Glenbard picks new assistant superintendent
Jeffrey Feucht, who in July will become the new assistant superintendent for educational services for Glenbard High School District 87, says he wants to continue efforts to get more students to take higher level courses and support professional development opportunities for teachers.
His appointment was confirmed Monday by the school board after a total of 76 candidates applied for the job.
He replaces Hector Garcia, who will become superintendent this summer in Plano School District 88.
Feucht, 36, who is currently assistant principal for instruction at Glenbard West, has overseen a boost in enrollment in Advanced Placement courses at the Glen Ellyn school since 2009. The number of students at West who took one or more AP exams increased 139 percent in that time.
He says there’s been a “shift in mindset” over the past decade about such courses. They’re not college-level courses in large lecture halls, he said, but college-level work with the “personalized support” of teachers in a high school classroom.
“Good research shows when kids challenge themselves in more rigorous courses, they’re not only more likely to attend college, but to graduate in four years,” Feucht said.
Before coming to Glenbard West, Feucht was a social studies and English teacher at Bartlett High School. While there, he worked on teacher professional development initiatives and wrote a winning proposal for a $1 million teacher professional development grant.
At all four Glenbard high schools, teachers participate in five institute days during the year where they receive additional training for designing and implementing programs that can have an impact on student learning, Feucht said.
His doctoral dissertation was about implementation strategies for professional development programs.
“Dr. Feucht is bright, possesses keen insight and clearly understands Glenbard’s core curricular and instructional work that is under way,” said David Larson, who will officially become Glenbard’s new superintendent the same day Feucht takes on his new role.
Larson, currently superintendent in the Birmingham Public Schools in suburban Detroit, was involved in the selection process for a new assistant superintendent for educational services.
Feucht said he will be meeting with Larson in advance of July 1.
Feucht has a doctoral degree in educational administration and a master’s degree in education leadership from Aurora University. He earned his bachelor’s degree in education from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.