55.0°,
Mostly Cloudy Two new principals on board in the Central School District
Familiar faces take reins at Grand Ave., Merrick Ave. middle schools
Middle school is a time of change and turbulence in students’ lives –– a high-speed transition from late childhood to early adulthood. Ensuring that students make that leap in a way that respects their social and emotional needs while providing an academically rich –– and demanding –– environment is the job of the middle school principal.
This coming school year, both Grand Avenue Middle School and Merrick Avenue Middle School will have new principals, each with years of experience as a classroom teacher and an administrator.
Carlo Conte, a former assistant principal at Calhoun High School in North Merrick, will take the helm at Grand Avenue, and Dr. Meador Pratt, a former assistant principal at Kennedy High School in Bellmore, will head Merrick Avenue.
The Herald sat down with both men last week, three days after they began their new jobs, when the middle school halls were empty and virtually silent, chairs were stacked neatly atop tables and documents were piled high in the principals’ offices.
Dr. Meador Pratt
Merrick Avenue Middle School
Pratt, 43, grew up an hour outside of Syracuse, and earned a bachelor’s degree, magna cum laude, in math from Colgate University and a master’s in science education and doctorate in educational leadership from Syracuse University.
After teaching science and math in the North Syracuse Central School District for a decade, in 2001 he became an assistant principal at Paul V. Moore High School in the Central Square School District, a 360-square-mile district north of Syracuse. There is a single high school for this suburban/rural district, which is three-quarters the size of Nassau County.
In 2004, Pratt moved to Long Island. Between the Hewlett-Woodmere and Lynbrook school districts, he served five years as a mathematics director before becoming assistant principal of Kennedy High in the Bellmore-Merrick district, where he remained for three years, from 2009 to this year.
“It definitely was a big transition moving” to Long Island, Pratt said.
