A new face in Hornet Country

It is my pleasure to announce that Jason Crutchfield will be joining the Henley team as our new assistant principal. Jason comes to us from Stuart's Draft Middle School in Augusta County where he served as an assistant principal for the past two years. Prior to that he worked for nine years as a classroom teacher at both the middle school and high school level. We are very excited to have Jason on board and look forward to what he will bring to Henley. If you would like to introduce yourself to Jason, his e-mail account is up and running at jcrutchfield@k12albemarle.org. I'm sure he would love to hear from you about what a great place Henley Middle School is for students, teachers and parents.

On another note, blogger.com has just added a feature to its site that allows me to post poll questions and collect data from users. I'm interested in getting some feedback about how this tool could be used to allow for input from parents, students and community groups about the happenings at Henley. I've posted a sample poll to try and gauge just how many of you in the blogosphere would be interested in using a tool such as this. Please think about whether or not this would be something that you would like to see used on occasion by responding to the poll that you see on the right side of this page. Unfortunately, this tool does not provide for free response answers, which would likely give me much better feedback. However, you can always reach me via the e-mail link on the top right of the page to let me know how you feel.

I've enjoyed hearing from many of you this week and hope that I have been effective in addressing this issues that you've brought to my attention. We're spending a great deal of time at Henley finishing up our staffing and working on the master schedule. We're also beginning to set some of the major dates for the 2007-2008 calendar. Right now, there are two dates that I would like everyone to be aware of:

• Monday, August 20 from 10:00-12:00 will be our Henley open house. Students should have received their schedules by this time and can come to the school to make sure they know where they are going on the first day of school.
• Wednesday, September 5 from 7:00-9:00 p.m. will be the Henley Back-to-School Night. This is a night where you can come to the school to spend an evening going through your child's schedule and hear about the types of things that they will be studying for the coming year.

We hope to see all of you at these informative events. Until then......Go Hornets!

Some welcome suggestions

It's been a busy week and a half so far in my new position. Summer school is well under way and, from what I've seen, has been very successful so far. I've been meeting many new faculty members, staff members, students, and parents, from whom I've been trying to gather as much information as I can about Henley and where we can go this year. Everyone I've spoken with has had some good insights and ideas for the future.

One of the highlights of my short time here, and one of my best sources for suggestions for next year, came across my desk just the other day. Two of Mrs. Harder's classes took the time to write letters to me that told me what is was they loved about Henley and what they would like to see next year. I wanted to share some of their ideas here. Reid wanted to bring lacrosse to Henley, Arthur suggested some new basketball hoops to replace the old ones behind the school, Kaitlyn thought eighth graders should be able to eat lunch outside, Ignacio wanted to see more seventh grade students represented on the field trip to Wallops Island, Emma thought we needed more air conditioning in the gym, Peter was concerned about bullying, Bryce was adamant that we should erect a statue to honor his favorite drag racer, and many other students from Mrs. Harder's class had more fine ideas for Henley.

I wanted to make sure that these students were aware of two things. The first is that their voice has been heard. While some of the ideas had more sound reasoning than others, I will take all of them into consideration. The second is that I was incredibly impressed with the quality of their writing and their ability to justify the reasons they felt that their ideas were ones that should be considered. Solid communication skills are the backbone of a strong academic career and of success in the global economy. These students are well on their way to both achievements.

Great work kids, and great work Mrs. Harder. I can't wait to meet you all in the fall and discuss some of the ideas that you had.

Until next time--Go Hornets!

Okay, Let's Get Started!

Now it's official. I have become the principal of Henley Middle School. I still haven't gotten used to hearing that, or to telling that to people I've been meeting around town. I feel very blessed to be in this position and I know that there will be many long days in the years ahead as I get to know the culture of Henley and the community we serve. I can truly say that there is nowhere else I'd rather be right now than right here, and I'm looking forward to the challenges and triumphs that my time here will bring.

Summer vacation, for me at least, is now just a fond memory. My family had a wonderful time, and we were able to relax and rejuvenate, and now it's time to get down to business. I spent a good deal of my time at the beach thinking about what these first few weeks would be like and of everything I needed to learn as I begin my career at Henley. As I've said before, it's all a little overwhelming, and at the same time incredibly exciting.

While I was away, a major change took place for the Henley team when Clare Keiser was named the new principal of Hollymead Elementary. Clare had been an assistant principal at Henley for the past three years and had a well deserved reputation as a strong school leader. In fact, I knew from the first day I met Clare that she was bound for a principalship in the very near future. Personally, I just hoped it wouldn't have been quite so soon. Our loss will certainly be Hollymead's gain. I certainly looked forward to working with Clare, and I know that she will be missed by many members of the Henley Team. We all wish her the best.

The search for a new assistant principal has begun, and we hope to be able to make an announcement in the next few weeks about who will be coming on board.

I hope you will notice that my e-mail address has been updated to reflect the activation of my Albemarle account. I can easily be reached through that link and will do my best to respond to all of your requests and questions within one working day. Albemarle has a pretty intensive training program for new administrators that will require me to be out of the building for several days over the next couple of weeks, and I'll be bringing my laptop with me each day and will be checking e-mail as often as I can. I look forward to meeting all of you in person, and will be sending out some communication soon with some dates, times and locations when we can all sit down together and come up with some strategies to make Henley better than ever.

As of this posting, there are fifty days until the start of the 2007-2008 school year. That may seem like a great deal of time now, but we all know that summer days slip by much faster than any other days of the year. One thing I've noticed about Henley in the few days that I've been here this week is that it is too quiet. A school just doesn't seem complete without the chorus of young, excited voices echoing through the hallways. That joyous sound can't return to Henley soon enough.

I hope everyone has a fabulous Fourth of July. Go Hornets!