Led in part by the Revere Public School Committee’s Student Representative Elni De Jesus, Revere High School held several focus groups with staff, parents and students at the end of March to find out what they are looking for in a new RHS principal and vice principal.
Last month, RHS Principal Dr. John Perella and Deputy Principal Leah Tuckman both submitted their resignations to School Superintendent Dr. Dianne Kelly–leaving a void in leadership at the high school for the 2022/2023 school year.
De Jesus has been working with school administrators to help foster the process to find replacements for Perella and Tuckman.
At the last school committee Dr. Kelly presented De Jesus’s data she compiled from the focus groups. De Jesus was not on hand due to last week being school vacation week.
In her report, De Jesus said the data that’s been collected so far from the RHS staff and student focus group found that staff and students are looking for a new principal and vice principal whose characteristics include empathy and flexibility. Somebody who has experience in competency based learning and detracting and performance assessments.
They also want somebody who’s a good communicator and responds to emails in a timely manner.
De Jesus reported that the focus group was also seeking someone who was hard working and had good organizational skills, understands social emotional needs of students and adults, notices the difference between a big issue and a small issue, is forthright and honest and has some extensive critical thinking skills.
During the focus group among parents, De Jesus reported parents are looking for someone that will enforce the dress code, enforce RHS’s code of conduct, and somebody who’s fair but firm.
Parents also want a RHS principal and vice principal that plans more community events and engages families and students in decision making. “All of these traits are important to everybody and all of this information will be shared with the community on our website,†said Dr. Kelly. “We’ve also engaged the Colin Center to help us with this search and they’re going to do a second round of surveys and focus groups with teachers and students and parents and I’ll have more information on that
