Booker High School Principal Named 2019 Principal Of Year

SARASOTA, FL — Booker High School Principal Rachel Shelley was recently named Florida Art Education Association’s 2019 Principal of the Year for her support of the arts in education.

“Dr. Shelley is our boss, our fearless leader and a champion of the arts for all of our students, in both the visual and performing arts magnet for our district, and as a healthy general education arts program,"said VPA film and animation teacher, John Timpe, who spearheaded Shelley's nomination.

"She is taking this a step further this year by building intensive reading language classes that entice student participation through programs such as music production," Timpe added.

Shelley, who has been principal since 2011, oversees the school’s Visual & Performing Arts program.

Under her leadership, the VPA program has thrived, with student works winning awards, as well as earning accolades by organizations like Niche.com, which ranked Booker High School as the 11th best school in Florida for the arts.

During her leadership, the school has had numerous Embracing Our Differences winners, while the theater department won the state title of best production at the annual Florida Theatre Conference. The Film & Animation department also produced its first professional-grade documentary that was adjudicated as a Sarasota Film Festival entrant.

"Even outside of the arts magnet program, Shelley is known throughout the school for beefing up arts opportunities," said school officials. "Early in her tenure as principal, she lamented the meager options for those students not enrolled in VPA. At that time, students only had an opportunity to take an elective in fine art, and the school had just one teacher in the general education fine art position."

Every student at Booker High School now has quality arts classes in not only visual art, which is supported by two full-time teachers, but also digital design, filmmaking, dance and music regardless of their ability or interest in enrolling in VPA, according to school officials.

The Florida Art Education Association was founded in 1952 with the mission of promoting art education in Florida by empowering teachers and administrators in their work of arts advocacy.