In an annual effort to identify exceptional elementary and middle school principals, the U. S. Department of Education and the National Association of Elementary School Principals, in corporate partnership with Annuity Life Insurance Company, sponsor the National Distinguished Principal Award. This annual award rests on these important goals:

• to attain national recognition for the critical leadership role of public and private school principals;
• to inspire the educational community to pay tribute to its own outstanding leaders;
• to increase public awareness of the importance of the principalship through broad media coverage events;
• to offer the opportunity for professionals serving both public and private schools to meet and work together toward sharing experiences, solving problems, and meeting common goals.

In June 2001, the NDP Private School Selection Committee and the Peer Review Panel met to review all of the candidates for this most honored award. The Department For Schools of the Evangelical Lutheran Church In America is pleased to announce that our candidate, Barbara Clark, has been selected to represent private schools as a 2001 National Distinguished Principal.

Barbara is the principal of St. Mark’s Lutheran School in Hacienda Heights, CA. She has served at St. Mark’s Lutheran School as a teacher or principal since 1983.

Miss Clark lists among her accomplishments the growth of her schools student population from 286 when she began, to 744 students this past school year. She established financial stability at the school, a state of the art computer technology program that begins in Kindergarten and includes on campus classes for teachers and staff, a comprehensive disaster plan that reaches out into the students homes, a personal goal setting program for students in grades 5-8, as well as a goal setting plan for all 70 of her staff, and numerous outreach programs for the school, congregation, and community.

Barbara Clark has created an environment in which students and faculty realize their personal, academic, social and spiritual potential by uniting students, parents, and faculty as a team. The goal of this team is to foster within each student a positive sense of hope for his or her future. Under Barbara Clark’s leadership, this team constantly works to improve the school’s educational excellence, while providing a nurturing, Christ-centered environment. Her philosophy of “doing what is best for students” permeates all decisions and interactions on the campus. “Barbara Clark has heightened my awareness of the awesome blessing and responsibility I have in touching students lives,” writes Linda Louise Merchant, St. Mark’s First Grade Teacher for thirteen years.

Congratulations Barbara, on this most distinguished honor!

Back to Fall 2001 Index