End of year review: Q&A

Katie Samol | The Chronicle

Last August, Ben Brown began his first school year as Mason High School’s (MHS) Executive Director of High School Experience and Principal. Since then, he has worked to support expanding initiatives, including the Experiential Learning Program and the Big Rock Student Leadership Team. Prioritizing improved school spirit, Brown has remained highly involved in student life. Now, as his first year as Mason’s principal comes to a close, The Chronicle sits down to talk to Brown about his experience transitioning into Mason, his first year in the influential role and his continued plans for improvement at MHS.
Q: In September, you were asked one word to describe your new year at Mason. You chose the word authenticity. Now that you have spent a year as principal, what word would you choose to describe your first year?
A: Joy. This has truly been a joyful experience for me, professionally, personally — I look forward to coming into work every day.
Q: What makes you look forward to each school day so much?
A: The amount of great people that are here. My daily interactions with everybody. The staff — my administrative team is hugely [important] because we have quite a few folks on the team. Too often in this profession, you feel like that GIF of Jon Snow in Game of Thrones when they’re all coming at him and he’s just standing there. That’s what it feels like most places, but here, we’ve got a squad. We have depth and very talented people. From an administrative standpoint, it gives me great security to know that I have a team that I can count on. From the student perspective, the students have just been so open and welcoming. I love our interactions. I love seeing them at games and concerts, and I love seeing them in their extracurricular pursuits. I get to see them in that light, and then I get to see them back during the school day, and then we can talk about it. I enjoy it, so, joy.
Q: I know a focus of yours this year was promoting school spirit. This was evident through your attendance at all football games, as well as changes in our building, like the wall outside of your office with the Comets logo. In what other ways are you working to improve Mason school spirit?
A: Aesthetically, I think we have a lot of room for improvement to enhance the school spirit side of things. This is obviously a wonderful facility. It’s 23 years old now, though, and if you look at how it was decorated, if you’re just dropped in random places, and you were blindfolded and they took the blindfold off, and said, “Quick! Where are you?” You’d be like, “Um, I’m in a school. Not sure what school.” There are all [of these] universal things around, but not a lot that clearly says, “The Comets.” Obviously, it takes some planning and budgeting, but I want to continue to grow overt messaging of school spirit throughout the school, aesthetically. Outside of that, I think we need to continue to give students an opportunity to co-create their school experience whether it’s through our Big Rock Committee, or through [other] programs that we have. All the different clubs, The Chronicle, MBC, things that have true, authentic avenues for student voice, [it is important] to receive that and to act on that when appropriate. Part of spirit is [that] people feel ownership. It’s not one or the other’s, it’s shared. You have to have empowerment for people to feel like, “I’m a part of this.” That’s the game plan, and to be consistent. Consistency is always the secret ingredient to success. It’s doing the mundane stuff that you don’t think is a big deal, [because] it is. We always try to be very consistent in what we do every day.
Q: Based on your efforts to improve school spirit, what outcomes have you seen?
A: For me, in interacting with so many people on a daily basis, those conversations that I have with people [show improvement]. Whether they’re parents [or] families that will notice, they’ll say, “I really like seeing you out front in the mornings, greeting kids,” or “Wow, you’re at all these events.” From the students, when I talk to them either at events, or the hallways or the cafeteria, just those friendly conversations [mean a lot]. Staff [are the] same way, them going out of their way to say that they’re happy I’m here. They ask about my family, you can tell they have a personal interest. I got a nice card from the MSA [Muslim Student Association] recently, which is really nice on the heels of Ramadan. General feedback like that, it’s emails sometimes, nice emails from people. It’s more of a feel thing. You can kind of feel the energy. By and large, I feel like we’re moving in the right direction. I feel like energy is up [and there is] a lot of positivity.
Q: You spiced up morning announcements this year with enthusiasm and Friday music. Why do you find this important?
A: It’s something I’ve done my entire career, and there have been times along the way where I wonder, “Is this even worth doing?” Like the music, for example. The feedback has always been pretty clear that the majority of people like it. You’re always going to have some [people] that want to get right to it but I’ve seen it here more than anywhere else, the impact it’s made. It’s just a cadence or a rhythm of interaction where it’s a routine, but it allows there to feel like more of a connection because we are so big that even if somebody, we might not know each other directly, just hearing that voice [creates connection]. It’s like, when you see a news anchor, you see him all the time and you’ve never met him, but you feel like you do, right? So I think psychologically, that plays a little bit of a part in it, just hearing someone’s voice and feeling that connection. Whether we want to admit it or not, as human beings, we all have a need to have some kind of connection with others, even the people that think, “Nope, I’m alone I just want to be by myself.” Well, there’s degrees of that, but it’s something in our makeup, we’re created to need a connection to people. I feel like it helps with that.
Q: Can you tell me more about what the transition was like from Lakota to Mason for you?
A: It was very unique in that some personal things occurred right in the same span of making that decision, specifically health-related with my wife, which was pretty serious. Thank God we’re in a good place with all that, we weathered that, and the staff here was and has been extremely supportive. We’ve made it through, but it was just hyper-intense but also kind of balancing at the same time, it forced the professional work stuff to be put in proper perspective with life, which I think is helpful, because when you start a new job, sometimes you can put all your energy into that and not be balanced with your family. This allowed me to have a wide lens and keep everything in perspective. So as important as this was to get off to a good start and do well, it’s just kind of more of a faith thing where it’s like, “Okay, here we go. I don’t quite understand why we need all these variables, but let’s go with it.” You know, trust it. And getting to know people and trying to give people an opportunity to get to know me, to quickly try to get in a rhythm. I feel like I’ve been here a lot longer, and not in a bad way, but in a good way of, “Yeah, I’ve always been here,” so that gives me great optimism for how it’s going to go moving forward. If I already have this kind of tight-knit connection and family feel with everybody, that’s only going to increase. It’s exciting. I like challenges. I like change. Everything was almost like uncovering a mystery, trying like a detective to figure out how it all fits together, that was kind of fun for me.
Q: What would you say was most challenging work-wise during the transition?
A: Well, it would have been a whole different story if I didn’t have the team that I had. There’s a lot that I would have been oblivious to, but they took good care of me. I could go to them and they would explain it to me. If I didn’t have that, it would have been a whole different story with stress and everything else. It just felt like everyone was so giving and helpful. I think people wanted me to get off to a good start by supporting me, which doesn’t always happen. There could be folks that aren’t thrilled that there’s a change, and they don’t go out of their way to be a bridge, but I feel like everybody was very helpful so it made the transition really smooth. Being the new guy, getting to make new relationships was the most important thing in the beginning.
Q: What project, initiative or event that you were a part of this year are you most proud of?
A: That’s a lot to choose from but I will say that our XLP [Experiential Learning] program is very specific to what we have that no one else has. Every high school is trying to do something like that, and they may have versions of it, and there could be high schools that do have it, but it’s in a class by itself, and the way we’ve expanded that with our working Trades Program, so it’s not just in certain career paths, I’d say that really has stood out to me. Let me also add the Big Rock team, because that’s a new phenomenon for me to see how student-driven that group is. We have a lot of groups like that, like SALT [Student Athlete Leadership Team], student-led groups that come up with ideas, plan things, and then execute it. That’s just beautiful to me. That’s one of my favorite parts of this type of work is we take ideas, we work together, refine them, and then we bring them to life. And it impacts people. So I would say XLP and our student-led groups, specifically Big Rock.
Q: At the beginning of the school year, Mason High School opened the long-awaited Dream Center. This happened at the beginning of your first year as principal. What role did you play in this major project? I know you were coming in on the tail end of it.
A: I’m very thankful for that timeline to match up. I feel honored and grateful for that, supporting the efforts in whatever way I can [is my role], whether it’s helping the students with the Cosmic Cafe or the makerspaces, or working with Mr. Roberts and Mrs. Zimmaro. Interacting with the students in there, and encouraging teachers to take risks, get out of their comfort zone and take their classes in there. We’re working on the E-gaming, that’s the main area that has not come to fruition. Before this year’s over, I need to get a bit more traction in that space to build on for the future, but that’s the only thing that hasn’t really come together like we’d like.
Q: How do you think the Dream Center is impacting Mason High School?
A: I would love to ask students about that, but just from my observation, I feel like it has a mental health benefit. I feel like students use it as a reset or a break. The fact that it’s open after hours now, I’ve seen a lot of productive work in there with collaborative student groups. The creativity of designing and creating things, whether it’s the poster machine buttons, the 3D printers, the Green Screen Room. I see students utilizing the tools, which was the hope, and the Cosmic Cafe is just amazing. Watching how they market their products, produce their products, the response from our students of how much they appreciate it [has been amazing]. To go to a high school and to say, “You know what? I want a fun drink. I’m gonna go get one.” And we don’t have to DoorDash that, or have someone bring it to us. We just need to see if we can get those cups a little larger. But that’s been a joy. I think it helps our students feel like this place is pretty special. I think most of our students are pretty well aware this isn’t happening everywhere. We’ve got it pretty good here, so we need to do our part to preserve it, contribute to it and protect it.
Q: Do you have anything else to add?
A: Just [to] express my sincere gratitude to everybody within this school community for making this place easy to assimilate into and to be my new home. I want to have proper closure this year for our seniors and do that right, but I’m also very excited about the future.