Area teachers move into leadership role
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By Cristina Kumka STAFF WRITER - Published: June 17, 2009
There's a transition happening at schools in Sudbury and Leicester — teachers are taking on new administrative roles.
Katherine Grodin of Middlebury, the teaching principal at Sudbury Country School, will join veteran principal Carol Eckels at Leicester Central School as the co-leader of that school beginning next school year, to ease Eckels' retirement out of the school.
Replacing Grodin at Sudbury is Susan Coombs of New Haven, a kindergarten through sixth-grade special education teacher at the Robinson School in Starksboro.
Coombs will start at Sudbury by next school year as an 80 percent employee, splitting her time as principal and as a kindergarten teacher.
Grodin will enter the Leicester school as the principal for 60 percent of the time and Eckels will mentor her and stay employed with the school district for 30 percent of her time as the co-principal.
The split leadership positions in Leicester and dual role in Sudbury are favored practices by the district, according to Rutland Northeast Supervisory Union Superintendent William Mathis, who said Wednesday that the positions were out of necessity or made for smoother transitions and will have a "neutral" effect on the individual school budgets.
Mathis said Grodin's starting salary is $35,000, Eckels will be paid $21,275 and Coombs will make $54,000.
There is no definitive timeline for Eckels retirement, according to Mathis.
In Sudbury, Mathis said Coombs' hiring had little to do with a school merger proposal recently voted down by residents.
Prior to the public's rejection of the proposal, the district was considering retaining only one principal for a merged school in Leicester, Sudbury and Whiting called the LSW Community School, but now, it's back to status quo with each school having its own principal, Mathis said.
The two new administrators were selected by the town's school boards following searches that included newspaper advertisements and Internet postings, Mathis said.
Coombs, a 51-year-old special educator for the last 12 years with a master's degree in education from the University of New England and who recently received a provisional principal's license, said she took the job after her time was reduced to 60 recent at the Robinson School following budgetary constraints.
"A teaching principal is the best of all worlds because I get chance to be in all the trenches, be among colleagues and teachers and make important decisions that need to be made," Coombs said.
Coombs will face a smaller school with 30 students and according to Mathis, will be presented an "exciting challenge with three of Sudbury's four teachers being new this year."
Grodin, a 32-year-old with dual master's degrees in history from the New School and in educational organization and leadership from Teachers College at Columbia University, said she was looking forward to working with Eckels.
She said the challenges of her new position were yet to be seen.
"That (having Eckels as a mentor) will make the transition easier and it will enable me to work with the same colleagues," Grodin said.
"I look forward to experiencing Leicester Central School's uniqueness."
cristina.kumka@rutlandherald.com
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