David Meglathery has a collection of ties that’s at least 50 strong, mostly gifts from others.
“No one on the West Coast wears ties,” said Meglathery, who’s retiring as principal of Edmonds Elementary School. “In Connecticut, a principal wears ties.”
So when parents and students at the school wanted to give Meglathery a send off, they had an idea. Each student designed a paper tie and wore it for a surprise march around the playground.
In addition to his ties, Meglathery is also known for standing out in the morning greeting students as they get off the bus.
“I know all the kids by name,” said Meglathery, who’s been at the school for five years. “I call them by name to test myself.”
Edmonds Elementary starts at 7:30 a.m.
“In December it’s dark, you basically need a flashlight,” Meglathery said. “It’s: how do you make this place more lively and cheerful?”
So Meglathery started a few things to help brighten the atmosphere, including a riddle read over the intercom each morning by students, and “no frown Fridays.” Actually, every Friday is officially “no frown Friday.”
The small school has offered Meglathery a huge sense of community.
“It’s kind of a Norman Rockwell school, with only 320 kids,” he said. “Everybody knows everybody.”
Parents are always at the school volunteering, and so are several seniors who live in the neighborhood.
For Meglathery, it was a refreshing change from an elementary school he’d worked at in Connecticut with 600 students. He left that school because of a plan to double the school to 1,200 students.
In a place like that, students wouldn’t have any identity – they would be lost, he said. On arriving in the Northwest, he was happy to see that places like Edmonds Elementary still exist.
“I was happy to see schools which were of a manageable size,” Meglathery said.
An example of the school’s spirit that stands out in his mind is when parents, students and locals worked together to raise money for a new playground a few years ago.
Spaghetti feeds to raise money for the project were packed, and students did a jog-a-thon that raised thousands. Within a year, and including matching grants, the school drummed up about $100,000 for the playground, something that usually takes about six years, Meglathery said.
He came to the school in July 2003, just a few weeks after he’d retired from his job as principal at Osborn Hill School in Fairfield, Conn.
He and his wife were moving out to be close to their son and grandchildren, but Meglathery wasn’t ready to give up education, so he took the job as an interim principal at the school.
“I only thought I would do it for six months – that was about five years ago,” Meglathery said.
He applied for and got the job as a permanent position in 2004, and every year since then, Meglathery – now 65 – and his wife have made the decision to stay for another year.
Until now, he just hasn’t been ready to leave.
“You know, you get involved in a school and it becomes a living and breathing place,” he said. “There’s a very exciting dynamic about being at an elementary school. I love the energy of the kids.”
But now Meglathery has reached the point where he’s more ready.
“I’m tired of the 5 a.m. wakeup,” he said.
But he’s not about to trade in his workday ties for a set of golf clubs just yet.
Next year, after doing some traveling, he will volunteer at Adams School in Ballard and work with student teachers at a local university.
And he’ll be back to volunteer at Edmonds Elementary.
“I’ll probably come up here as long as they will have me,” Meglathery said.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
