posted by: Bass, Joseph A - MNPS at May 04, 2012 4:02:00 PM
Carmon Brown, Debbie Booker to lead new Metro Schools
Two innovative Metro Nashville Public Schools will open August 1 with veteran educators at the helm. Carmon Brown will lead the Academy of Opry Mills and Debbie Booker the new Bridge School. Brown and Booker are currently assistant principals at Antioch High School.
“Carmon Brown will be a strong leader for the Academy at Opry Mills. He has worked with high school students for 20 years and understands how the Academy can help students overcome obstacles and earn a high school diploma,” said Jay Steele, associate superintendent for high schools. The original Academy at Opry Mills was displaced by the historic May 2010 flood. With support from the Simon Youth Foundation, the Academy will return to Opry Mills August 1 for the 2012-13 school year.
“Debbie Booker has worked in high schools and middle schools and, most recently, has been the principal of Antioch’s ninth grade academy,” added Steele. “She is very well qualified to serve as principal for the new Bridge School, which will help struggling students in grades 8 to 10 get back on track academically before they continue to high school.”
Brown has public and private school experience, having taught at Brentwood Academy and Friendship Christian School in addition to teaching social studies at Brentwood, Maplewood and Hunters Lane high schools. From 2004-11, he was an assistant principal at Hillsboro High School where, among other duties, he helped implement the Academies of Nashville small learning communities program. He also served as International Baccalaureate principal when the school received its Middle Years Programme authorization. Brown earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from David Lipscomb University.
Booker currently serves as the principal of the Academy of Hospitality at Antioch High. Previously, she taught mathematics at McGavock High and chaired the mathematics departments at Lake Taylor High and Booker T. Washington High, both in Norfolk, Virginia. She began her career teaching mathematics to military dependents at Ft. Irwin Middle School in Ft. Irwin, Calif. Booker holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and a master’s degree in education from Alabama A&M University and the Ed. S. degree in administration from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
Billy Fellman, who was previously announced as the principal of the Academy at Opry Mills, will instead lead the Academy at Hickory Hollow. That position opened when the current principal decided to move out of state.
Metro Nashville Public Schools is earning a national reputation as the district’s graduation rate has climbed, the annual dropout rate has nosedived and community involvement in schools has accelerated since Jesse Register, Ed.D., became the director of schools in 2009.
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