It’s been three months since Centreville High School welcomed a new principal to the building. Principal Erik Healey has a long history of teaching. The University of Virginia graduate started his career in Falls Church City Public Schools teaching math before becoming the Dean of Students. He was later promoted to an Assistant Principal position at Arlington Public Schools before moving to Fairfax County Public Schools where he served as the Director of Student Services. Now he’s serving as Centreville’s Principal and has been positively received across the building.

The Centreville Sentinel requested an interview with Dr. Healey who was extremely easy to access and open to conversation. We formulated six questions ranging from student’s phone usage, to chronic absenteeism, and club and elective funding. We’d like to preface the interview with a reminder that Dr. Healey has only been with Centreville for 3 months so many of the problems to be addressed, or concerns students might have, are only just coming to his attention.

What are your top 3 priorities coming into Centreville?

There are 3 big focus areas for us. First is ensuring the level of instruction our students are receiving is of the highest quality regardless of the class you’re taking. I want to make sure that all of our students walk away with not just content knowledge, cause that’s great, but also the skills in order to be successful regardless of what path they’re gonna take.

The second is to build a positive school climate. I want to ensure we have positive relationships with each other; students to staff, staff to staff and student to student. And that means providing the support that’s necessary when needed.

The third is what I call Getting Better Together: Are we continuously improving and collaborating at a high level to be as successful as possible?

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Centreville has faced an increasingly large issue the past few years with students leaving campus either on foot or in their cars during lunch or plus period. Is there a strategy in place to stop this and what’s currently being done?

There are lots of things we definitely need to address. We have more students that are leaving campus than should. Technically, according to the SR&R, if you leave campus and you come back, you’re subject to search. It’s a safety thing for us, and we’re responsible for you regardless of whether you’re in room 216 or at the colonnade. 

Do we have a strategy? Yes. Can I articulate it to you right now? Not really.

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The admin has been going to different classrooms to observe phone usage among other things. What have you observed and would you describe the current phone policy as successful? 

Do you have any plans in place now or into the future to further curb phone usage in the classroom?

I have observed in my time in classrooms that we are doing better than a lot of places I’ve been. I recognize that at the beginning of the year with Mr. Lehman and our admin team, we put out a policy to keep phones in caddies or in backpacks away for the day. Those are two different things in my mind, even if you have it on vibrate, you just hear the vibrations and there’s an itch to see what’s going on. In a general sense are we doing pretty well with it? Yeah, we’re doing pretty well.

There’s definitely some room for us to improve. The division has different pilots going on across the county in terms of completely away for the day and the pouches and the pouches. I’m curious to see what some of the other schools are seeing, the ones who are in that pilot. I think what’s important about cell phones particularly for you all at your age and how to manage them effectively. You’re gonna leave HS and you’re gonna have a cell phone that someones not forcing you to put away for the day.

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What makes Centreville the right school for you to lead?

I was most intrigued by the diversity of this community. I have worked in a lot of different places and I find that schools that have the kind of diversity that we have flourish more than others. I think we gain a lot from understanding the perspectives of people who have lived a different life than you. 

I’ve heard nothing but positive things about how supportive this community is. We have a lot of parents, organizations, and community members that come to us and they’re really committed to the success of the school and that to me is really important.

We’re doing reality well and got some high test scores when you look at it generally. But also there are pockets of students who really need some greater support and those are the things that I flock to that are interesting to me.

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Are there any challenges you’ve faced in your new role?

Every day, I think this role in a general sense whether it’s at Centreville or any school is challenging. We’ve got 2,300 students and over 200 staff and many community members and everyone has different ideas. The biggest thing is how do we bring everyone together to one common cause?

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Centreville has very poor chronic absenteeism rates, among the lowest in the county. What can Centreville learn from your previous schools and do you have any plans to curb the issue?

Chronic absenteeism is not just a Centreville problem, but a societal problem especially since covid. I look at our chronic absenteeism percentage every single day because it is something that is a challenge. Since I’ve come here, I’ve sent out a weekly newsletter and I often mention our chronic absenteeism rate because it’s an issue. We’re not just talking about unexcused absences either, like you go away on trips often, that’s a problem too. 

We’re looking at how we develop the right tools to monitor chronic absenteeism early. How do we get creative around providing support for students who are chronic absenteeism? And how do we make school an engaging place where students want to be.

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Some academic clubs and elective courses don’t necessarily feel financially supported by the school, are there any future plans to better allocate school funds to these groups?

I’m always willing to sit down and have a convo about what your goals are. There’s a ton of research about how when students are engaged outside the classroom it makes them more successful academically, they are more connected to a community, and find more success in life. The more that we can get kids involved the better. With respect to finances, finances are finite, so sometimes you have to prioritize certain things but that doesn’t mean we don’t believe the work that’s happening.

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After the interview, Dr. Healey asked for feedback on the school, which led to discussions on a range of subjects including the effectiveness of ROAR and Plus Periods, effective phone usage policies, and outreach to students that don’t feel a part of the Centreville community. The Sentinel thanks Dr. Healey for his time.