At Jones College Prep, you can find three new faces who you may not have met yet – assistant principals Sean McGuire, Courtney Jordan, and Jimini Ofori-Amoah – walking in and out of classrooms determined to make an impact.

All three of the new assistant principals are coming to Jones with strong administrative backgrounds, working within CPS for years, and qualified to join the administration of one of the highest-ranked schools in Chicago. McGuire most recently served as an assistant principal at Intrinsic High School, Jordan as the resident principal at King College Prep, and Ofori as an assistant principal at South Shore International College Prep.

“I feel like I’ve learned 50 new things a day in regards to Jones, whether it’s where classes are, another student program, or just the culture of Jones,” said Jordan. “I think that’s  very important, especially for the leadership team and just enjoying this environment.”

The three have all had varying paths to their status. Assistant Principal McGuire comes from a long line of educators, which helped foster his appreciation for the profession.

“My mother was an educator, and both of my grandmothers were teachers. I just have had deep admiration for the work that educators have done, and then just some personal appreciation for those in my family,” said McGuire. “I think my individual experience in school was seeing a real divide between the experience of students, which planted the seed in me to be deeply invested in ensuring that education experiences and environments worked for everybody and served everybody.”

While McGuire grew up knowing he wanted to go into education, Jordan and Ofori went through different paths. Following college, Jordan initially prepared to go to dental school and started working as a science teacher in the meantime, which helped her fall in love with education. Ofori always knew she wanted to work with kids in some capacity, and realized she wanted to be an educator after observing her cousin’s class.

“One of my cousins who became an educator a little before me had invited me to come and observe his class, and he was just like ‘come see what I do, you might really like it,’” said Ofori. “One day of being in his classroom and helping him out and I absolutely fell in love with it. It was the best thing I ever accidentally fell into.”

The arrival of the three new assistant principals comes after their predecessors left at the end of last school year, leaving an opportunity for new minds to take over.

“All three of them came through as candidates that were extremely prepared and thoughtful,” said Principal Dolan. “Each of them showed up in a way that we had heard staff and students communicated they wanted their administration to show up. They all came in enthusiastic to hit the ground running.”

In a short span of time, the assistant principals learned alongside each other how to collaborate as an efficient team.

“I think just kind of coming in being ourselves and being like, hey we’re all on the same team, we’re going to figure this out together, was just the right mindset that all three of us happen to have,” said Ofori. “So yeah, we are technically new, but it doesn’t feel like that. We feel more new to the space than we do to this team.”

So far, the assistant principals received a warm welcome from staff and students at Student Government’s recent AP questionnaire form.

“What’s great about a school like Jones is the degree to which things are student run. All the questions from students were really genuine,” said Ofori. “They were really trying to get to know us outside of our jobs and willing to give us a chance after students have been through a lot of turnover. We’ve been met with such a deep appreciation in every setting.”

In the wake of student backlash to previous decisions made by Jones administration over the past year such as the restructuring of AcLab, the assistant principals understand the importance of listening to student voices and earning their trust early on.

“We’re making an effort to communicate with people, and it’s really important that we set up consistent and regular systems and structures to facilitate that input,” said McGuire. “Are we hearing not just those loudest voices? We’re being intentional about how are we going to make sure that we’re appreciating and pulling sentiments from students that aren’t in student government, that aren’t necessarily finding academic success easier, that aren’t necessarily tapped into those mechanisms. Easier said than done, but I think we all have that commitment philosophy to students.”

Assistant Principals McGuire, Jordan, and Ofori are ready and determined to work towards the betterment of students and staff at Jones, and their doors are always open for anyone who wants their voice to be heard.

“Right now, what we need to be doing is listening, and I think long term, we have to figure out how to support and reach whatever direction it needs to go,” said McGuire. “I think it’d be wrong for us to say right now what exactly we want our legacy to be in terms of a specific choice or adjustment, but I think we want it to be choices and changes that are made with the community that everybody feels happy about.”