Island Park School District welcomes new staff

Students weren’t the only new people in the Island Park School District when the schools opened their doors earlier this month. New faculty and staff were also there to greet the children and start their new careers in Island Park.

Lincoln Orens Middle School welcomed Jennifer Robbins, a new English/Language Arts teacher. Robbins taught at William T. Rogers Middle School in Kings Park, Holy Trinity Diocesan High School in Hicksville, Copiague Middle School, and Henry L. Stimson Middle School in Huntington Station.

She is a graduate of Siena College with a bachelor’s in English. She earned a master’s in Adolescence Education from Dowling

College.

The school also has a new guidance counselor, Andrea Cutler, who joins the district after having served as school counselor at Floral Park Memorial High School.

A graduate of SUNY College at Oneonta with a bachelor’s in Child and Family Studies, she earned a master’s in School Counseling from New York Institute of Technology. Cutler is also a member of the New York State School Counselors Association and the Nassau Counselor’s Association.

At Francis X. Hegarty Elementary School, a new FLES/Spanish teacher, Irlanda Feil, welcomed students on the first day.

She came to Island Park after having served as FLES/Spanish teacher in the Uniondale School District. Prior to Uniondale, she was a substitute teacher in Brooklyn and a teacher assistant at Long Beach High School.

Feil earned a bachelor’s degree in Spanish Language, Literature and Culture from SUNY Old Westbury.

And rounding out the new staff in the district is Robin Antila, the new school nurse at the Hegarty school. She previously worked in the Franklin Square and New Hyde Park School Districts in long-term leave replacement positions. A registered nurse, she also has worked in the medical-surgical and step-down units for several hospitals.

Antila earned an A.S. degree in Nursing from Excelsior College and both an A.A.S. degree as a Physical Therapy Assistant and an A.A. degree in Liberal Arts from Nassau Community College. A volunteer with Twice Exceptional Children’s Advocacy (T.E.C.A.), Antila also volunteers in the community by administering flu shots and conducting diabetic screenings in local public libraries and health fairs.