Terry Hall

She finds lots of parent involvement

It’s not that Terry Hall has never experienced parental involvement – in fact she just spent two years opening a new school near Atlanta where parents were excited and committed. It’s more that Davidson Elementary is a school with, well, an unusually high level of parent interest.

“I’m getting about 60 e-mails per day,” noted Ms. Hall, who began her new job as the school’s principal on July 1. “I’ve actually had days where I’ve set aside time from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. just to meet with parents. The parent involvement here is more than I’ve ever seen before.”

As she adjusts to her new role, Ms. Hall is dealing with teacher cuts the school district made before her arrival, preparing for a new school year, becoming familiar with a new town – and facing all those parents who want to say hello and talk about their kids.

“Now I’m putting that parent time on hold, because I need to get ready for the teachers,” Ms. Hall said.

The teachers start work on Tuesday, Aug. 18. The school welcome-back picnic follows on the 23rd, the open house is the 24th and the first day of classes is Tuesday, Aug. 25.  Ms. Hall doesn’t glance at any calendars as she recites those dates – they are all imprinted in her mind.

HOW SHE GOT HERE

The search for a new principal started in February, when Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) announced that former principal Celeste Spears-Ellis was moving  to Allenbrook Elementary in Charlotte as part of a district-wide effort to shift principals from high achieving sites to schools that are struggling. (See our Feb. 10, 2009, story “DES principal Ellis to transfer to new school.“)

Last spring, a principal selection committee formed to help guide the search for a new school leader. The nine-member committee included people from the school staff, Parent-Teacher Association, School Leadership Team and the community. The committee spent two days interviewing candidates, ranked the applicants and then presented CMS Superintendent Peter Gorman with a single name: Terry Hall.

Terry Hall has already set up her new office in Davidson Elementary School.

Ms. Hall has a master’s degree in educational leadership and administrative supervision from the University of Georgia, and spent three years at a low-achieving school with a high percentage of students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunches. She was able to help close the achievement gap at that school, which earned federal recognition for academic progress during her tenure. Ms. Hall then helped open a new school that has posted high test scores and has demographics and achievement levels that compare to Davidson’s.

She also has deep familiarity with the Davidson area. Ms. Hall was born in upstate New York, but her family has since gravitated south. Her mother has lived in the Charlotte area for more than 20 years, and now resides on Lake Norman. In addition, Ms. Hall’s husband’s brother used to live in Davidson.

“His wife, Mary Hall, was a teacher’s assistant at Davidson Elementary,” Terry Hall said. “We used to visit and even then I could see myself being a part of this town.”

Terry’s husband, Frank, is a chiropractor planning to open a new office in Charlotte. As they work to sell their home in Atlanta and search for a new permanent residence, the Halls are currently renting the Dilworth home of a Davidson College professor and his wife. The Halls have three grown sons who have all come to Davidson this summer to see “mom’s new school.”

“They’ve all toured the school, and so has my mom and my two sisters in Raleigh,” Ms. Hall said. “The whole family has been a part of this move.”

DEALING WITH STAFF CUTS

Even as she has been meeting parents and giving tours to family, Ms. Hall has had to deal with the impact of deep cuts to education funding that the state has handed down to the school district.

Since the end of the school year, CMS has cut 1,175 jobs due to budget reductions, and almost 57 percent of those positions were held by teachers. (See Aug. 3,  “Local public schools feel the pain of teacher cuts.”) At Davidson Elementary, the cuts meant the school lost four classroom assistants (Jeannette Allen, Cathy Brandon, Shirley Christmas and Tamala Rock), third-grade teacher Nicole Beebe, art teacher Jen Faulkenberry, and assistant principal Charles Copeland. (Note: on Tuesday, Superintendent Peter Gorman told the school board that changes in the budget mean he should be able to re-hire about 286 teachers, as well as some school counselors and secretaries. See his presentation on the CMS website (PDF format).)

Enrollment, meanwhile, is going up.

Ms. Hall said the school is now at well over 900 students.  The fifth grade will be the largest class, requiring seven teachers.  (Teachers Katie Ruzinsky and Patricia Strike will move up from fourth to fifth grade.)

“This summer alone, we’ve probably registered more than 45, and not that many have dropped,” Ms. Hall said.

She is hoping the enrollment increase will allow her to rehire Ms. Beebe for the third grade.  Ms. Faulkenberry has joined the art department at Hopewell High, and her part-time art position will be taken over by Evelyn VanHecke, who will divide her classroom time between Davidson Elementary and Davidson IB Middle, where Ms. VanHecke has been the art teacher for several years.

Ms. Hall said the school will not be getting another assistant principal and she is not expecting to get more classroom assistants.

“We had 12 assistants and we’ve had four cut,” she said.  “Initially, every kindergarten class needs an assistant.  That leaves four assistants to be split among the upper grades.  We can adjust that later in the year.”

She said the losing an assistant principal position has meant that she and Assistant Principal Laney Edwards have had to make some changes.

“We looked at our administrative work and delegated some duties,” Ms. Hall said.

She pointed out that budget reductions are a reality that districts across the country, including the district Ms. Hall just left in Atlanta, cannot avoid.

“It’s not like we have fluff,” she said, “but I feel very comfortable with what we have here.”

Ms. Hall has also been impressed with how staff have helped out, even in the face of cutbacks.  She said several staff members came in to work shifts at the front desk during the summer, some to get administrative hours in for degree work and some volunteering personal time.

“My first two weeks I didn’t know where the bathroom was much less how to register new students in North Carolina,” Ms. Hall said with a laugh.  “We had staff here registering students, answering phones, filling in.  It’s just an incredible team.”

LEARNING THE ROPES

Ms. Hall has already met members of the PTA, the School Leadership Team and the CMS North Learning Community.  She has also met Davidson Mayor John Woods, and is looking forward to meeting other educators in the community, whether they are at charter schools or private schools.

Ms. Hall shook hands with Davidson Mayor John Woods and PTA President-Elect Beth Cashion during a community meeting in June.

“Mayor Woods is going to help me arrange meetings with the other schools in Davidson – I want to understand what they are all about,” Ms. Hall explained.  “It’ll be really nice to open that door.  After all, we share this community.”

She said the school will be unveiling a new math curriculum this year, a CMS pilot program known as “Math Investigations” that will start with grades K-2 and be optional for grades 3-5.  Davidson Elementary will also be setting up five new Promethean Boards, a kind of high-tech interactive whiteboard, provided for classrooms by the PTA.

Ms. Hall is hoping to work with the teachers to create a new team consisting of representatives from each grade level who can collaborate on gathering classroom input and setting the schoolwide vision.

She is already working with the School Leadership Team to bring to Davidson a citizenship program she created in Atlanta called “HIP.” That stands for being Helpful, having Integrity, and feeling Proud of your school.

“We can be HIP Tigers,” Ms. Hall said.  “It’s a program to teach social skills and how to be a positive citizen.  I’m hoping to have paw prints to hand out for HIP behavior.  At my last school we were the Kangaroos, so I handed out ‘Joey’s.’”

Overall, as she looks forward to a new school year, Ms. Hall said she is not seeking “to make a mark” as the new principal, or change things that are already working well, like the Tigers on the Prowl running program, which she appreciates as a runner herself.

“This is not a year when I can sit back and watch,” she said.  “This school runs beautifully, but I’ll have new ideas and I will do tweaking.  The overwhelming feeling I have is the responsibility of taking a school of this caliber and keeping it building and growing.”

RELATED LINKS

See our previous coverage on Ms. Hall’s arrival:

• June 5, “Davidson meets new principal Terry Hall”
• April 17, “New principal was top choice of community committee”

Charlotte Meckelnburg Schools wrapup of Tuesday, Aug. 11, school board meeting, including superintendent’s presentation on re-hiring laid off teachers and staff.

Aug. 12, 2009, Charlotte Observer, “Gorman: CMS to restore 286 teacher jobs.”