Educators start new chapters in careers at Hot Springs

Tommy Wells is the new assistant principal for Hot Springs World Class High School. - Photo by Richard Rasmussen of The Sentinel-Record
Tommy Wells is the new assistant principal for Hot Springs World Class High School. - Photo by Richard Rasmussen of The Sentinel-Record

Tommy Wells and Clarice "Nikki" Anderson were named assistant principals for two schools in the Hot Springs School District earlier this week during a special called meeting of the Hot Springs School Board.

Wells will be the second assistant principal at Hot Springs World Class High School and Anderson will be the assistant principal for Oaklawn Visual and Performing Arts Magnet School. Wells started Thursday and Anderson will start July 1.

"I am very excited to be a part of Hot Springs. I am excited about the quality of education that Hot Springs puts out. I am excited to be a part of the teaching staff and excited to be a part of the new area," Wells said.

He said he feels he was selected because of his love for the children, his 12 years of experience in the education field in "big and rural" school districts and for spending the first part of his teaching career in Little Rock.

"Spending 12 years in many different capacities of dealing with kids is something that is easy for me," Wells said.

Wells was the athletic director and dean of students at Cross County High School for two and a half years before he moved to Hot Springs. Prior to that, he was the athletic director, coach and dean of students for Palestine-Wheatley High School in Palestine.

He said he has learned that students who are achieving and students who are learning look the same no matter where they are and plans to apply this to his instruction in Hot Springs.

His vision for the school, he said, is to support and help Principal Kiley Simms to carry out the school's mission.

"My vision would be for all students to achieve and all students to learn; all students being a productive person, a good person," he said.

Simms said she thinks Wells will bring a "wealth of knowledge" to his new position.

"He is bringing skills, and he is bringing, most importantly, an openness and willingness to build relationships with our kids," Simms said. "He knows how to build those positive relationships with kids to motivate them, and I am excited for our team to have grown (as) one. He is going to be a great addition."

Clarice "Nikki" Anderson has been named assistant principal for Oaklawn Visual and Performing Arts Magnet School. - Photo by Richard Rasmussen of The Sentinel-Record
Clarice "Nikki" Anderson has been named assistant principal for Oaklawn Visual and Performing Arts Magnet School. - Photo by Richard Rasmussen of The Sentinel-Record

Anderson will be overseeing nearly 800 students grades K-6 in her new position as Oaklawn Visual and Performing Arts Magnet School's assistant principal.

She said she hopes to use her new position to continue the professional learning committee and be a "difference-maker."

"I hope that my time at Oaklawn will be like a legacy; that I will leave something that each teacher or staff member will want to be involved in or do more of, because they've had a role model that was striving for perfection," Anderson said.

"I know there's no such thing as a perfect person, but there is such a thing as a person with a great heart, and I hope that my smile and my heart becomes so contagious that love will just spread all through Oaklawn.

"I pray that building will be a place that's filled with love, and when you walk in that door you know that not only are you going to learn academically, but you're going to love in the midst of it all," she said.

Previously having worked as a second-grade teacher at Langston Leadership Academy and a reading interventionist at Gardner STEM Magnet, Anderson said she has a "willingness to be able to capture kids' hearts."

"Being able to come down to their level because I understand that the love some students get at school may be the only love and attention they get," she said. "So I'm always trying to see your heart so that I can reach you academically, because if I haven't reached your heart then I definitely can't reach your mind."

Anderson said she wanted to pursue the assistant principal position because she has always had "great leadership skills."

"A couple of years ago I finished my master's in administration and I said 'I'm going to be somebody's assistant principal one day,' and at that time I was at Langston ... I just felt like I had skills and I had the personality; I have great people skills," she said.

Anderson said she enjoys building relationships with the students and families of the school.

"I get a thrill from being able to make a difference," she said. "I knew there was only so much I could do in a classroom setting, and it needed to extend beyond that point, so I was excited about having an opportunity to take things I have learned in the classroom."

Anderson said her vision is for Oaklawn Magnet students to know nothing is unattainable, that they can be anything they want to be as long as they work hard for it, and that "the sky is the limit."

"My vision is for those kids to grow up, and people know their name, and they make a difference in this community where they have attended school," she said. "That's my vision: That whatever they learn, they come back and pour that into the lives of other people because someone poured it into them."

Local on 01/12/2020

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