Tom Drake’s retirement didn’t last long. He stepped down from his role as principal of Crossett Brook Middle School after 14 years at the end of the 2022-2023 school year. Now he’s back in the classroom at Waitsfield Elementary School teaching grades five/six. In an email Waitsfield principal Kaiya Korb sent to the community last week, she wrote, “Mr. Drake has most recently worked as the principal of Crossett Brook Middle School. Anyone who has met Tom before knows that he is all about middle school students. Tom’s nine years of classroom teaching, along with his work as a school administrator, were almost all with this age group. He is very much looking forward to getting back to the classroom setting and the direct focus on teaching and learning. Alex Stengel, whom we had hired to this position in early April, decided over the summer not to relocate to Vermont. While this change of plans was unexpected, I am thrilled to have a dynamic educator like Tom joining Waitsfield School and confident he will support the growth of the students in this classroom. In addition to his depth of knowledge and experience, Tom already has working relationships with several WES staff. He and Torrey Smith, our other fifth- and sixth-grade classroom teacher, will be a great team. Torrey will continue teaching sixth-grade math and Tom will teach fifth-grade math.”
