A Seat Worthy of the Superintendent of the Year for 2012

After being selected Superintendent of the Year for 2012 by the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents (CAPSS), Dr. Diane Ullman, the Superintendent of the Simsbury Public Schools, figured that was enough.

But to her surprise at the Jan. 10 meeting of the board of education, Joseph J. Cirasuolo, Ed.D. executive director Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents, was in attendance and with him was a new chair. The chair was presented to Ullman at the meeting.

Ullman has served as the Superintendent in Simsbury since 2004. Prior to becoming Superintendent in Simsbury, she was the assistant executive director of the Capitol Region Education Council, an assistant superintendent in the Farmington Public Schools and a building principal in Branford, CT and Jefferson County, CO.

CAPSS selected Ullman as the Superintendent of the Year in recognition of the fact that her leadership in Simsbury has resulted in many additions of value to that school system. Among the most prominent of these are:

• Strong community support for the school system.
• A culture of continuous improvement in the school system.
• A strategic plan with specific targets for student achievement, district operations and financial management.
• A system wide professional learning community.
• Specific goals for students that include facility with relationships, higher order thinking skills, technology and languages as well as competency in the basic language arts and mathematics areas.
• Strong community involvement in the school system.
• Recognition by national and state agencies of schools and staff members as exemplars of excellence.
• A system wide commitment to provide for Simsbury children schooling experiences that expose them to the cultural and ethnic diversity that reflects the population of the United States and Connecticut.

As the Connecticut Superintendent of the Year, Ullman has been nominated by her peers for recognition as the American Association of School Administrators (AASA) National Superintendent of the Year for 2012. AASA will announce the name of the National Superintendent of the Year during its National Conference on Education that will take place in February 2012.