Susan Stevens has accepted the position as the new Head of School at Chilmark School. Superintendent of schools James Weiss announced Ms. Stevens's appointment last Friday, after public interviews of her and two other finalists were concluded on May 21.
Susan Stevens. Photo courtesy of Bak Middle School
Chilmark School's current leader, Diane Gandy, will retire at the end of the school year.
"I spoke with Mrs. Stevens last night at her home in Florida and she was truly excited to be joining our team," Mr. Weiss wrote in an email to The Times on May 29. "She will bring broad experience in both classroom and special education as well as many years as a guidance counselor and building coordinator to this position."
In a follow-up phone call yesterday, Mr. Weiss said Ms. Stevens's three-year contract sets her salary at $82,000.
Ms. Stevens currently works as an exceptional student education (ESE) coordinator at the Bak Middle School of the Arts in West Palm Beach, Fla. Her students include special education students who are disabled and gifted students. She has about 600 gifted students that she oversees, about 200 at each grade level, and about 30 to 40 ESE students, making a total of about 727 students under her guidance "umbrella."
"Her experience is really with much bigger schools, but she's played a role within them that I think will put her in good stead in terms of Chilmark School," Mr. Weiss said.
Enrollment at the Bak Middle School, a public arts magnet school, is 1,300 students. At Chilmark School, Ms. Stevens will oversee 33 students in grades K-5.
"I got an email from a friend of mine today, who said, 33 kids, you'll know all the families and their cats and dogs and grandparents," she laughed.
Ms. Stevens already got some insider tips from a former Chilmark School student who happens to attend Bak Middle School.
"Before I came up for my interview, I interviewed her," Ms. Stevens said. "She had two negatives - one was when you climb in a tree, there's a rule she thinks is stupid - only two to a tree - and the other is that she didn't like the food. Otherwise, she told me positives about every teacher she had."
Ms. Stevens said the student also offered insight about how she felt being in Chilmark School's multi-grade environment, which was very helpful. "She probably gave me more information than anybody else, because she actually lived it - she didn't see it from the outside," Ms. Stevens added.
In her current position, she supervises four special education teachers and works a lot with individualized instruction, Ms. Stevens said. "That's important, because I know at Chilmark School, every class has to have differentiated instruction based on multi-grade levels."
Chilmark School has three combined classrooms, K-1, 2-3, and 4-5. A preschool housed at the school is operated independently.
Ms. Stevens's background includes experience as a teacher in a grade 4-5 class in one of her first teaching jobs. "I didn't have a full-time aide - and I had more kids in my class than they have at Chilmark School," she said with a laugh.
Chilmark's head of school position involves the same responsibilities as a principal, but is a 10-month rather than 12-month position. Ms. Stevens will serve as one of two administrators in the Up-Island Regional School District's two schools, the other being West Tisbury School.
As a cost-cutting measure suggested by Mr. Weiss, the new Chilmark head of school also will work part-time as a reading specialist, which is expected to save the URISD $32,000 next year.
Mr. Weiss said the reading instruction component involves working with six to eight students, individually and in small groups of one or two at a time. "She can fit that in any time she wants over the course of a week, so I don't see that as being too much of a disconcerting time commitment, but it will be something different," he said.
Ms. Stevens said school ends Friday at Bak Middle School. She plans to come back to the Island and visit Chilmark School on June 25 to meet the faculty officially, and then go back to Florida to pack up. She also will attend a retreat for Island principals in August.
"I'm really looking forward to it," she said. "I'm a little nervous, of course - it's all new - but I'm excited about a new challenge. I'm ready."
Originally from Rockville, Md., Ms. Stevens met her husband, John Stevens, when they were teaching together in Florida. Mr. Stevens, who grew up in Edgartown, has been principal of the Edgartown School since 2007.
They were married in 1981 on Martha's Vineyard. Although they continued to live in Florida, the couple bought a home in Edgartown about 15 years ago after they started spending summers on the Island with their children.
Daughter Tristan, their youngest, is in college. They also have two sons. Tanner attends Brandeis University and Tyler received a degree from the Art Institute of Atlanta.
Ms. Stevens received a B.A. in elementary education, early childhood, and teaching of the emotionally handicapped from the University of South Florida. She has a master's degree in guidance and counseling from Florida Atlantic University and certification in working with children with autism from the University of Florida.
