Dear Grade 6-12 Families,
I am happy to announce that principals John Thorsen and Mike Burns will be working together as our new grade 6-12 principal team. This week, the Board of Education named Mr. Thorsen and Mr. Burns co-principals of Chatham High School and Chatham Middle School, which will afford the District maximum flexibility with this new administrative structure. Mr. Burns will be responsible for all instructional-related objectives in grades 6-12. He will be working closely with Dr. Lisa Ruud, our director of academics, Brian Simon, our pupil personnel services director, teacher leaders, and our strategic planning teams to implement the District's academic and social/emotional learning goals. Mr. Thorsen will focus on student, parent and community engagement, student discipline, and supporting our assistant principals in their roles at the respective schools. This new structure is designed to better support our alignment of programs at the secondary level.
We are excited about this new structure as we believe it will allow us to strengthen many of our existing programs and improve our academics, while also providing opportunities to create innovative approaches to some of the challenges related to our COVID response over the past 18 months.
Both Chatham High School and Chatham Middle School will continue to operate as they currently do, as separate schools, only the principal administrative structure is changing. Justin Forest, our high school assistant principal, and Mike Stead, our middle school assistant principal, will continue in their current building assignments.
To reach Mr. Thorsen or Mr. Burns, please contact your school’s main office as you usually would.
We are all looking forward to welcoming our students back to school on September 9th.
Sincerely,
Sal DeAngelo
Superintendent