Pine View recently welcomed back former Pine View math teacher Tara Spielman as the new high school Assistant Principal. After several years as both a teacher and working in professional development, she has returned this year to assume the position of an administrator.
Prior to her work in administration, Spielman taught math for numerous years, starting at Heron Creek Middle School for two years. She then began working at Pine View, where she taught math for six years. However, at the end of the 2013-2014 school year, Spielman left Pine View to work with district offices in a department known as professional development and teacher evaluation. “In that role I did a lot of workshops and seminars for teachers — coaching and helping new teachers specifically,” Spielman said. Last year, she gained even more experience as an Assistant Principal of McIntosh Middle School.
Photo by SANA RAHMAN
Although Spielman always knew that she wanted to come back to Pine View, she was pleasantly surprised that she got an opportunity to return so quickly. After previous Assistant Principal Jennifer Nzeza took another opportunity at Southside Elementary School, Principal Dr. Stephen Covert and district offices reached out to Spielman in May to fill the vacancy. When given this chance to rejoin Pine View as an administrator, Spielman immediately took the offer. “Pine View is my home, and I missed it tremendously,” Spielman said. “When I was here, there wasn’t a day that went by that I wasn’t absolutely grateful to be working with the students and staff at Pine View, so I’m happy to be back.”
Spielman is excited about the different experience she will have as an administrator rather than a teacher. She explains that instead of having control over a more compact group of students in a classroom, as Assistant Principal she is able to tackle a broader and more diverse range of issues within the entire student body.
Going into her first year as an Assistant Principal at Pine View, Spielman hopes to make sure that students feel comfortable communicating with her and the administration. “I want them [students] to know that I care about them, that the door is open, that any concerns they may have, whether they are academic or social, that this is a safe place for them,” she said. She plans on continuing this platform and creating a more unified teacher and student body as well.
“She was not only an amazing teacher, but someone who was a mentor,” twelfth-grader Arooj Khan said. “I think it’s really amazing to see her in the administration — she totally deserves it.”