Starting this year, APs are assigned by grade level rather than by students’ last names. A state-mandated review in the spring of 2006, which required the school to examine its special education program and its graduation and dropout rates, had emphasized the need to address the issue; the idea also came up during budget presentations earlier this year.

Over the course of the last year, the IHS Leadership Team and Ithaca City School District Administrative Team came to favor two proposals above the others. According to IHS Principal Joe Wilson, the first proposal would have “add[ed] additional administrators to the central office and would have had them supervise curriculum and instruction from there.” The second plan gave department leaders more release time and assigned APs differentiated roles based on school needs and the administrator’s strengths; this plan also assigned APs by grade level.

The Leadership Team recommended that the Board of Education (BoE) reorganize the AP system following the second plan. According to Associate Principal Colleen Ledley, there were two main reasons the BoE supported the change. Firstly, the BoE approved of the idea of having four associate principals instead of three associate principals and one assistant principal. Secondly, the plan would allow administrators to interact with students in areas other than discipline.

While this proposal was being discussed, the IHS administration experimented with the idea; during the second semester of the 2006-2007 school year, Associate Principal Gregory Santoro became the ninth graders’ AP, in addition to being the AP for the students already assigned to him by last name. According to Wilson, Santoro was chosen “because of his excellent rapport with the students and his demonstrated ability to handle a large disciplinary.”

According to the IHS Administrative Team, the experiment was a success. Referrals decreased, and the team expects this trend to continue throughout the year. Santoro also felt an increase in camaraderie within the school, suggesting that it is easier for students to identify with their APs if they are assigned by grade level.

However, there are concerns about the change. One advantage of the previous system was the opportunity for APs to know their students for more than one year. In addition, ninth graders tend to receive more referrals than any other class, which increases the workload of the ninth grade AP.

English teacher Rich Armstrong said of the associate principals that there are “two too many.” He believes that the money spent changing the AP system should have been used instead to hire more teachers. This would have reduced class sizes and put “running [the school] back in the hands of teachers.”

The Student Services Department was also reorganized this year. To help ninth graders, the school created a ninth-grade support team, which included two ninth-grade guidance counselors and specific training for ninth-grade Regents teachers. The school now also has a twelfth-grade team consisting of Associate Principal Debra Rivera, Model Transition Program Facilitator James Scarpulla, guidance counselors, and College and Career Services Director Debra Walker.

The school hopes that this new organization will help students develop unique bonds with adults by allowing APs to become liaisons in class events instead of just disciplinarians.