Meet Your New Principal: Seaholm's Deana Lancaster

There are five new principals at this year, and they're all excited to meet their students and the Birmingham community.

Comprising this new class of principals, all of whom replaced resigning or retiring administrators during the summer, are: Jamii Hitchcock at , Deana Lancaster at , Jason Clinkscale at , Laura Tinsley at the and Susan Crocker at .

Patch is catching up with all of Birmingham's new principals and introducing them to you in a series of profiles. Today, we're talking to:

Deana Lancaster

School:

Replacing: Terry Piper, who

History: Lancaster is a transplant to the area but has already found her home in the Birmingham area. After growing up in southwestern Ohio, Lancaster graduated from Miami University in Oxford, OH, in 1998.

Lancaster went on to teach in the Talawanda School District in Oxford as a high school English teacher for five years. She then was assistant principal at Talawanda High School, then filled the principal role at a Talawanda elementary and middle school.

During her time in Oxford, Lancaster introduced Chinese to the elementary schools and redesigned the student advisory program. Partnering with nearby Miami University, Lancaster invited engineering students to help eighth-grade girls prepare for the Ohio Achievement Assessment in Science, and she helped create a digital media program at Talawanda Middle School using resources available through the university’s Interactive Media Studies department.

Lancaster, whose husband grew up in Bloomfield Hills, is also the mother of two: Jack, who will be entering the third grade in the fall, and Ian, who will be in kindergarten.

Plans for 2011-12: Lancaster said it's too early to tell what will happen during the year — and too early to say if anything will change. However, she noted that she wants to become personally involved in the lives of Seaholm students, whether that's visiting classrooms, serving cafeteria duties, promoting student groups and asking students directly: What do you think Seaholm should be?

Lancaster also has plans to address any lingering issues left over from last year, when racist graffiti was discovered on the walls of a boys bathroom. Former senior Courtney Thomas has been charged with one count of ethnic intimidation, and the case is .

Lancaster said she wants to help Seaholm "continue the healing" from last year, noting that staff members will participate in diversity discussions before the school year starts. However, Lancaster said, it's more important that students lead the majority of the discussion, and she said she will be working with various student groups to faciliate activities throughout the year.

"You never want to have a situation like this where the end of the school year is where the discussion stops," she said.

Why she loves Seaholm: Lancaster said the students and staff at Seaholm have been incredibly welcoming so far, and she looks forward to the beginning of the year.

Lancaster spent a large chunk of time at the end of last year shadowing former Principal Terry Piper, she said. “I felt at home from the very beginning,” she said.

Message to parents and students: Lancaster said she wants parents and students to come to her with any problems.

"I'm one of the most approachable and friendly person they can meet," she said. "Come in and meet me. If we can do anything, we want to make it easy for them."