Knight: No big changes coming next year

Sung Tha Zathang, reporter

Since the announcement of current principal Barbara Brouwer’s retirement this school year, Cards wondered who the new principal would be. Now that it has been decided that Brian Knight, current Southport Middle school principal, will take her position, students are now talking about what they are concerned about and what they are excited about. Most students are concerned about uniforms.

Since Knight is from the middle school where they have uniforms, the students are concerned that there might be dress code when he comes into the school. One of the students that is concerned about dress code is freshman Duh Thang.

“The only reason why I am concerned with the new principal coming is that I am afraid he might give us dress code,” Thang said. “ Since I just came out of middle school and it’s my first year of not wearing uniforms, I don’t want to wear uniform again. I want the dress code to be how it is now.”

The students don’t have to worry about uniforms because Knight says that dress will not change next year and that the township wide uniform dress code only runs through 8th grade. He also says that the expectation at the high school level for dress is different and will not be something that changes.

Without the concerns for uniforms, students like sophomore Sophia Craig, are excited about some little changes that Knight might have for the school like some of the clubs and the events that are at SHS.

“He might make dances more exciting and make more people be interest in the school’s pep rally,” Craig said. “Not a lot of people go to the school’s pep rally because they think it’s boring, so with Mr.Knight, he might be able to change the thoughts of those students and more students might go to the school’s pep rally instead of going home.”

Many of the students are excited about the good changes that might happen, but Knight says he does not plan on coming in and changing things on day one since SHS is a great school and Brouwer has done an excellent job taking care of the needs of students and staff at SHS.

He also says that there might be very small tweaks along the way during year one, but he says he plan on taking a great deal of time that first year to get to know the school culture before any changes would be made. Even though almost every student at SHS right now has had Knight at some point, he still needs to adapt to the new changes, new students and new staff.

“Students have nothing to worry about, Southport High School will continue to be the amazing school it has been under Mrs.Brouwer’s leadership,” Knight said.

Upon hearing this from Knight, many of the student’s concerns have decreased according to Craig. She says that students won’t have to worry about uniforms anymore. She also says that she is glad that Knight says that there won’t be any big changes at the start.