After five years as principal at Palmerston’s East Otago High School, Marcus Cooper is moving to Geraldine High School.
Mr Cooper said he had mixed feelings about leaving because the community had made him feel so welcome during his tenure as principal at East Otago.
"It’s bittersweet because we’ve done so much in the five years we’ve been here and I’d like to think we’ve had a positive effect on the school and the community.
"It’s really sad in that regard but also really exciting because it’s a bigger school and it will be different."
Geraldine had a roll nearly four times the size of East Otago — 620 pupils compared with 170 — and Mr Cooper was looking forward to the challenge.
Mr Cooper was proud to have renovated some of East Otago’s infrastructure as well as introduce a semesterised option that split the year into two semesters with six classes each semester for year 9-10 pupils.
"The kids get more variety and more ownership in their learning and more agency."
The option had been available for three years and the pupils had been more engaged, had better NCEA results and bad behaviour had decreased, Mr Cooper said.
He had also introduced restorative practices to deal with in-class behavioural issues.
"The restorative practices is essentially a mana-enhancing way of dealing with staff and students when relationships break down.
"Instead of being punitive, its restorative.
"We’re not trying to punish the kids, we’re trying to fix the relationships."
Mr Cooper said he was looking forward to moving to Geraldine with his wife and three children aged 10, 11 and 13 who would attend Geraldine High School.
East Otago deputy principal Keith Fleury would be filling in as principal for the first term while the school found a replacement for Mr Cooper.
