SAUGUS — Brendon Sullivan has a new challenge ahead of him.
After working 20 years in the Saugus Public Schools, Sullivan is set to become the new principal of the Middle-High School.
Sullivan joined the school district as a high-school English teacher in 2001, a role he held for 12 years. He also served as an advisor to the classes of 2008 and 2012.
From there, he moved up to the administrative side of the town’s education system in 2013; he spent a year as the full-time director of humanities for grades 6-12. His role grew the next year when he was also appointed assistant principal of the high school.
In 2016, he was named interim principal when Michael Hashem was named acting superintendent. Before that interim role, Sullivan had been working as executive director of curriculum, instruction and accountability for the school district.
For Sullivan, getting to enact change is a big reason why he wanted to become a principal.
“I like the position you are in as a principal to really affect change, to really work directly with students and teachers to try and get every student the opportunity to have a great education,” said Sullivan. “When you’re in a school, there’s a lot of excitement, and I’ve always really enjoyed that in my career, so it’s something that I’m very anxious to get back to.”
Sullivan will be taking over for Hashem, who recently stepped down as the Middle-High School principal to return to teaching math at the school.
Sullivan said he has a close relationship with Hashem, saying that will be a benefit as he will have someone to reach out to if he needs to talk about his new job.
“I’ve worked very closely with Mike for a long time and I have learned a tremendous amount from Mike,” said Sullivan. “Mike is a great educator, he’s a great leader and he’s a great teacher. When you have someone like that they are great to work for because they not only pass along great advice from their years of service, but they also give you the opportunities to take things on, to try out ideas and give you support.”
With town schools pivoting to a remote education model in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, one of the tasks that Sullivan is looking forward to is being able to help students and teachers return to normalcy in the fall.
“The No. 1 thing next year is trying to get back to a sense of normalcy,” he said. “I think we have done a great job of managing it as a district, but I think everybody is looking forward to the course we are on now and hopefully continuing to returning to a sense of normalcy, returning to being able to focus a lot more on education — which is what all of us as educators got into the profession to do.”
