Arbor Heights School's new principal Christy Collins, pictured, met with staff, parents and students Friday in that West Seattle school. She has been with the Lake Washington School District for 29 years. She replaces Dr. Carol Coram, who becomes assistant principal at Denny Intl. Middle School with colleague Chanda Oatis.
As current Arbor Heights School principal Dr. Carol Coram joins her colleague and sorority sister Chanda Oatis (Alpha Kappa Alpha) as assistant principal at Denny International Middle School this fall under principal Jeff Clark, the new Arbor Heights principal, Christy Collins, will take Dr. Coram's place.
You can see our story about Dr. Coram leaving here:
Collins toured the school classrooms and chatted with some of the youngsters following a positive exchange she had with staff and parents Friday morning.
She told the West Seattle Herald she was looking forward to her new position.
"It's very exciting," said Collins, who was born in Portland, and currently lives in Leavenworth.
"I'm honored and thrilled to be here," she said. "This is where I wanted to be, in Seattle. After 29 years in the Lake Washington School District, a wonderful career with with many opportunities as a principal, teacher, and special education coordinator, I wanted to get back to the classroom, or what I call the 'large classroom', working with staff, students, and parents again, more hands on, rather than going back as a principal in Lake Washington. I thought I needed to challenge myself. I'm a firm believer that if we're going to challenge our children, stretch our children, stretch our teachers, it was going to be a stretch for me to come to Seattle Public Schools and felt very strongly that I needed to be that model."
"I'm extremely excited," said Amy Christensen of the new principal. Christensen is a PTSA member with a child in first grade at the school and another entering third grade. She gave a little talk during the morning's presentation. "Her energy, the answers to the parents' questions, I think it's just going to be a great year. We have a wonderful community at Arbor Heights and I think there is a lot of potential to bring it all together and I have a lot of trust and faith in her that she'll do that."
"We're really looking forward to her coming in and making next year super exciting, and super fun," added Amy's husband, John, a PTSA co-president. "It's going to be fantastic."
