JAY – Since the day Peter Brown became an educator 38 years ago, it has always been all about the kids. When the Jay High School principal retires at the end of this school year, it will be still about kids.
His grandkids, Zachary, 3, Nikolas, 11 months and Kyra, 9 months.
Brown, who turns 60 in April, has been thinking about retiring for a while.
He wrote a letter of resignation before February vacation and put it on his visor. He thought he’d wait and see if he still felt the same after he returned from Aruba.
He’s noticed some changes about his wife, Denise, of 37 years, who retired as a school teacher last year.
She’s well rested and she’s doing things she wants to do including playing tennis, teaching at the Sylvan Learning Center in Augusta and visiting grandchildren, he said.
“I guess I’m envious,” Brown said.
Brown submitted his resignation letter Tuesday night.
He came to Jay High School in 1985 as assistant principal and became principal in 1997.
When deciding whether he wanted to retire this year, he said, he looked at his health.
“I’m in pretty decent health; I’m in good health,” he said, “and my grandchildren mean the world to me.”
During his career that began at Telstar High School in Bethel, he taught students as well as coached them in athletics, which meant he missed a lot of time with his own children, Derek and Rebekka, while they were growing up.
“I’ve said I’m not going to miss my grandchildren growing up, but they’re three hours away,” he said.
He plans to travel, he said, something he doesn’t get to do often. And he’ll be visiting the grandchildren with Denise more often.
He’s been dedicated to his job for so long, he said, he’s caught himself giving out the school’s number as his home number.
Sitting in his office Friday, he laughed about that.
During his tenure, Brown has led the school to raise the aspirations of students by raising the passing grade from 60 to 65, increasing graduation credits from 18 to 24, requiring students to take six classes each semester, and to pass five classes to participate in athletics each season. The number of students going to college has also risen, he said.
Students will be ready in 2007 when they need to have a standards-based report to graduate, Brown said, and by the time he leaves the school accreditation process will nearly be completed.
Brown said he has promoted smaller class enrollment of 12 to 15 students for better learning opportunities, something way different than 44 students he taught reading to in 1968.
Class offerings have also expanded: from piano and guitar lessons to distance learning instruction for advanced placement statistics and American sign language.
“I really think for a school our size, we have a very broad program to offer our kids,” he said.
Brown said his secret of getting along with students is respecting them and treating them as adults.
While Brown said he wants to try to get his biological clock to stop waking him up at 4:30 a.m. after retirement, he’s considering pursuing consulting opportunities.
In the meantime, his wife is making a “honey-do list,” he said.
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