Whitney Young High School principal selected to succeed Joyce Kenner; it will be the school’s first new leader in nearly 30 years
For the first time in 27 years, a new principal has been selected to lead Chicago’s Whitney Young Magnet High School. The Local School Council awarded a contract Wednesday to Whitney Young Assistant Principal Rickey Harris.
“The students really like him. If I can use the word hip, he’s really hip,” outgoing Whitney Young Principal Joyce Kenner, 66, told the Tribune. “He’s still very, very professional. He’s smart. He’s articulate. The faculty and staff for the most part, I believe, respect him. He’s creative. And I hate to say this, but he’s younger. He’s younger, and he has the energy to attend the numerous events that I used to attend.”
Harris, who turns 50 this month, won the role over Kerry Dolan, assistant principal at Gwendolyn Brooks College Preparatory Academy, a selective enrollment school in Roseland. Kenner, the Whitney Young principal since 1995, announced in April that she would be stepping down from the post. She said seven people applied for the chance to take the helm of the selective enrollment school.
At the meeting, Kenner tearfully passed a baton to Harris, who called her the greatest of all time. He later told news reporters he felt elated to be selected by the LSC, which voted unanimously in his favor.
He said his main focus during the leadership transition is to “create a sense of belonging, to really make sure that everyone feels safe, not just physically safe, but psychologically safe, making sure that everyone has what they need to continue to be successful.”
The search for Kenner’s successor lasted much of the summer, with a virtual candidate forum taking place last week. Harris and Dolan answered questions about how they would maintain a school culture of inclusivity; attract more Black students to the school, where the student population is nearly 18% Black; and improve the diverse learners department, among other topics.
“I honestly felt like it was a transparent process — and it was as fair as it possibly could be, given that one of the candidates had been affiliated with Whitney Young for a large number of years,” Kenner said of the search. “When you know a building, to me, like this person knows it, it’s hard to discount that.”
Harris served as the dean of students at Whitney Young from 2006 to 2010 before returning two years ago to be an assistant principal, according to his online resume. He’s also worked as an administrator at University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, Wolcott College Prep, South Shore International College Prep High School, Dvorak School of Excellence and St. Margaret of Scotland Catholic School, his resume states.
Harris will be the fourth principal in the history of Whitney Young, considered one of the top high schools in the city. Last year about 2,100 students attended the Near West Side school, heralded as Chicago’s first magnet high school when it opened in 1975.
The announcement comes as Chicago Public Schools leaders move forward with a controversial plan to open a new high school on the Near South Side. The $120 million proposal includes $70 million once set aside for a new Near West Side high school. Kenner opposed that project at the time, expressing concern it would lead to a traffic nightmare for her school.
The group behind the Near West Side high school plan has shifted its focus to pushing for an open-enrollment neighborhood program at Whitney Young to serve students within a boundary designated by CPS.
Meanwhile, the new CPS year is set to start Aug. 22. Kenner, who received a standing ovation at Wednesday’s LSC meeting, said she may help greet people arriving at Whitney Young on the first day of school. She said her next assignment — besides spending time with her young grandchildren — is to write a book about her Whitney Young experience.
“Any major event that occurred, I would write it down and just put it in a folder over the last 22 years,” Kenner said. “And so I think I have hundreds of incidents that occurred that I’m going to write about. It’s going to be a leadership book.”
