According to Elliot Landon’s email, candidate Shelley Somers was unanimously selected by the Staples High School search committee as the finalist to fill the open position for principal next year.

Somers has been working as principal at Central Middle School in Greenwich, Connecticut for five and a half years. “It’s not like I hate what I’m doing,” laughed Somers. Rather, Somers saw the job opening for principal at Staples and decided to seize the fun opportunity to grow her career.

“My past jobs have been to ‘fix it,’ but now I have an opportunity to take something that’s not broken and make it great,” Somers said. She is excited about the high standards for teaching and learning, involvement in sports and arts, and amazing athletics at Staples and aims for improvement rather than repair.

Somers sees her empathy and fairness as two of her personal characteristics that would make her a successful candidate for principal. “[Somers is] really outgoing, very straightforward and genuine,” search committee member Jojo Adler ’16 said. Adler added that her unique “bubbly yet level” personality makes her the choice candidate.

When asked about replacing Principal Dodig, Somers remarked that there are “big shoes to fill.” If she is selected for the position, she plans to spend as much time with Dodig as possible to learn all he knows.

“I understand that just walking into the building doesn’t make you a success as a leader,” Somers said. “I will have to prove myself.”