New principal named for Winston Campus Junior High

Community Consolidated School District 15 has announced that René Carranza, a former assistant principal in District 15, will return to the District to serve as principal at Winston Campus Junior High next year.

Mr. Carranza first joined District 15 in 2001 and served as an assistant principal at Winston Campus Junior High for a year before moving on to serve as Carl Sandburg Junior High's associate principal for the next two years. In 2004, he left District 15 to join Community Consolidated School District 62 in Des Plaines, where he served as principal at Plainfield Elementary School through the 2010-11 school year. This year, he served as principal at District 62's Orchard Place Elementary School.

In all, Mr. Carranza has been an educator for 38 years. He began his career in 1978, serving as a kindergarten and first-grade teacher in Los Angeles, California, and, for the next 18 years, held a variety of teaching and counseling positions within a number of school districts in the southern California area. In 1996, he accepted his first principal position in West Contra Costa Unified School District in Richmond, California, and served there for five years before moving to Illinois to serve as Winston Campus Junior High's assistant principal.

Mr. Carranza holds a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of Southern California, and a master's degree in clinical psychology from United States International University. He earned an education specialist degree from Northern Illinois University, where he is currently a doctoral candidate in educational leadership.

Mr. Carranza's appointment is effective July 1, 2012.

-- Story submitted by Community Consolidated School District 15