AVID staff member

Baron with AVID conference teachers

Here at Roosevelt, we have hundreds of people that make up our staff. Each of these people is unique and important in helping our school and students thrive and grow. Just recently a new assistant principal was hired, Dana Baron has joined our Mustang family!

I know a lot of students, including myself, are often confused why we have so many principals, and what exactly each of them do. Baron gives some explanation of what kinds of responsibilities assistant principals have.

“All the different assistant principals have different duties, so like different programs they oversee. And then also you have students who you support, so students are divided among assistant principals.”

Baron personally works with AVID and supports the counselors in her specific area, as well as the students she oversees. Her office is B218 which is located in the upstairs B building hallway!

Baron has worked in education for many years but wasn’t always an assistant principal. She was previously a dean at JFK High School in Norco and before that worked for many years as a science teacher.

“I taught Biology, Anatomy, Natural Science, and at the very beginning of my career I taught Agriculture Science,” Baron shares.

It’s common to want a change in your career after many years of doing the same thing. Lots of people will change their job field entirely at a certain point in their life, growth does not stop when you become a working adult. Baron was initially a science teacher but then decided to advance to an administrative position.

“I just wanted something different and I wanted to grow,” Baron explains. “And work with more people, different people. Growing as a leader and having a bigger impact.”

Not many people think about becoming an assistant principal or a principal, in fact many people, such as Baron, start out as teachers and then decide to move up.

“I think you start as an educator hopefully because you love your subject and you love kids. And then eventually mentors or people that we work with encourage us to go to the next step,” Baron says.

It’s just like how someone may start out as a regular student, and then have a specific teacher that impacts them so much, that they decide to start teaching themselves. Teachers are mentors but even your teachers have their own mentors and inspirations too! We as people are constantly impacting others, and you never know what you’ll inspire someone to do.

There are many perks to having a job as a teacher or administrator, and Baron shares what her favorite part about what she does,

“Seeing kids grow from maybe what would’ve been a contentious situation, like maybe they’re not doing well, maybe their grades are low,” Baron said. “Maybe they get in trouble behavior wise, and then seeing them grow from that and then overcome that and learn and graduate, as honestly sometimes a totally different person.”

We all know the impact that students have on each other. The friends you make at school can completely change your life for the better. But the same can be said about teachers and staff. We overlook who they are purely because of how much we dread going to school. But your teachers and administrators are only a part of your life temporarily, and you may look back on high school and realize how much of a difference they made on you. Everyone has that favorite teacher that they’ll never forget, or that one favorite principal. Maybe Mrs. Baron will be yours!