Westmoreland named to new assistant principal position

CLARKESVILLE – The Habersham County Board of Education has approved Doug Westmoreland to serve in the newly-created assistant principal position at the Habersham Ninth Grade Academy and Habersham County Alternative School.

Westmoreland previously was working as a math teacher and testing administrator at Habersham Central High School.

Superintendent Matthew Cooper told the board that HCHS Principal Jim Van Hooser and HNGA Building Administrator Stan Rentz worked together to select Westmoreland for the position.

“Looks like they interviewed a total of eight people for that position, and I’ve talked to them along the way – it’s a very thorough interview process,” Cooper said. “Obviously this position is very important to our school system, important to ninth grade academy and their success over there.”

Cooper said Van Hooser and Rentz pointed out that Westmoreland’s skill set make him the ideal person for the position. In addition to helping with discipline and safety, Westmoreland will help coordinate scheduling and testing.

“Doug has experience with these other areas,” Cooper said.

Also during Thursday’s called board of education meeting, the board approved hiring Stephen Palmer as the system-wide school psychologist.

Two school nurse positions also were filled, with Mysti Anderson to serve at Habersham Ninth Grade Academy and the Habersham County Alternative School and Rebecca Pless to serve at Level Grove Elementary School.

In addition to the resignations of a custodian and a special education paraprofessional, the board approved the resignation of Ryan Baker, drama teacher at Habersham Ninth Grade Academy and Habersham Central High School, effective Aug. 6.

“The purpose of this called meeting was to approve personnel,” Cooper said. “[Friday] is the first day of pre-planning, and it wouldn’t have been good for these people before you to have to wait until after school had already started. This is just the nature of starting the school year. We do have these last-minute resignations, people moving, things happen.”

“I appreciate your willingness to be here this morning to approve some of these personnel,” Cooper told the board. “Hopefully moving forward we can limit these called meetings as much as possible, but this one was definitely necessary.”