By Becky Coffey, Harbor News Senior Staff Writer:
OLD SAYBROOK
For Oliver
Barton, the newly hired principal at Old Saybrook High School, math,
science, and environmental education have supplied the focus of his
professional life. After graduating from Yale College in the 1970s,
Oliver followed in his mother’s footsteps and became a teacher,
teaching math and science for 13 years at New Haven’s High School in
the Community.
But, passionate to reach more
students, he sought a new challenge and with a parent group founded a
non-profit environmental education organization—Common Ground—to offer
all New Haven students after-school and weekend environmental
programming. Within two years, he was the director of both this
educational effort and of the new environmentally themed
Common Ground charter school, planted with its own organic garden.
After 15 years leading both Common
Ground and the Common Ground charter school, Oliver, who also earned an
advanced degree from the Yale Forestry School and from Southern
Connecticut State University in school administration, decided it was
time to apply his leadership skills and environmental education
interests in a new arena.
“As I researched Old Saybrook High
School, I was impressed with the career internship program the school
had and with the town’s strong support of education and young people,”
says Oliver. “There is a deliberate effort to connect students to
experiences in both the public and private sector in the community.
“I also was impressed with evidence of
the town of Old Saybrook being very progressive with land conservation,
in supporting native environments, and in protecting the natural
resources of the shoreline,” Oliver continues.
After a rigorous search process, he was appointed to the new post in April 2009; he started his new duties as of July 1.
Oliver also brings with him a strong
commitment to building global awareness in Old Saybrook’s students to
prepare them as they enter a new interconnected global economy. It’s an
interest he first forged while attending the American School in
Barcelona, Spain as a high school student.
“The world is a lot bigger than one Connecticut town. The job market and the professional environment are global,” Oliver says.
Last spring Oliver started making connections by attending school events like the South Pacific
performance and spending time in informal meetings with staff and
students. Formal meetings to hear from staff and the administrative
leadership team started in July.
“It was really very inspiring
to
meet with so many faculty members and to see their passion for the
school, its students, for the program, and the professional
environment,” Oliver says. “So many things are working really well.
There are some really excellent teaching practices and I want to see
what we can do to get teachers to share these instructional ideas
across the school.”
He also wants to build more connections between departments and to assure rigor in the curriculum.
“It’s very easy for high schools to
get compartmentalized with so much specialized information and content.
We sometimes don’t have time to see the larger learning objectives,” he
says.
Besides his other interests and experience, Oliver is also a builder.
“I’ve always been fascinated with
building things,” says Oliver, who admits to having spent many hours in
his basement shop as a young man. As an adult, this interest is
fulfilled by restoring old houses.
Over 15 years, he and his wife gutted
and restored an 1880s-vintage home in which they lived in Fair Haven.
Four years ago, he moved with his family to a 1920s-vintage cottage in
Branford that is his current restoration challenge. But he still makes
time to enjoy the merits of the shoreline location, sailing Hobie Cats
and kayaking in the Sound and area rivers with his family.
Pictured: Oliver Barton, an experienced math and
science educator and educational leader, brings energy and commitment
to his new post as Principal of Old Saybrook High School. Photo by Becky Coffey