sheila Dunham and Reginald Thomas. The third assistant principal would work alongside them and the rest of the Administrative Team.
“Each year, it seems like our numbers have been increasing as far as student body population, and, this year, we are hovering right around 1,800 kids. That’s a lot more than we’ve had in the past,” Thomas said. “Based on the amount of students, the district felt like it was necessary to honor our request that we have an additional administrator.”
The job posting for assistant principal was removed from the Career Opportunities page on Aug. 18 in order for school personnel led by CCHS principal Dr. Swade Huff to conduct applicant interviews. Huff hopes that hiring a new administrator will alleviate the current workload of the Administrative Team.
“That person coming on board will definitely be a part of the teacher evaluation process, provide good customer service to our parents, address discipline as needed (and) support extracurricular opportunities that we have in the school,” Huff said. “Basically, all the areas of focus that we have now as administrators, we’re just gonna divide the obligations up into five equal parts as opposed to four, which will definitely make it more manageable in terms of meeting our obligations in a timely manner.”
According to Huff, Phase One of the hiring process has been completed.
“We interviewed this past week and after the Labor Day weekend, there will be a Phase Two of the interview process with Dr. (Demond) Means at the District Office to vet the top two candidates. So, hopefully in a week or so, when we come back from the Labor Day weekend, we’ll have a new addition to the Admin. Team,” Huff said. “The more hands on deck, I feel like the better off we will be as a school.”
According to U.S. News & World Report, there were 1,419 students at CCHS in the 2015-16 school year, meaning the student body population has increased by nearly 400 students in three years.
For science department chair Valinda Miller, an alternative means to address the increase in student population would be to hire teachers rather than a single administrator.
“I think it would help the teachers more (than hiring an assistant principal) if we were able to hire more teachers,” Miller said. “Just by having that bio teacher that’s teaching two classes, instead of me teaching 36 in each class, I got 32. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but it does make a huge difference. So instead of having 160-170 kids, I got about 145.”
When it comes to managing the student population, junior Oscar Robles feels that the responsibility lies in the students themselves.
“I honestly don’t think it’ll help any kind of disciplinary situation if we just keep adding more administration,” Robles said. “I feel like, just the culture that students have among themselves is something that we, as a student body, need to change for us to better ourselves in the disciplinary area.”
With a hiring upcoming, Miller hopes to see the new assistant principal engaging with the increased number of students.
“I think the new assistant principal needs to be visible. Students need to know who he or she is,” Miller said. “I think it’s all about relationships with the students and I believe our new principal (Huff) has kind of ingrained that with the current administration and I’d like to kind of see that more.”
