WITH A HEAD OF SCHOOL
BY VERA AZARIn October 2022, the King’s Academy Board of Trustees announced the appointment of Stephanie “Penny” Townsend as King’s fourth head of school. Townsend took the helm in April 2023, succeeding Peter Nilsson, who served as head since 2019. Notably, Townsend is the first woman to hold the position. Soon after arriving on campus, Townsend spent some time talking to Beyond King’s Editor Vera Azar.
VA: You’ve worked at both boarding and day schools, but for the past eight years you’ve been at a day school. What made you return to boarding schools?
PT: Both types of schools have pros and cons, but I have found the relationships you develop at boarding school are deeper and more rewarding. Students create more school spirit because
it’s home to them. The beauty of boarding school is in the richness of opportunities. Teachers see students in other places than the classroom. Boarding schools humanize teaching because it’s a relationship-based education.
VA: You’ve only been here a short while. But in that time, what are the differences you’ve seen between
King’s and the schools you’ve worked at in the United States?
PT: In general, there are more similarities than differences. But there are some cultural differences. The kind of diversity we have here among the faculty — the expats and the locals — is different from the faculty diversity we have in the US. Also, this is a big campus, it takes students to another level, it has a scholarly stature about it because of the way the students move around campus and go into different buildings and classrooms. The fact that there is more freedom and space to move around informs how students interact.
It’s been interesting arriving during Ramadan, as that has given me another perspective on the culture. How these students manage their lives during Ramadan has been a real treasure to see, the fact that they can fast and go through the academic day. They are gritty. They have a cultural awareness that they
don’t shed when they come to boarding school. And the way the community supports it. In other words, the local culture is still very important despite this being a boarding school.
VA: You’ve moved here with your husband Mike. Is he excited to be here? Is he likely to teach, dean or coach while here, or will he play the role of first spouse to your head?
PT: No, he won’t be the queen’s consort! Mike has had a long career. He’s been an administrator, he has worked in admissions, and he was a masterful teacher in the classroom. He’s a voracious reader – he reads literature better than anybody I know. He loves students, he’s a softie, and he’d will want to figure out where he can be most useful.
VA: You’re a mother and a grandmother. Is this the first time you have lived so far away from your family? How did they feel about you taking on this job?
PT: It’s certainly the farthest plane ride from anybody! If my family wasn’t supportive, they didn’t tell me. I’ve lived abroad before and I’ve always had an adventurous spirit. My being here has also opened a whole other world to my family. They’re super excited to visit.
VA: Global citizenship is a core principle at King’s. And what more than knowledge of languages can make one a global citizen? Yet at King’s, as elsewhere, world languages often get the short end of the stick. As a former teacher of Spanish yourself, do you think we need to change that?
PT: Any university would be very impressed to get a student who speaks three languages — English, Arabic, and something else. There’s a seemingly trite expression that I’ve heard about how knowing a second or third language gives you another soul. But it is not trite. Being able to communicate in another language — even if not fluently — is a whole way of learning about the world. We need to look at our language requirement, but at this point I don’t know enough about all this to decide what we can do.
VA: King’s already has many women in leadership positions – in fact we are a majority. But we’ve never had a female head of school. What message is King’s sending out to the world by having a female head?
PT: Empowering girls is important to me. It’s good for students everywhere to see a woman in leadership. But it’s not enough to have the female leader and think we’ve got that covered. We also have to empower women across the board. I noticed a club here without girls in it, and I said ‘you need more girls’. Boys outnumber girls at King’s so I’m sensitive to that.
VA: How important is it to involve parents in decision making at King’s? And how do we keep the right balance in terms of getting buy-in while ensuring we stay true to our mission and goals?
PT: Communication is key. Parents help inform decisions, but they don’t make them, and all parents have different
aspirations for their own children. It’s a partnership but we’re the senior partners because we are the educators. At the same time, we can’t do anything without parent buy-in but we understand that we’ll never have that 100%. Parents have to understand what they’re signing up for. But if they are unhappy, we have to understand why that is to decide what we can do about it.
VA: You’re already making it clear that you love to be around the students. Do you also see yourself teaching, advising or coaching or do you think the huge amount of work you have as head of school will not allow that to happen?
PT: I can see myself picking up a Spanish course. I would love to do a walking club or take the students horseback riding. It’s good for them to see the head doing other things. I’ll probably also have advisees — I’ve always had advisees.
WHO IS PENNY TOWNSEND?
The appointment of Penny Townsend as King’s Academy’s fourth head of school in October 2022 brought to a close a global search effort that began in July 2022. According to the announcement by the Board of Trustees, in their search process the trustees sought input from many members of the community to have a clear sense of what King’s needs in its next leader, and how to begin shaping the school’s future.
Townsend emerged as the clear first choice of the search committee. An accomplished educator, a passionate community builder, and a thoughtful, collaborative colleague with more than three decades of experience in independent schools, Townsend has worked as a teacher, coach, advisor, dorm parent, administrator and head of school.
Townsend was most recently head of school at Ransom Everglades School in Florida from 2014 to 2022. Prior to Ransom,
from 2006 to 2014, she served as head of school at the Pennington School, a day and boarding school in New Jersey. From 1983 to 2006, Townsend served in many roles at Taft, a boarding school in Connecticut. There, she was an AP Spanish teacher, dormitory faculty, assistant girls’ ice hockey coach, head of the Modern Language Department, director of the Language Learning and Resource Center, director of the Taft Summer School, and dean of the faculty. She began her career in education as a Spanish teacher at Northfield Mount Hermon School, a boarding school in Massachusetts and her own alma mater.
Townsend received her Bachelor’s degree cum laude in history from The University of Connecticut in 1979, and her Master’s degree in Spanish Language and Literature from Middlebury College in 1986. She graduated from The Northfield Mount Hermon School in 1975.