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Skipper continues AHS record of advancement
5/17/2008 12:33 AM   1 comment(s) on this story E-mail this story to a friend

By ROB NOVIT

Senior writer

The appointment of Bryan Skipper as the new South Aiken High School principal is the latest chapter of a rather remarkable run by former Aiken High School assistant principals.

Skipper spent two years at Aiken High and the last two years as principal of Wagener-Salley High School. Other assistant principals at Aiken High in recent years - Garen Cofer, Carl White, Ben Osborne and Pat O'Neill - are now the principals at Aiken High, Schofield Middle School, Kennedy Middle School and the Aiken County Career Center. All worked for Joe Padget, now retired.

"Joe had 20-plus years as a principal. He brought tons of experience to us," said Skipper.

Skipper is excited about the new assignment at South Aiken and plans to meet with current principal Dr. Jan Nashatker, who is taking a faculty position at Converse College in the fall.

Skipper plans to meet the faculty and staff soon as well. The only downside is that his wife Kim, a math teacher at South Aiken for the past four years, will have to take another position with the district.

"That's a tough thing," said Skipper. "We came together as a family and decided this is what we wanted to pursue."

He called his two years at Wagener-Salley a great learning experience. Skipper appreciated the support he received from Area 4 assistant superintendent Joy Shealy and longtime assistant principal Owen McAlister.

"We try to give the kids as many opportunities as we can," Skipper said. "We have teleconference classes and dual credit classes through Aiken Technical College. Through ROTC and agricultural programs, we have kids that traveled to state and national competitions. Our drama students won first place in a (district) competition, and we don't really have a drama program. Our media specialist and an English teacher met with them on club days."

Before moving to Aiken, Skipper served as a math teacher and coached baseball and football at J.L. Mann High School in Greenville. That school is about the same size as South Aiken and provided him with exposure to a large-school operation.

He acknowledges the challenges of a larger student body and faculty, but Skipper said he'll also have more help with three good assistant principals and clerical staffers. He will look at areas he needs to focus on and work with the staff as a team, he said.

"Aiken County as a whole has some veteran administrators, and there's not one I can't call to discuss things," Skipper said.

He acknowledged that the economy is hitting everybody hard in terms of budgets and resources.

"I haven't had a chance to look at the data to see where cuts are going to hit the hardest," said Skipper. "Everybody will have tough decisions that have to be made. Ideally, we'll preserve the academic programs first and foremost."

Contact Rob Novit at rnovit@aikenstandard.com.





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  1 comment(s) on this story

:  5/17/2008

Nice article! Good luck Mr. Skipper!

Janie
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