Superintendent's decision sends Hunter to SMES, Sellers to CVS

By Lynn Hotaling

The transfers that will result in a two-way assistant principal swap were announced Wednesday by Superintendent Mack McCary, who said he had consulted extensively with school board members, principals and central office administrators about the moves.

McCary's decision will send Ellen Hunter, assistant principal at Cullowhee Valley for the past three years, to Smokey Mountain Elementary. Neal Sellers, assistant principal at SMES for three years will move to Cullowhee Valley.

The superintendent initially issued a press release announcing a three-way trade. Steve Jones, assistant principal at Scotts Creek for one year and at Blue Ridge for one year, was slated to move to Cullowhee Valley, while Sellers was to return to Scotts Creek where he taught physical education for a number of years.

School board members approved two-year contract extensions for all three last week. No indication was given at that time that any of the administrators would not remain at their current schools.

"(Ellen) Hunter brings a wealth of experience and knowledge in curriculum and instruction and will be able to assist (SMES Principal) Tom Dowell in working with teachers to identify and implement strategies to ensure the progress of all students," McCary said.

Hunter, who had applied this spring for the principal's vacancy at Cullowhee, was passed over when school board members followed McCary's recommendation and named Theresa Peters of Fayetteville to succeed retiring Principal Ron Yount. According to McCary, Hunter told him that she thought if she were not the right person to be principal at CVS, then she needed a change, a decision the superintendent said he supported.

Sellers, a longtime physical education teacher at Scotts Creek before moving to SMES three years ago, "has had an exceptional career with the school system," McCary said.

McCary changed his mind and decided to leave Jones at Scotts Creek after that school's Improvement Team asked him to reconsider, he said Wednesday morning.

"After I looked and listened, I changed my mind," McCary said about the decision to leave Jones at Scotts Creek. "I'd rather be right than appear infallible."

Sellers, despite his ties to the Scotts Creek community, volunteered to go to Cullowhee Valley, McCary said.

"I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard place in providing a good team at each school," McCary said. "The real dilemma is trying to look at what each school needs. We're trying to figure out with limited resources how we can get a team in each school that helps that school continue to progress."

The "limited resources" he referred to, McCary said, are the limited number of teachers in the county looking forward to becoming principals and assistant principals.

"That's one reason we're looking at replacing some administrative positions with instructional specialists," McCary said, as was done recently when teacher Tinnie Salzano was named to replace Assistant Principal Libby Knight at SMHS, and sixth-grade teacher Susan Norman was named to fill a Central Office vacancy.

McCary confirmed Tuesday that SMHS Assistant Principal Ken Henke will retire this summer. Henke's likely successor, McCary said, is Alex Bell, an administrator at the high school for the past two years.

Bell's background in Total Quality Management and peer mediation will allow him to look beyond the traditional assistant principal's role of discipline and consequences toward ways of building students' leadership skills, McCary said.

School officials first played "fruit basket turnover" two years ago when a Friday morning board meeting resulted in administrative changes at five of six county schools.

The June 1999 transfers sent then Scotts Creek Principal Bell to Smoky Mountain High School, Blue Ridge Assistant Principal Loretta Easton to Fairview, Fairview Assistant Principal Dowell to SMES as principal, Fairview curriculum specialist Thurza McNair became Fairview's assistant principal and Jones, then an exceptional children's teacher at Blue Ridge became that school's assistant principal.

Last year's moves, though not as extensive, impacted three schools. Former SMHS Principal Kenny Nicholson came out of retirement to return as principal; Henke, who was SMHS principal during the 1999-2000 school year, returned to his former role as assistant principal; SMHS Assistant Principal Wanda Fernandez went to Scotts Creek as principal to replace Principal Nancy McMurray, who was transferred to the Central Office; and Jones, assistant principal at Blue Ridge at the time, was sent to Scotts Creek as assistant principal.

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