Familiar faces team up to lead Slippery Rock Area High School
Jesse Pattison and Shawn Zappia are familiar faces in the Slippery Rock Area School District, dedicating their daily lives to their students and the institution shaping them.
Now, leading Slippery Rock Area High School this year will be a team effort between the two men.
Pattison, assistant principal at the high school; and Zappia, principal of special services for the high school; will share a title: co-principals.
The Slippery Rock Area School Board approved the creation of co-principals for the high school at its June 22 meeting, giving Zappia and Pattison the opportunity to blend their skills and provide sound leadership to Slippery Rock Area High School.
“Mr. Zappia and I are very similar in the fact that we both value a team-based mindset when it comes to problem-solving and achieving goals,” Pattison said in a Slippery Rock news release. “While our two positions have distinct responsibilities, our collaborative approach will allow us to utilize each other's strengths and experiences to best support our students, staff and families.”
The move comes after the previous high school principal, Cory Hake, took an assistant superintendent position at Allegheny-Clarion Valley School District.
Pattison, who worked closely with Hake for the past two years, will hold the position of principal of academic affairs. He will deal mainly with curricular and instructional matters, the district said.
Zappia will serve as the principal of student affairs. He had previously served as principal of special services for the high school.
“Through shared leadership, the co-principal model will allow Mr. Pattison and me to be more visible and accessible to students, parents, and staff. This specialized approach will increase the efficiency and effectiveness of our efforts to support academics, school safety, and the organizational needs of Slippery Rock Area High School,” Zappia said.
Making Pattison and Zappia co-principals was not the original plan. But Greg Schiller, the school board’s president, said while interviewing candidates, the board decided to deviate from its normal process and interview the two together.
“I was encouraged watching them during their interviews,” Schiller said. “You could see how excited Jesse and Shawn are to jump into these roles, and how they had already been working with each other to define the jobs. That type of enthusiasm should serve our high school community very well.”
Working closely together in the same building, the co-principals both cite cooperation and collaboration as factors that will make their tenure as co-principals successful.
“We are fortunate to have two well-qualified administrators that bring different and similar experiences to the job. As the two of them work together, their skill sets should complement each other,” Schiller said.
