Over the next several weeks, Candice Berthiaume will move her desk a few feet away from its current location when she becomes principal of Greenview Knolls Elementary School.
The 39-year-old Port Republic resident was the assistant principal during the 2022-2023 school year and served as the interim principal last year.
“I am extremely excited for the opportunity to be principal at Greenview Knolls,” Berthiaume said during an interview as her sons Michael, 12, who attends Calvert Middle, and Cody, 9, who attends Barstow Elementary, played on the schools’ playground. “I’m most excited to start a fresh school year with a fantastic school community.”
She said the move from acting principal to principal at the same school will make the transition that much easier.
“I think it’s extremely [important] just because I’ve been able to build relationships with parents as well as the staff,” she said. “So I already know everyone and I’ve had the time to build partnerships as well as knowing the school data is important because I’ll be able to hit the ground running with the school improvement plan with our team.”
When asked what makes a good school principal, she said it was her “experience in leadership and then my personality of being authentic and compassionate will make me a good principal. Kids come first. Every decision I make is for the best interest of the students.”
She added that communication and consistency will be keys to a successful school year and “those will be a huge focus for us this school year just making sure that we instill life-long learners in students and focusing on their academic and social and emotional well-being. I think we’re just going to be very consistent with the programs that we have in place.”
Regarding the school’s personnel of about 60, she said they are “the best staff” and “all hard working, all step up to come together as a family.” The school has a little over 300 students.
Berthiaume, who graduated in Calvert County from Patuxent High School in 2003, spent five years teaching fifth-graders and two years teaching second-graders at Hollywood Elementary, before spending the next seven years as an instructional resource teacher at Lettie Marshall Dent Elementary.
“I want to be a constant for the staff, students and parents as we navigate the school year together,” she said of her goals for the upcoming school year. “It is important to me that every student wants to get up and be present at school each day.”
The move was just one of many personnel moves so far as St. Mary’s tries to finish its annual jigsaw puzzle of new teacher and administrative placements.
“We’ve been pretty successful in securing teachers for pretty much all of our positions,” said Superintendent Scott Smith, who added he’s been challenged by a shortage of special education and middle school science teachers.
Smith said teachers are being drawn to a stable school system. He said a new $60,000 starting salary and career ladder are all “really helping us in our recruitment of people from all over the state as well as other states.”
“Other than that we’ve had a pretty good hiring season so far,” said Smith, who added new moves will be announced in mid-August. “Certainly this is our busiest time of the year [for recruitment], but overall we’re getting some very qualified candidates and I think we’re going to have a successful start of the year.”
Virginia Gretton was named assistant principal at Leonardtown High School. Last year Gretton taught English and was the acting assistant principal at the high school. Smith said Gretton was “super qualified and a fantastic candidate.”
Other new teachers that were recently hired include Constance Carrington (Great Mills High), Kameron Daily (Great Mills High), Paige Fost (Esperanza Middle), Erika Francis (Evergreen Elementary), Philip Gibson (Lexington Park Elementary), Nicole Harris (Lettie Marshall Dent Elementary), Lauren Hicks (Great Mills High), Catherine Holden (Virtual Academy), Kimberly Jordan (Hollywood Elementary), Brandon McCormick (George Washington Carver Elementary), William Moss (Chopticon High), Mary Mourey-Wild (Virtual Academy), Margrit Quesnell (Special Education), Claire Runkles (Special Education) and Logan Schmoyer (Chesapeake Charter School).
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