Phillips takes over as interim principal at Milton

When Milton Elementary School Principal Amy Shinn agreed to head up Trimble County’s Student Support Staff late last year, it created a immediate opening in the position Shinn was leaving at Milton.

When asked to step into that void by Superintendent Todd Neace over the holiday break, veteran teacher Becky Phillips answered the call to serve through end of the school year while the school district advertised and hired a new principal.

Phillips is interested in leading the school both now and later.

“It seemed a great opportunity for me to just kind of move right in since I’m already familiar with the school and I can pick up with the initiatives we already have going and try to implement some new things to help us continue to grow,” Phillips said.

Phillips is hopeful of applying for the position as full-time principal. But for now, she is excited for her new role, which includes supervising and evaluating personnel, guiding the curriculum, protecting and prioritizing instructional time, building a positive culture in the building, and more.

“It’s a good learning experience for me,” she said. “I’m kind of getting my feet wet a little bit and learning all the ins and outs of administration.”

Her new role with the school was announced on the Milton’s Facebook page on December 27. She said the staff, students and public have been very supportive of the announcement. “I’ve had lots of phone calls, messages, visits, text messages, and I’ve had lots of gifts,” she said. “It seems to be well welcomed and a lot of people are very excited for the change and anxious to see what happens.”

Phillips has worked in education 26 years. Before coming to Milton, she began her teaching career at Southside Elementary School in Shelbyville, Kentucky, where she taught first and second grades from 1997 to 2002.

She moved with her family to Madison, Indiana, in 2002, and has taught at Milton ever since. She first taught visual arts and writing, then first grade and worked in the Primary Academy until she moved to teaching kindergarten three years ago.

Phillips said one of her favorite memories at Milton is launching the Primary Academy. “We were grouping kids together based on their abilities and we had multi-aged kids moving back and forth in the different subject areas and I worked very closely with that team,” she said.

One of Phillips’ goals is to implement authentic learning experiences for students. Instead of standard paper and pencil classwork, she wants students to do lesson-based projects like write a letter to the mayor, or create something that can be more meaningful to their education while still learning the skills needed schools strive to teach.

Although well known at Milton after two-plus decades at the school, a meet and greet with Phillips has been scheduled for 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 24, at Milton Elementary. Phillips will be on hand to meet students’ families and the public.

“We’ll have several different stations set up for informational purposes of different things that are offered in the school,” she noted.