Longtime educator Valerie Akins was recently named Chapel Hill High School’s interim principal after former principal Charles Blanchard retired last month; she will serve as interim principal for the rest of the school year.
Akins said she is “beyond excited” to lead the school after retiring from her education career in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. She formerly worked with Blanchard as an educator in Guilford County Schools and has 34 years of experience in education.
“To come back into school, post COVID, and just experience the school has just been rejuvenating. The kids are very rejuvenating, and [the school] is state of the art, as well,” Akins said.
Akins says she is honored to support Chapel Hill High School for the remainder of the school year and has embraced becoming a new part of the school community.
“’I’ve spent some time reading the history and just knowing where the school came from, and the role that it played in the community really excites me,” Akins said.
She started as a journalism major at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, but switched her major to education after returning home during spring break.
“I was visiting my mom’s school, and something hit me during the visit: I want to do this,” Akins said. “I immediately came back to Carolina and did all the work to change my major.”
Akins comes from a long line of educators and service people. Many of her aunts and uncles were teachers, and her father was a high school teacher for over forty years.
“My maternal grandmother was driven about in terms of service, so she said, ‘I don’t care what you guys do. All I want you to do is do something where you’re giving back and serving,’” Akins said. “My paternal grandmother was all about education and she loved the fact that her kids were teachers, so I connected the two.”
Akins started her teaching career in Rockingham County Schools before moving to Guilford County Schools after three years. She taught at both elementary and middle school levels.
She stated that math was one of her true loves, and she even became a math coach in Guilford County, passing on her love of education and service to other educators.
After her work as a math coach, Akins decided that she wanted to lead a school. She served as a principal at two middle schools and one elementary school in Guilford County.
Throughout her teaching and administrative career, Akins said she has prioritized supporting all students and making sure that everybody is valued.
“I wanted to create an environment . . . focused on community and where students and teachers and parents all had a voice. That was really critically important to me, and that the space was safe for everyone and inclusive,” Akins said.
After serving as a principal, Akins became a principal supervisor for Guilford County Schools, where she advised and mentored elementary, middle and high school principals, before retiring in 2020.
She then decided to pursue another goal of hers and started a leadership consulting firm called Leadership Reset Consultancy Groups.
She said that she always loved coaching and mentoring and decided to pursue that passion outside of the world of education.
“I was just exploring different counties and letting them know about my businesses and that I was out there,” Akins said.
She found her way back to education when she was offered the position to serve as the interim assistant principal at Phillips Middle School last school year. She worked in the position at the school for six months prior to taking the reins at Chapel Hill High School in April of this year.
