New High Bridge Elementary School Principal Chuck Eller sees his job as similar to a coach’s — not playing in the game but making sure his team achieves success.
Eller’s job is to ‘‘equip, train and motivate” his staff to educate students and watch ‘‘on the sidelines” as they excel.
Last school year, Eller served as assistant principal of High Bridge and spent the previous two years as assistant principal of Benjamin Tasker Middle School.
Eller is replacing Pamela Redmon, who was promoted to regional director for Region 4 with the Prince George’s County Public Schools.
‘‘I want to be a part of or help develop our staff into one that really collaborates closely with one another, kind of iron sharpening iron. We’re going to help support each other in order to grow as professionals and good teachers and good administrators, and really just try to build a really solid learning community where we’re all involved.”
Before becoming an administrator, Eller spent 14 years as a sixth grade teacher. Eller said he is looking forward to overseeing students from a diverse age range at the elementary level — after working with middle school students.
‘‘It’s something new all the time,” Eller said.
Eller has decorated his office with pictures of his family, football momentos, and even a skeleton that he once used for teaching.
The teaching tool was so popular that he allowed his students to decorate the skeleton for different times of year and occasions, such as with a Washington Redskins hat when the team won the previous week.
Soon, Eller said, the skeleton will be dressed in a Hawaiian shirt and summer garb to welcome teachers back to school.
Although he studied business at Bowie State University and began his career in sales and management, Eller said his career always involved teaching others, such as teaching customers how to use the products he sold.
‘‘I fell into the natural teacher’s role.”
In the late 1980s, Eller earned his teaching certificate and began teaching sixth grade.
He said he enjoyed bringing his business experience into the classroom.
‘‘I knew where the kids were going and what they needed to get there,” Eller said.
Eller’s goals for his first year as principal include child-focused educational policies, improving special education, rewarding students for accomplishments, and promoting parental involvement in the school.
‘‘I’d like to see us really focus on the kids,” Eller said. ‘‘When I make, or collectively with the staff, we make a decision, it should be in the best interest of the kids, not necessarily the adults.”
Eller said teachers and administrators sometimes are overwhelmed with all they have to do and forget to reward students for what they have accomplished.
He plans to go into the classrooms with stickers and other rewards to mark students’ achievements.
Eller also plans to work to improve special education through co-teaching which includes both regular education and special education students together in a class with two teachers. He said his goal is to mainstream as many of the special education students as possible.
Special education students make up more than 25 percent of the school’s population of about 300 students, according to the school’s Web site.
‘‘We continue to work really hard with the special ed students, and they’re achieving at higher levels each year,” Eller said.
Eller also wants to encourage parents to come to the school and be involved in their children’s education.
‘‘I think we have a welcoming environment.”
Shaw Taylor, a parent of a first-grader who will attend High Bridge this year, said Eller has been very receptive in his concerns.
‘‘I must say he’s been very receptive so far. We met for I’d say about 30 minutes, we walked around the school, because my interest has been maintenance of the school,” Taylor said. ‘‘We walked around, and we talked about how best to get parents involved. I must say from my discussions with him, he and I are on the same page as to what needs to be done.”
E-mail Megan King at mking@gazette.net.
Charles E. Eller Jr.
Age: 52
Hometown: Bowie
Experience: sixth grade teacher at Kettering Elementary, Patuxent Elementary, and Kenilworth Elementary, two years as assistant principal at Benjamin Tasker Middle School, one year as assistant principal at High Bridge Elementary School
Education: Bachelor’s degree in business, Bowie State University
Family: Wife, Cindy; sons Ryan, 26 and daughter-in-law, Ashleigh; Michael, 24, Jake, 22, and Timothy, 19
Pet: Yellow Labrador, Jessica
Hobbies: Tennis, volleyball, traveling to the beach
Community involvement: Member and deacon, Reformed Presbyterian Church of Bowie
Favorite movie: ‘‘Braveheart”
