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Two school principals say good-bye
Carbine and his wife, Donna, will move to a home they've purchased in southern Utah. Once settled, Carbine plans to continue his woodworking hobby. The couple hopes to conduct a church leadership mission somewhere in the United States and spend time with their five children and 19 grandchildren, all of whom live in California. Hill and her husband, Dan, who is retiring as assistant principal at Valley View Middle School in Simi Valley, are moving to Portland, Ore., where their daughter and her family live. They also have a son who lives with his wife and children in the San Francisco area. The Hills are trading in their educator badges for grandparent badges, according to Pam, to enjoy their four grandchildren.
Carbine has been principal of Mountain Meadows for 13 years, overseeing the school's growth from kindergarten through third grade and its expansion to fourth and fifth grades next year. The school currently includes 440 students and 21 teachers. Carbine is known in the school community as a "visible" principal, opening up car doors for children during drop-off and pick-up times in the morning and afternoon, and spending time with students outside on the playground during recess and lunch. "Getting to know the children has been a great asset over the years. I think it helped build confidence showing children I'm interested in them," Carbine said. He credits a "great working relationship" between staff, parents and students with the school's success. "What I will miss most is the close relationship between students and teachers. That's going to be the toughest. They will move on as will I and I will always have those memories of my time here," Carbine said. Second-grade teacher Lisa Austin described Carbine as always cheerful and a "big teddy bear." Over 6 feet tall, Carbine has a gentle and calm way about him that has worked well with the all-female staff at Mountain Meadows who will miss him, Austin added. "He's here early, works late, and would rather do a job than ask more of us because he knows how hard we work," Austin said. "When you get stuck in traffic he'll go sub in your class until you get there. On rainy days he's in the cafeteria dealing with the madhouse. All of these little things add up to a great leader. He's so humble he says, 'You guys are the great ones.'" For the past 42 years Carbine has lived in the Conejo Valley and worked in education. With the Moorpark district for more than 23 years, Carbine served as assistant principal at Chaparral Middle School. He also taught non-English-speaking students, provided instructional support to migrant students, and was an elementary school teacher in Woodland Hills and Northridge. A native of New Mexico, Carbine is fluent in Spanish, learned through a church mission to Central America. He earned an undergraduate degree in Spanish and a master's in administrative education from San Fernando State College, now Cal State Northridge. Carbine has seen much change over the years in the way students are taught. He recalls teaching methods as being more informal than today, with no monitoring of classrooms or what was being taught. By contrast, today's standards call for much greater accountability, he said. "What the kids are learning now is amazing compared to what we learned. The curriculum has been pushed down all the way to kindergarten- it's amazing what they're doing." Carbine recognizes that the changes may increase pressure on teachers and students but believes that "in the long run they benefit." Pam Hill Hill has been with the Moorpark Unified School District for 19 years, nine of them as Flory principal. She was hired by the district as a fifth-grade teacher at Flory, then taught at Arroyo West before becoming program coordinator, with assistant principaltype responsibilities for both Flory and Arroyo West. Prior to moving to Moorpark, Hill taught middle school in Half Moon Bay and Sacramento. She took a sabbatical and managed a bookstore in Half Moon Bay but said she missed the children too much. Hill was born in Santa Maria during World War II. Her family drove from California to New York to live with her grandfather while her father, an Air Force colonel, was stationed in England. The family moved often as the military relocated her father. "I had a great childhood. We traveled all over the world," Hill said. Hill spent her first two years of college at the University of Maryland's campus in Munich, Germany, where her father was stationed, then transferred to the University of Nevada Las Vegas when her father's military job changed. Hill met her husband in a class at the university, where both were majoring in education. The couple has lived in Moorpark for 15 years. Hill has enjoyed living in the community where she works. "Sometimes shopping in the grocery store takes a little longer but it's nice to see parents of students and to chat in a different environment," Hill said. Former students often return to visit Hill and update her on their lives. Some have even returned to the district as teachers. Mandy Hardin, a secondgrade teacher at Flory, was in Hill's fifth-grade class at Arroyo West 17 years ago. She remembers always feeling that Hill's class was a safe place to be. "You wanted to be part of that environment and it's the same thing here at Flory. Without her the school wouldn't be what it is," Hardin said. "I'm going to miss her so horribly." Under Hill's leadership Flory has grown from fourth and fifth grade to include kindergarten through third grades with a focus on science, math and technology. There are now 500 students, 30 teachers, a fully- equipped science lab and wireless laptops available to entire classrooms, among other facilities. The school is so popular that it receives more student applications than space allows and an enrollment lottery is held annually. In a partnership with California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, student teachers train at Flory. "We have a very unique curriculum that staff and I have worked hard as a team to build that really excites the children and gets them interested in knowing about the world around them," Hill said. We've come so far. Our test scores have gone up dramatically." Visitors often comment about the energy and excitement at the school, which she said makes it even more difficult for her to leave. Hill is a member of the Rotary Club, where she's developed a group of close friends whom she will miss. "I get teary just talking about it," Hill said. "I know it's the right decision but it breaks my heart to leave what I have here- my colleagues, my friends." |
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