Dini helps principal manage school

Beyond the multitude of concrete steps to the school office, through the thick glass doors and a few steps to the right, sits principal’s secretary Sue Dini. She offers welcoming smiles to bleary-eyed students passing by. 

Dini’s desk is barely visible under mountains of documents: mail, administrative paperwork and pale yellow folders bulging with records and reports. 

As the administrative assistant to two principals in the past seven years, Dini helps manage school budgets, teachers’ grants and appointments for the school’s main leader. She also makes sure that teachers stay within their department budgets, manages substitute teachers and occasionally helps out in the Guidance Department. 

Dini prepares the folders for the substitute teachers, holds attendance sheets for them and makes sure that they come to class on time. In addition, Dini completes all the attendance forms and lists of students to send to the district office.

Lastly, Dini is in charge of the shadow program, in which students at the school are “shadowed” by prospective students. She matches up potential students with current students based on common interests. 

Dini said she thoroughly enjoys working with administrators and students alike but does not find any one aspect of her job to be particularly difficult.

“Challenges?” Dini said. “I don’t really have a challenge. Is that bad?”

Dini said she enjoys the different aspects of her job: she acts both as the “meet-and-greet” person in the office and as the secretary for the principal. 

“I like my job,” Dini said. “I like working for [principal] Robinson. He is very easy-going and has a really nice way with people.” 

While Dini enjoys working with her colleagues, her favorite part of her job is interacting with students. She finds that students at the school are respectful, polite and hardworking. 

“The kids are very involved in the activities they do. I think that has stayed the same over the seven years,” Dini said. “There has just been a steady flow of people who really care and who work hard for the school.”