Baldwin-Whitehall School District: Changes To School And District Leadership

Press release from Baldwin-Whitehall School District:

July 6, 2021

Dear Families of the Baldwin-Whitehall School District,

"We are pleased to share with you some changes within the school-level leadership of our District's administration. These changes will become effective on July 6, 2021, although a period for transition will occur in early July as well.

Aligning each one of our principals and assistant principals into roles that both challenge and engage their experience, strengths, and passions at this time is a very important step on our path toward our new school building plans, which will eventually take effect when R.A. Lutz Elementary opens in 2023.

A full list of school-level leadership roles for the 2021-2022 school year can be found on the next page.

Some highlights of our realignment include:

• Baldwin Middle School will now operate as a satellite office within Baldwin High School, rather than as a subsidiary of BHS's administration, placing greater emphasis on serving the unique needs of our 7th and 8th grade students.
• Mr. Scott Ross has been officially promoted to the role of Middle School Principal where our District community will benefit from his 25 years serving this age group with significant depth of experience.
• Ms. Melissa Ferguson will be joining us in a permanent role as Assistant Principal at Harrison.
• Ms. Patricia Fusco has been appointed to become the Principal of McAnnulty Elementary and its current K-1 student community, which will eventually become a Kindergarten center for the entire District, an incredibly powerful alignment of her skills and focus on the nurturing environment that will become the foundation for every family we welcome into the District through their Kindergarten experience.
• Mrs. Heather Wessel has been appointed as the next Principal of Harrison Education Center where her skills and talents acquired as a primary teacher, former assistant principal at Paynter Elementary, and principal at McAnnulty will lead those students and staff into the future.
• In addition to these existing offices, Dr. Kara Eckert will be charting the course of a newly-created role of Coordinator of Student Engagement, whose responsibilities will include counseling services, ESL, and diversity & inclusion among other important initiatives.
• We are actively recruiting for the role of Principal at Whitehall Elementary School and welcome your referral of qualified candidates.

Our new administrative realignment has been carefully considered in order to maximize the strengths of each one of our team members as they enter a crucial two-year transition period for our District.

Thank you for everything you do to support our administrators in their daily work and to create a robust and engaged school community through which our families, teachers, and staff work together to create a meaningful, memorable and unique experience for every student we serve.

I look forward to working alongside this team as they lead our schools to all-new levels of success."

Sincerely,

Dr. Randal A. Lutz

Superintendent of Schools

Baldwin-Whitehall School-Level Administrative List

(Effective July 6, 2021)

Baldwin High School (Grades 9-12)

Principal Mr. Shaun Tomaszewski

Assistant Principal/Athletic Coordinator Mr. John Saras

Assistant Principal Ms. Candee Nagy

Assistant Principal TBD (new hire)

Baldwin Middle School (Grades 7-8)

Principal Mr. Scott Ross

Assistant Principal Mr. Jon Peebles

Harrison Education Center (Grades K-6)

Principal Ms. Heather Wessel

Assistant Principal Ms. Melissa Ferguson

Assistant Principal Ms. Alicia Johnson

Whitehall Elementary School (2-5)

Principal TBD (new hire)

Assistant Principal Ms. Laurel Rader

McAnnulty Elementary School (K-1)

Principal Ms. Patricia Fusco

Coordinator of Student Engagement

Dr. Kara Eckert

This press release was produced by Baldwin-Whitehall School District. The views expressed here are the author’s own.