Thursday, August 16, 2007

Long-time classroom teacher ready for first year as principal and Valley Falls mayor

by Clarke Davis

A parade of students through the neighborhood and a slice of watermelon will mark the first day of school Friday at Valley Falls.

Susan Grey, the new K-8 principal, said an 8 o’clock program for parents will include instructions on what the school will have available on the web site and presentations by the Recreation Commission and the Parent-Teacher Organization.

Parents will then join their children in the classrooms prior to a watermelon feed.

“The high school students are invited to join everyone for watermelon before we dismiss at 11,” she said.

Besides settling children into their rooms and acquainting them with their teacher, the purpose of the day is to get parents into the building.

“We want the adults to learn that they are welcome and that we want their involvement,” she said.

The school wants to increase the number of volunteers in the building and Grey said the staff will be better organized to utilize their help.

“Teachers are going to make a list of their needs,” she said. “They will need tutors and people who will listen to students read. We will also have jobs for those who aren’t comfortable working with children.”

“There will be opportunity for everyone to help us,” she said.

New this year will be some nights set aside for parents to visit the school to see what their children are doing.

“It will just be a couple of grades at a time, maybe the fifth and sixth and then the third and fourth on another night,” she said. “We will let the students do the planning and preparing for it.”

Grey, 41, came to Valley Falls for her first teaching job 18 years ago.

She said she would never have bet at that time she would have stayed this long but “Valley Falls got into my blood — the whole community — it’s like a big family.”

Her community service landed her at city hall where she served six years on the city council and she now has the unique status of being both the school principal and mayor of the city.

Grey is a Seaman High School graduate and was raised with six siblings. Her youngest brother, Scott Stanley, is a Meriden grocer, and her parents, Lee and Joanne Stanley, reside near Perry Lake. She is a divorced mother of two children, Jennifer, 21, and James, 14.

She graduated from Washburn University and has a master’s in curriculum design from Texas Wesleyan and a master’s in school leadership from Emporia State University. She has also been a part-time field consultant for the Curriculum Leadership Institute working with a district near Chicago.

During her tenure at Valley Falls, she taught all the elementary grades except kindergarten and fourth and was involved in curriculum development in every subject.

Is there a downside to becoming the principal over a staff of which she was a member?

“There’s more positives than negatives,” she said. She was a leader in curriculum development and she believes her knowledge of the present system gave her one up on someone from the outside.

As for the staff, she said she knows their strengths and respects every last one of them.

“This is a highly qualified staff,” she said. “I knew that going in.”

Amy Sherretts, Valley Falls, will be a new fourth-grade teacher at Valley Falls this year. She has taught the last 16 years at McLouth. New to the middle school are Jeff Schneider, Olathe, social studies and computer tech., and Brandy Turner, language arts, coming from the Auburn-Washburn district.

New vocal music and band teachers are Karla Lero and Ryan Nichols, respectively.

The two sections of second grade will be combined this year with an expected 22 students.

Grey was president of the city council and became mayor upon the sudden and unexpected death of Mayor Robert Zieg in April.

“It was very sad. I had the utmost respect for Bob,” she said. “He was there for all the right reasons. There was no hidden agenda.”

Grey said she enjoys being the mayor and will continue to work for the city in that capacity provided she doesn’t run into too many conflicts.

If there are conflicts, it’s the mayor’s office she will forfeit. She’s paid $20 a meeting.