NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — There are some staffing changes ahead for the North Adams Public Schools — including the search for a new principal for Drury High School.

Colegrove Park Elementary School Principal Shelley Fachini is moving to special education, and Drury High Principal Amy Meehan will be replacing her at "Old Drury."

That will leave a vacancy at Drury High School that will be filled by an interim principal.  

"It's a domino effect," said Superintendent of School Barbara Malkas on Thursday.

Malkas said it was decided to split a preK-K special education coordinator into two positions after discussion with retired Superintendent James Montepare and Noreen Donnelly, former administrator of special education, before both left the district.

Two coordinator positions — one for preK and one for early education — were created. Fachini, she said, had was interested in the early education coordinator, who would have a broad scope of responsibility looking at kindergarten readiness and grade transitions, and developing further readiness skills through outreach with community partners.

Fachini's background is in early education and special education.

That opened up a vacancy at Colegrove, and Malkas said Meehan had told her she was looking for a challenge and wanted to have elementary experience. "She was hands down the best candidate," said Malkas.

Meehan was dean of students at Drury before being named principal in 2006.

Both jobs were posted and the candidates interviewed by a committee, the selections were unanimous in both cases, Malkas said. "This was their personal choice to do something different."

She expected to make an announcement shortly on who will lead Drury for the interim. The decision has been made to hold off for now on advertising for a new principal because of the timing.

"At this point, most people who would have taken [a principal's job] have already done so," Malkas said. Rather, the district will wait to begin its search about the same time as other schools so as to provide a greater quantity of good prospects.

"We really do want to have a broader stakeholder group on the interview committee," she said, instead of just administrative staff. "We'll form the search committee later on in the school year ... I really feel we would want students as well as parental involvement."

David Racette has been hired as the new athletic director, a year-round half-time position.

"We interviewed four candidates and all of them were highly qualified," Malkas said. "Mr. Racette we felt was the right candidate because we felt he brought a wealth of experience and a knowledge that will help not only grow our problems in the school district but work with our community partners."

Montepare had put $30,000 into the budget for such a position with the hope the city would match to create a director who could work with all the schools and youth sports partners. That didn't happen but Malkas said Racette was hired with that "vision" in mind.

The school district has already added Thomas A. Simon as director of student support services and Kimberly Roberts-Morandi as director of curriculum, instruction and assessment.

"We're happy to support the professional growth of anyone who is interested in taking on a new challenge," she said of the changes at Drury and Colegrove. "I'm thrilled that we have the internal capacity and the willingness of our staff to step up and take on a new challenge."

Malkas said this year will be looking at the development of a strategic plan for the next few years. "Also thinking about how we are allocating resources and being very mindful of how we are using not only financial resources but human resources."

But she said she's been joking with her assistant about what seems like musical chairs.

 "Over the next two weeks, the music needs to stop and everyone one needs to be in a seat," she said. 

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