Harwood hiring decisions fill three top jobs, likely launch another principal search

April 8, 2023  |  By Lisa Scagliotti 

As the school year winds down, administrators at Harwood Unified Union School District are busy filling positions for next school year where staff have announced resignations or retirements. 

Superintendent Mike Leichliter on Thursday announced three administrative hiring decisions that will fill several key positions while likely creating another principal vacancy. 

Decisions have been made to fill: The high school/middle school athletic and activities director position, the assistant principal position for Harwood Middle School, and a district-wide administrative position. The latter would move Moretown Elementary School’s principal, setting in motion a new principal search process. Two of the hires need school board approval.

Athletics and Activities Director 

Ian Fraunfelder. Courtesy photo

Leichliter said Harwood will welcome Ian Fraunfelder as Athletic and Activities Director for next school year. Fraunfelder lives in New Hampshire and has worked as athletic director at Bellows Falls Union High School for the past 14 years. He’s a graduate of Colby-Sawyer College with a bachelors degree in exercise and sport sciences and he previously worked as recreation director for the town of Swanzey, New Hampshire. 

Fraunfelder will succeed Sue Duprat who has been serving as interim athletic director since February following the resignation of former AD Chris Langevin who stepped down in January. Duprat, who retired in 2017 after 14 years in the position, agreed to return during the transition this spring. 

Harwood Middle School Assistant Principal 

Bethany Turnbaugh. Courtesy photo

Another decision has been made to fill a key opening with the hiring of Harwood alumna Bethany Turnbaugh to take the position of assistant principal at Harwood Union High/Middle School overseeing the grade 7-8 middle school. Turnbaugh, a 2003 Harwood graduate who lives in Fayston, currently is assistant principal at Lamoille Union High School, Leichliter said. Her hiring needs approval from the HUUSD School Board, which has that decision on its April 12 meeting agenda. 

Turnbaugh has a bachelors degree in psychology with an education minor from Framingham State University and a masters in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Northern Vermont University at Johnson. She said she’s currently enrolled at Castleton University in its Educational Leadership program.

She says her work is “grounded in trauma informed restorative practices and influenced by non-violent communication.” Her work in school settings has included positions as a school-based clinician and school assistance coordinator at Lamoille Union High School. “I have had the opportunity to work with a wide range of ages and abilities from birth all the way through age 70. I bring with me a deep understanding for mental health and well-being,” Turnbaugh details in a bio shared with Waterbury Roundabout.

In a letter to Harwood families on Friday, Co-Principals Laurie Greenberg and Megan McDonough announced the hiring committee’s choice, saying the group “enthusiastically recommended” Turnbaugh for the position. 

Turnbaugh’s background in counseling and mental health “is important due to many of the challenges we are currently facing in Harwood as well as schools throughout the United States,” the principals said. At Lamoille, Turnbaugh has helped create systems to address many of these challenges and has initiated the use of restorative practices to support students, they said. 

Turnbaugh describes her approach to working with students: “This therapeutic lens allows me the opportunity to step back from a specific behavior or incident and identify developing skills or unmet needs and learn towards more restorative practices as we work to pull students in and form relationships and connections when they have historically been pushed out in punitive measures.”

Her role at Lamoille Union involves many of the administrative duties that are part of the middle school position at Harwood the co-principals noted. “She comes highly recommended and will be a tremendous asset to our school,” their letter says. 

Jennifer Clark Durren has been chosen by the search committee as one of two co-principals for Crossett Brook Middle School starting July 1. Courtesy photo

Turnbaugh would replace current Harwood MS Assistant Principal Duane Pierson who moves to Crossett Brook Middle School as co-principal starting July 1. Pierson will work with Jennifer Clark Durren who has been hired as Crossett Brook’s other co-principal starting this summer. The Harwood School Board approved her hire at a special meeting on April 4. 

The Crossett Brook co-principal positions will be new with Pierson and Durren. They will succeed Crossett Brook Principal Tom Drake, who is stepping down in June after 14 years as the school’s top administrator. The school’s assistant principal position is currently vacant. 

Moretown Elementary Principal tapped for new post 

Moretown Elementary School Principal Mandy Courturier has been tapped for a districtwide position. Photo by Brian Mohr, Ember Photography

Finally, a third administrative hire will create another vacancy that will require a new hiring committee to form, Leichliter said. 

Moretown Elementary School Principal Mandy Couturier has accepted the new district-wide position, Director of Multi-Tiered Systems of Support, created in response to new state requirements related to special education. 

Couturier, who has been principal at Moretown Elementary for five years, has accepted the job offer for the new position and announced it to families at the Moretown school this week. The Harwood school board needs to approve that hiring decision as well and has it on the agenda for next Wednesday’s meeting. 

In her letter to families, Couturier called her role as principal at Moretown Elementary her “dream job” that changed her life. “I have truly loved being the principal of Moretown School. I was welcomed with such open arms and together we have accomplished so much,” she wrote. 

She explained her new role and the new challenge it offers: “I am faced with a leap of faith, a brand new position that offers a chance to utilize my background in special education and social, emotional and behavioral learning to support the district in continued work in our multi-tiered systems of support framework. In essence, our system of identifying students who may require something more or different to meet their needs and then implementing the interventions that best meet those presenting needs. It provides an opportunity to keep supporting students and staff at Moretown School, in a different fashion, in addition to all the other schools in our district.”

Couturier said she would assist with the transition to a new principal who would be chosen by a hiring committee formed soon. It would include a Moretown parent and several school staff members, she noted. 

“Moretown School will always have a special place in my heart,” she said. “More Joy, More Community, More Kindness.”