While most teachers and students will be going back to school after a nice Christmas break this January, Carolyn Adams, principal at Southmoreland High School, will be taking a permanent break. After leading the high school for the 2006 portion of the upcoming school year, she will hand the reins over to a replacement for the 2007 portion of the school year when she retires after 14 years of service. Adams graduated from Elizabeth Forward High School in 1965 and from Westminster College with a degree in biology in 1969. That year she began her teaching career at the Baldwin Whitehall School District, teaching seventh-grade science. After one year there, she accepted the biology teaching position at Elizabeth High School, where she stayed for 22 years, eventually heading the science department. “I loved teaching and being in the classroom,” Adams said. “I enjoyed interacting with the students and had a real affinity for the subject matter.” While teaching at Elizabeth Forward, Adams went back to school and earned her master’s degree in secondary guidance and counseling in 1981 from California University of Pennsylvania. “Once I became the department head, I realized there were so many other things that impacted kids and I wanted to try them,” she said. However, after receiving her guidance degree, she found there weren’t as many opportunities as she had originally thought. A few years later, some former colleagues and friends, John Moreschi and Pam Cignotti, encouraged Adams to look into pursuing something on the administration side of things, and she began to look at obtaining her principal’s certification. In 1993 she did just that from California University of Pennsylvania. “At that time there were a number of individuals who had gotten their principal’s certification, but didn’t make use of it,” Adams said. “I decided if I got the right opportunity I would do everything I could to become a principal.” After making application to several school districts, she received an interview at Southmoreland and was called back for a second interview a short time later. “At the time I had no idea where the school was located, so I made a trip with my husband one Saturday,” Adams said. She went to a function at Scottdale Elementary School and talked with parents. Then she went into Scottdale and talked with the business owners. “I wasn’t going to make the move unless I felt I was the person the community needed and wanted and vice versa,” Adams said. “I wanted to make sure we were a good match.” In August 1993, the evening before she was to begin her first day of school at Elizabeth Forward, she got the call telling her she was hired to be the assistant principal at Southmoreland High School. “Coming to Southmoreland I had the wonderful fortune to work under John Beck, who was the principal at the time,” Adams said. “He was a terrific, knowledgeable, very effective mentor to me.” After serving five years as assistant principal, Adams was offered the position of principal when Beck retired. For the past nine years, Adams effectively guided hundreds of students while in her current position as principal, so it’s no surprise that the decision to retire was a hard one. “It was probably the most difficult decision I’ve ever had to make in terms of my career,” she said. “In the end, I looked at the constant commitment and the enormous amount of time that it takes to fill this role, and although I enjoyed doing it, I decided it was the time in my life to explore other interests and spend more time with my family.” Not working is something that will be foreign to Adams, however. She has held a job since she was 16 years old. “I think it will be nice to explore what’s out there,” she said. “I’d like to take piano lessons and I do want to travel, but right now I’d just like to kick back and pay attention to my surroundings, my home and my family.” Adams has already been offered another job, but indicated that she is not ready to make a commitment like that yet. “If I can’t keep my mind out of education, then there’s a possibility I might work part time,” she said. She plans to work with the state’s Distinguished Educators program, which is run by a group of retired school administrators in an effort to help out school districts within the state that are experiencing difficulties or not performing up to the required standards. Adams said she will miss the interaction with the students the most when she officially retires. “I just think being able to work with young people every day and help guide them through the maze of their high school education is such a wonderful opportunity,” she said. “I’m just not sure what I’m going to do when it’s 8 a.m. and I haven’t had to make 100 decisions already.” She added that she couldn’t have done the job she has done without the help and support from the faculty, staff and administration at the school. “I want people to understand that this is a collective effort and I really appreciate the support I’ve always received from the community and the staff,” Adams said. She also said she hopes that one day her former students will remember her as being caring. “I would hope that they would say ‘she was an educator who cared about us and our education,'” Adams said.

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