Dear MFS community,

I am pleased to announce that Upper School Director Chris Kimberly has been appointed Assistant Head/Academic Dean beginning July 1. He will replace Barbara Caldwell who announced her retirement earlier this school year.

The Assistant Head/Academic Dean has primary responsibility for the academic program at MFS including faculty hiring and professional development, along with many other important duties and responsibilities.

In October, we retained the national educational search firm, Carney, Sandoe & Associates, to recruit and vet candidates. In November, we formed a seven-person search committee made up of teachers, administrators and our Board chair. Ultimately, the search committee came to unity in recommending Chris for the position. Chris has done a fine job since beginning here in 2009 as Upper School Director. Prior to coming to MFS, he served as the Academic Dean at Emma Willard School, a prestigious girls’ boarding school in Troy, NY. Prior to that role, he taught chemistry, biology, and physics and served as head of the science department at “Emma.” Chris has a B.A. from Princeton University and an M.S. from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He is a member of Moorestown Friends Meeting and has three sons at MFS.

The seven finalists (from a field of 73) came from as far away as Hawaii and California and included a head of school, an associate head of school, and five division directors. In addition to being interviewed by the search committee, each finalist was interviewed by more than 20 members of the MFS community, including trustees, administrators, administrative staff, teachers, and students.

Chris has enthusiastically accepted the position. He will begin serving as Assistant Head/Academic Dean July 1, but he will soon begin to work on the transition with Barbara Caldwell. Barbara, whom we will be honoring in the spring, will launch a search immediately for a new Upper School Director.

I am very happy with this outcome. I enjoy working with Chris and have personally observed the many strengths identified by the search committee, which include his intelligence, his breadth of knowledge, his leadership with technology, his ability to think expansively, and his commitment to MFS and Quaker values.

I would like to thank all those who participated in this process, particularly the hard-working and discerning search committee: Kathy Cook, Morgan Gandal, Kelly Goula, Naoji Moriuchi, Michael Omilian, Priscilla Taylor-Williams and Karen Washington.

Sincerely,

Larry Van Meter
Head of School