When longtime Garlough Environmental Magnet School Principal Sue Powell started her first teaching job 35 years ago in Columbia Heights, the principal took her and three other new educators out to lunch.

Sue Powell has announced she will retire as principal at Garlough Environmental Magnet School in West St. Paul in December. (Courtesy of Independent School District 197)

“I remember telling my colleagues, ‘I can’t believe I get paid to do this,’” said Powell, who went on to lead West St. Paul’s Garlough school for 20 years. “It just fulfills my soul, and motivates me every day. I want to do better every day — you want to find the window or key to every student’s learning style.”

Due to personal and family health concerns, Powell has announced her retirement for later this year. Officially, she will take family and medical leave through the fall, and retire in December. In the meantime, Libby Huettl, formerly the principal at Somerset Elementary School in Mendota Heights, will serve as interim principal at Garlough.

School starts in District 197 on Tuesday, Sept. 2, for kindergarten, fifth grade and ninth grade, while the year begins on Wednesday, Sept. 3, for students in grades first through fourth, sixth through eighth, and 10th through 12th.

In addition to Powell’s time at Garlough, she taught elementary school for 14 years in the Columbia Heights public school district, served as a principal for a year in the Glencoe Silver Lake school district, and also taught high school English at a foreign language school in China.

“I loved my job. I loved going to school, even when there are hard things going on in my family, or in life,” Powell said. “I think kids and staff really feel joy going there. If you walked into Garlough, you would probably feel joyful, too. It just fills my heart.”

Nature-focused learning

Sue Powell with “Mango.” (Courtesy of Independent School District 197)

Garlough offers unique nature-focused learning opportunities, with outdoor classrooms called “Outdoor Wonder Learning Stations,” as well as access to a plethora of animals like birds, hedgehogs, fish and snakes, to mention a few.

Powell was integral in establishing the school’s nature-focused learning; she calls herself part of a “Boundary Waters family,” and enjoys being out in nature herself. That said, she credited families, staff and community members for creating the school’s unique offerings.

“So many people interconnected to make this school so awesome,” Powell said.

Xiomara Medina-Calderón started working at Garlough the year before Powell became principal. At the time, Medina-Calderón was a special-education paraprofessional, and as a Spanish speaker, helped acclimate Spanish-speaking families to the school. For the past eight years, she has been an official school cultural liaison.

Medina-Calderón witnessed the principal’s passion for helping each and every student, she said, regardless of the circumstances. Powell was integral in launching Garlough’s reading challenges — where the reward for students could be the principal sleeping on the roof or eating a mealworm.

Last year, to kick off the school’s focus on birds, Powell donned an inflatable flamingo suit and got on the roof before that morning’s school bell.

“Working with Sue for the past 20 years has been the most wonderful thing for me,” Medina-Calderón said. “I’m going to miss having a great boss, a great educator, a great advocate for students, and I’m going to miss having my friend there every day.”

Path to principal

Sue Powell, left, principal of Garlough Environmental Magnet School, hands Alisa Gines, center, an envelope full of checks on Nov. 25, 2009. Gines’ son, JC, right, a fourth-grader at Garlough, and daughter Amariah, 5, lost their dad to bladder cancer and the school collected more than $1,000 to help the family. (Ginger Pinson / Pioneer Press)

Powell’s route to education was a bit circuitous. Her plan since childhood was to become a doctor. She was on her way, with a bachelor’s degree and working as a psychometrist.

But her plan changed; she had recently gotten married, and was starting a family. She learned about a nine-month post-baccalaureate program for teaching and switched gears.

And why not? It was the family business after all. Both of her parents were teachers, with teaching lineage even going back to some of her great-grandparents.

Very early on, Powell said, she loved teaching. But it truly became her calling after acceptance into the Bush Educators Program during her fourth year of teaching. That opened her eyes to the path of school administration. The Bush Foundation program was billed as a way to train teachers, principals and superintendents for lasting, systemic and transformational change within school communities, Powell said.

“Very, very, very soon into this program, I realized I was in the right place and was motivated by all the possibilities in education,” Powell recalled. “I am such a strong believer that each individual is only held back by their fears, and constantly thinking about ‘what if this or what if that’ to convince themselves not to do something. And that is not me. So, even though I had a toddler at home, I started down the road to reaching that dream. … I have never regretted it one minute. Being a principal filled my bucket every single day.”

Eventually, she also completed her doctorate in education, making good on her childhood goal.

Student becomes a colleague

One of Powell’s former students can attest to her charge to inspire.

At 5 years old, Josselyne Nila de Chavez moved to West St. Paul from Mexico. The new kindergartner was still learning English, and getting used to her new country. In one particular instance, Powell noticed that the new student had a particular proficiency for mathematics. Nila de Chavez said Powell made sure she was able to attend the Girls Excel in Math enrichment program at the University of Minnesota.

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“She was always finding opportunities for us to grow and experience things outside of school,” Nila de Chavez said.

At Garlough, it allowed the young student to find a community, and later, a lifelong mentor. As Nila de Chavez matriculated herself, considering her own career, the former Garlough student made plans to become a teacher. While completing her bachelor’s degree, she became a paraprofessional at Garlough Environmental Magnet School.

“I joked that I couldn’t call her by her first name. It still felt like she was my principal,” said Nila de Chavez, 29. “I have so much respect for her, and I admire her so much.”

Nila de Chavez became a teacher at Garlough last year, and has plans to complete her master’s degree to one day become a principal herself.

“She inspired me to do that. And even now that she’s retiring, I told her, ‘Please continue to mentor me,’” Nila de Chavez said with a laugh. “She said, ‘I’ll always be here to help you.’”