By Neil Corbett – Maple Ridge News
For 17 years, Sylvia Russell worked in the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows School District, and last Monday she returned, now in the top job.
Russell, the new superintendent, began her teaching career in Quesnel, was a vice-principal in Campbell River, and in 1988 came to School District No. 42. She served as the principal of Riverside elementary and Maple Ridge secondary, and went to the board office as the director of human resources in 1999, and was later promoted to assistant superintendent.
In 2005, she left to go to the Coquitlam School District, where she served as assistant superintendent for a decade.
When former superintendent Jan Unwin left the district to work with the education ministry, it created an opportunity. Returning to the district where she had spent most of her career, with such success, was appealing to Russell.
“I hit one of those places in my life where I felt I needed a change,” she said. “I loved this school district. There’s a real willingness to try new things, to look at the needs of students and try to innovate around those needs.”
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