After a month of interviewing, the Princeton Regional School Board has selected PHS’s new principal.
By:Robert Sgobbo
The end of the 2000-2001 school year concluded with the departure of PHS’s principal, Dr. John Kazmark. Kazmark’s three-year position was marked by a series of accomplishments, such as creating the programs of credit completion and summer school. As the time came near for Kazmark to leave, PHS anxiously waited to see who would be the next principal, and if the new one would be as successful.
The start of the principal search began in June when the 2000-2001 school year was about to end. It was then that Mr. Lew Goldstein, director of the Human Resources, was put in charge of the search.
Under Goldstein’s plan, applications for those applying for Kazmark’s job had a deadline of May 18, 2001. From those applicants, board members and teachers were to conduct the interviewing process. At that point, board members, teachers, as well as two students, Cameron Hoyler and Andy Skemer, from interviews chose the best nominations, and then the final principal.
Unfortunately, many big plans such as this can skew. Goldstein’s original deadline of May 18 had been pushed back due to the lack of applicants applying for Kazmark’s job. In response, Superintendent Dr. Claire Sheff Kohn expanded the search by having the New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association help recruit applicants.
Goldstein in effort to find a principal placed advertisements in many prestige papers around the country, including The New York Times. He put a job description of a PHS principal and the qualifications an applicant must have on the Princeton Regional Schools web site.
"The candidate must be passionate about working with a talented student body and staff and be able to collaborate with diverse constituencies within a supportive, actively involved community. Outstanding oral and written communication skills, leadership strength and a sense of humor is required."
While this sounds more like a description of a perfect politician than a perfect principal, the fact is a politician is what students want. "The students want a principal who isn’t going to make radical changes, much like Dr. Kazmark," explained Andy Skemer, editor-in-chief of Princeton High School’s student newspaper, The Tower.
In an opinions article from The Tower written by Michael Schwartz, he wrote "Instability destroys the way a school is run…If we have the ability to do something one day and then things radically change in the blink of an eye, whether it be in the middle of the year or in the middle of four years, students and teachers alike get thrown off pace, upsetting the way everyday business is conducted…rhythm is key to getting through it all…Now, all that is left is the past and all that could have been the Kazmark future is no more."
These ideas by the students were shown in the April 27, 2001 issue of The Tower. Student polls revealed about 65 percent of students felt that Kazmark had an "excellent" or "above average" administration at PHS.
After a month of interviewing, the Princeton School Board held a special session on July 10th at Valley Road Administrative Building. This meeting was held especially to vote on the appointment of PHS’s new principal, Ms. Sandra DeLuca.
DeLuca has been working at PHS for the past three years. When she first came she was hired as an assistant principal, which she held for two years. Last school year she held the position of PHS’s guidance director.
"In many cases it is the assistant principal who acts as the disciplinarian of the school," said DeLuca. "But I have always viewed my job as a guidance counselor. You deal with student issues and personal issues as an assistant principal. It is the same issues that guidance counselors deal with."
Upon coming to PHS, DeLuca had a resume full of different occupations one might not expect a principal to have, such as law clerk, Mercer County assistant prosecutor, and a special agent in the Naval Investigative Service.
"I try to downplay these occupations in the sense of being a disciplinarian. Yet all these different experiences help you to work with people. The law background helps with thinking skills and people with problems," DeLuca said.
Ironically, Princeton Regional School District held a nationwide search for a principal who turned out to be working within PHS. Yet this is only history repeating itself when a nationwide search was held for Kazmark, who at the time was principal of Johnson Park Elementary School, one of four in the district. With PHS once again picking a person to be principal within its own district, the question is if it has found the principal that would bring stability to the school and push it for the better.
Dr. Jeffrey Graber, assistant superintendent of Princeton Regional Schools, worked directly with Goldstein in the interviewing process. The interviewing committee, which he was part of, gave the recommendation of DeLuca to Superintendent Kohn whom made the final decision.
"Ms. DeLuca is the best one for the job…she is very student centered and has good interpersonal relationships…she has excellent knowledge of the school and is ready to move forward with the renovation," said Graber. DeLuca had applied for the job when the opening came up. She was picked out of five finalists in the interviewing process.
"It was a window of opportunity when this job came up. I thought it would be a good challenge, like when I came to become an assistant principal here in the beginning. When I first came here I never thought I would become principal," said DeLuca.
DeLuca as principal has many challenges she will face. Aside from the regular work with handling the school’s curriculum, staff, and students, DeLuca has a new project to work on that has no precedence. DeLuca will have to guide the school’s extensive renovation project approved by Princeton voters last May. PHS’s renovation will fix up existing parts of the building as well as expand the school to add new facilities.
"I want to view this time as a fun and positive time. It is a unique period that will pose challenges. Such challenges will be scheduling difficulties and keeping the curriculum intact. Working with staff and students, as well as working with the curriculum, are my main objectives that go above the building project. I also don’t want to get too hung up on the distractions this project will cause, because it should be a time we can make a mark on our school," said DeLuca.
DeLuca has also other plans for PHS- revising the attendance policy and helping PHS stay clean. "Students shouldn’t feel entitled to the eighteen absences they are allowed by the state," said DeLuca. "I also want to increase the cleanliness of the school. I hope to have eating more contained in the cafeteria."
One problem that DeLuca does not have to face, she believes, is being the seventh principal in the last decade. "It’s [PHS] a tough, unique, and good place. It is a very prestigious place and people tend to move on. I don’t feel being the seventh in line poses any problem for me. All I know is that I’m committed to this school and I’m staying," said DeLuca.