AGWSR Superintendent Erik Smith is wrapping up his seventh and final year at the district as he is resigning at the end of the school year to take the shared superintendent position of the New Hampton and Turkey Valley school districts.
Smith is serving as both superintendent and high school principal this year and tells RadioOnTheGo News why he decided to take the new position at New Hampton and Turkey Valley.
“From a personal standpoint, it does get us closer to both of our families. I’m from Sumner originally and my wife, she’s from Waverly-Shell Rock and we were up in Nashua-Plainfield for seven years. I was a principal up there. So we’ve got a lot of connections in the area. We’ll have two kids left in the district. So I have a son in high school currently a freshman and a fifth grade son. My other two will be out and in college. But yeah, obviously that conversation and just opportunities for them down the line too and what that looks like. But yeah, was obviously, it’s obviously bittersweet for us. We enjoy it. We still enjoy AGWSR, the district, but it’s just one of those things where you kind of had an opportunity and we decided that we were going to take that opportunity.”
Current BCLUW Superintendent, Ben Petty, will serve as shared superintendent with AGWSR next year. Smith says there are a few positions yet to be filled at AGWSR heading into the 2025-26 school year.
“We did offer an early retirement package this year. We had four teachers that accepted that package. So we’ll be looking to replace them. One of the retirees, we won’t replace just it’ll be an attrition. So we’ll reduce the position there through attrition, which will be good for us as a plan. We are changing our grade configurations for next year. So we’ll have all K-4 students up here at the Accolade Elementary and all five through eight students in Wellsburg. That did afford us the opportunity to reduce at least one position within those elementary grade levels, just with the combination of the section. So, but yeah, we’re still looking for another high school science teacher. We’ve replaced one high school science teacher, but the second one we’re still trying to hire. And then other than that, we’re full.”
Smith officially begins his new position at New Hampton and Turkey Valley July 1st.
