Tough staffing decisions at Charlotte Central School

Charlotte Central School administrators Tim O’Leary and Beth Slater have had the challenging responsibility of navigating the school through a series of staffing reductions necessitated by the 2025-26 school budget. They have approached this task with a focus on the school’s core values: taking care of ourselves, each other and this place.

The personnel changes for the next school year include:

• Connecting Youth mentorship — Kate Rooney is retiring at the end of this year, and Jessica Phelan, who previously served as the district’s Connecting Youth communications coordinator, will step into the mentor coordinator role at Charlotte Central School.
• Behavioral support — David Leng will join Tim Holcomb as a second behavior systems coordinator in a program designed to support student well-being.
• World language — After 35 years, Sarah Pierson is retiring. Her institutional knowledge and rare dual certification in French and Spanish will be missed. Owen Duff will join Charlotte Central School as the full-time world language teacher and also serve as a core teacher on the seventh-eighth grade Omega Team. All seventh and eighth graders will study French next year. Spanish instruction will continue in some form next year, for students who have been studying it in previous years. 
• Seventh and eighth grade humanities — As Julia Beerworth takes on her Rowland Foundation Fellowship, the Omega Team (seventh and eighth grades) will operate with one humanities teacher next year instead of the two. This represents a full-time equivalent (FTE) reduction in a fifth-eighth classroom teacher for next year.
• Music — Andy Smith, who has been full time at Charlotte Central School as an instrumental music teacher, will be shared with Hinesburg Community School next year as Charlotte Central School saw half an FTE reduction in music educators in next year’s budget.
• Fourth grade — Tasha Grey will join Charlotte Central School while Dana Hanf remains on parental leave. As part of the reduction in overall kindergarten-fourth grade staffing, the current third-grade cohort will move from three learning groups into two classes for fourth grade. As a result of this reduction in staff, Jane Redden will not be returning to Charlotte Central School next year; she is planning to take a one-year leave of absence from the Champlain Valley School District to explore other opportunities. 
• Academic intervention — Due to a full-time equivalency reduction in paraspecialist intervention staffing at Charlotte Central School, the fifth-eighth grade literacy interventionist role will not continue next year, while the fifth-eighth grade math paraspecialist interventionist position will remain. Kindergarten-fourth grade interventionists Nan Boffa and Elizabeth Kehr will remain in their current positions. Deb Killkelley will shift her role to focus entirely on coordinating and delivering intervention services, with particular attention to supporting fifth-eighth grade literacy. 
• Special education — Due to a reduction of one full-time special educator position at Charlotte Central School, Betsy Martin will transition to a role at Hinesburg Community School. The school and district will work to redesign the Charlotte Central School special education model for next year. 
• Administration — The administration has moved from two and half positions in the original 2024-25 budget to two positions for the coming year. Tim O’Leary continues to serve as full-time principal, and Beth Slater serves in a dual role — assistant principal and director of student services. 

Big week at Charlotte Central School

The week ending Thursday, May 23, had many interesting activities happening at Charlotte Central: 

• Eighth graders headed to Champlain Valley Union High School this week for their in-person orientation. 
• Charlotte Central School welcomed future kindergartners, who explored classrooms and met one another. Meanwhile, caregivers met with other members of the school team for an orientation and tour.
• A visit from Champ occurred on Wednesday. The beloved mascot of the Vermont Lake Monsters gave high fives, brought smiles and helped with dismissal. 
• The new stage curtain arrived and will be installed in early June.
• The fifth-sixth grade social was a dance to remember, complete with a DJ in the multipurpose room, gym games and caregiver-donated snacks. 
• Charlotte Central School celebrated mentorship on Wednesday night with a dinner hosted by mentor coordinator Kate Rooney honoring Connecting Youth mentors and mentees.
• An author visit by Ann Braden inspired young readers on Friday. She is best known for writing books about kids standing up for themselves and others, even when it’s hard.