GUILDERLAND — Energy. Michael Piccirillo, newly named principal for Guilderland High School, has lots of it.

Last Tuesday, after being appointed unanimously to the $110,000-a-year post, Piccirillo thanked the school board with gusto and then zipped up the Northway to make a presentation before the school board for Shenendehowa — the largest school district in the Capital Region. Piccirillo is lead principal for the Shenendehowa Middle Schools, overseeing a program with 2,200 students and 250 staff members.
"It was an out-of-body experience," Piccirillo reported afterwards. "People said it was the best presentation I’d ever given."
In 1997, the district created a profile of Shenendehowa graduates featuring eight "critical attributes," he said.
"It defines expectations of whole people, not just academic success," said Piccirillo. "At the middle school, we said, the process needs to be tangible. Kids need to identify and then collect evidence of what’s important. They create a portfolio, not just grades on a transcript. We put together a process we’re really proud of."
He thinks a similar process might work at Guilderland "within the framework of what Guilderland expects of their students."
Piccirillo goes on, "The nice thing about the process is it focuses on student self-reflection. Kids learn to look at themselves honestly. They learn to set goals...If you ask them about being an involved citizen, they see what they need to do to achieve that."

Asked about a growing concern at Guilderland — that teachers may feel they have to sacrifice the richness of curriculum — a district priority — in order to meet growing state and federal test requirements, Piccirillo redefines the terms of the question.
"We need to get at three levels — the know, the do, the understand," he says. The first can be a matter of rote learning; the second, skills; and the third level, the most important, connects across curricula.
Piccirillo said he understands teachers are feeling pressure. "We have to meet the needs of all learners," he said. "But we don’t want to sacrifice the understanding part for the knowledge part. A lot of the know is the lower-level rote-type information. You can’t sacrifice the understanding...I’m a supporter of depth of curriculum, and enrichment of curriculum."

Family man

Piccirillo and his wife, Diane, have a daughter, Emma. She is two years and four months old.
"We adopted her from China when she was a year old," he said. "We’re having the time of our lives. I’m learning so much about life, watching through her eyes."
His wife’s mother lives with the family, too, Piccirillo said. "We benefit from having another generation," he said. "You have to take care of family."

Raised in Brooklyn, Piccirillo was the youngest of five siblings in a close-knit working-class family. He had two older brothers and two older sisters. Their father worked in an envelope-making factory and their mother worked as a waitress.

He started kindergarten in Public School 81 and then went to first grade at Saint Brigid’s.
"I loved it," recalled Piccirillo of his early schooling. "I was good in math, really good at multiplication tables. I loved history.
"We were taught by nuns or priests. We wore uniforms. It was very strict in terms of rules. It was a traditional learning environment that focused on the basics and gave me a good foundation."
After the fourth grade, he moved to Lake George Elementary School. "It was a totally different world. They had a multi-age, open classroom, where you worked at your own pace."

Piccirillo loved that too, he said.
"School-wise, it was a nice change of pace, more suited to the way in which I learn. I could go as fast as I wanted in math."
He concluded, "I’m pretty adaptable. I figure out what I need to do to succeed."

The move to Lake George was difficult socially, though.
"In New York City, your social life is out on the street; it’s right there, 24 hours a day," he said, recounting various games always in action. "At Lake George, I didn’t see my peers, except in school...It was a tough transition."

While he was active in high school plays and continued to do well academically, Piccirillo’s teen years centered around baseball.
"Baseball was my dream," he said. "I was a pitcher and played third base. I was known for my hitting."

He graduated from Lake George High School in 1980 and went to Ithaca College, a Division 3 school.
"I’m not ashamed to say it; I thought I might have a career in baseball," said Piccirillo.
While he made the team at Ithaca freshman year, he was only able to suit up for home games. "At that point, I decided I had to look at education," he said.

His family was facing a crisis as his oldest brother, Stanley, battled cancer. Stanley had been diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease when he was 16 but the cancer had gone into remission allowing him to graduate with a psychology degree from Syracuse University and begin a career as a social worker. The cancer returned, though, in 1981.
"I was 19 years old, a sophomore in college," recalled Piccirillo. "The baseball wasn’t working out. My family needed me."

He left Ithaca College half-way through his sophomore year and attended community college, he said, while he helped support his parents emotionally and financially.

His brother died at the age of 26.

Journey to a career
Piccirillo transferred to the State University of New York at Binghamton for his junior year. "I was able to resume and think about what I wanted to do," he said.

Piccirillo graduated in 1984 with a bachelor’s degree in sociology. He and a friend then took a cross-country trip to California.
"We would bus, hitchhike, whatever transportation we could get our hands on," he said. "It was an amazing experience. I kept a diary of all we did and all the people we talked to. We tented in campgrounds and met the most interesting people...Everyone let their hair down."
Although, when the two friends set out, they thought they’d get jobs in California, Piccirillo said, "We didn’t want to work for Disneyland."
He came home with this thought: "I knew I wanted to work with people."
While his brother, Stanley, had worked with individuals as a social worker, Piccirillo said, "I liked to work with groups, to analyze people...I started to substitute teach and I really loved it. I loved being with the kids."

He earned a master’s degree in social studies from Binghamton and later completed administrative certification at SUNY Plattsburgh.

His first job, in 1987, was as a social studies teacher in North Warren at the Pottersville Middle School.
"It was a beautiful structure on the outside," he said of the school built in the 1930’s as part of the Work Projects Administration. "The stonework was nice; it even had molds of the faces of the workers.
"On the inside, you could see the age. The rooms were small. But the kids were fantastic...They came from a rural background...They really wanted to learn and to get to know you as a person."
It was there, at the Pottersville Middle School, Piccirillo said, that he learned the value of making a personal connection. "I used it as leverage to teach content and skills," he said.

Becoming an administrator

Seven years later, in 1994, Piccirillo had the opportunity to teach at his alma mater — Lake George High School. He was hired as a high school social studies teacher and also coached football and baseball and oversaw the yearbook production.

He became the school’s first assistant principal, a part-time post, which he enjoyed.
After three years, he decided he should either teach or be an administrator full-time. "It was difficult to do both well," he said.

He got a call to interview for a job as an assistant principal at Niskayuna. It was the Friday of Labor Day weekend, and he did not expect to get the job.
"They hired me before I left the building," he said, noting he had also been hired on the spot with his first job at North Warren.
He said of Niskayuna, "This was a big jump in size, a high-powered Suburban Council school district; it was very daunting."

He relied on what he had learned in his first teaching job — the value of personal connection.
"I started on Monday, Sept. 15. The first thing I did was get a yearbook and copy the photos of the staff members. I started saying hi to each one I recognized...The scuttlebutt was, ‘This guy knows our names.’
"People need to know you’re there to support them, that you’re available and accessible. I spent the first two weeks cruising the building."
He remembers walking by a band-practice room and stopping in. "I was drawn to the music," he said. "It was beautiful." He stayed for the performance, and applauded at the end, starting a long-term friendship with the band director.
"A student came up and told me, ‘The band director loves you. You’re the first administrator who’s listened to us,’" Piccirillo recalled.
As an administrator, Piccirillo said, "I try to keep up connections — with teachers, students, parents. To me, it’s all about personal connection. You can’t allow yourself to get caught up in paperwork during the day...We all need each other."

Although he missed the classroom — and still enjoys occasionally teaching — Piccirillo did not regret the switch to administration, he said.

After two years at Niskayuna, Piccirillo took a job at Shenendehowa to return to middle school. After being an assistant principal, he became principal of Gowana Middle School and then moved into his current post as lead principal.
"I’m the one who puts it all together," he said of his job as lead principal, which he enjoys.

However, a new reorganizational plan will eliminate the position, he said, and he didn’t want to bump his colleagues.
"It was a soul-searching moment for me," he said. "I wanted a position with a school district doing some great work."
He described Guilderland as being "high-powered, with a supportive community and excellent staff doing innovative things."
Piccirillo went on, "I thought I wouldn’t get the position being a middle-school person going into a high-school arena. I just laid out, ‘This is me.’"
He concluded "It’s a great match. What Guilderland is looking for is what I do well — connect things together, using all the stakeholders, creating a vision for their high school. He paused for just a moment and then re-phrased — "No, our high school."

"True vision"

Superintendent Gregory Aidala says it’s a good match, too.
"Mike Piccirillo has excellent experience as an administrator," he said. "He knows how to involve people in the process of running a school."
He said of Piccirillo’s work at Shenendehowa, "He’s got true vision. He was able to mobilize people in terms of a true team effort."

Twenty-four people applied for the Guilderland job, Aidala said, and six were considered in first-round interviews. The field was narrowed to two finalists and the committee making the selection reached consensus on Piccirillo, Aidala said.

Piccirillo will start work at Guilderland shortly after Thanksgiving, Aidala said.

He will work at first with interim principal Frank Tedesco, a retired administrator who spent three decades in education. Tedesco filled in at Guilderland High School after Ismael Villafane announced he was leaving in June. Villafane, who had been principal at Guilderland for two years, returned to Texas, where he had spent decades as an educator.

Villafane followed John Whipple, who was principal at Guilderland for 14 years.
"He’s upbeat and very excited about coming to Guilderland," Aidala concluded of Piccirillo, "and we’re excited to have him."